Category Archives: Parenthood

Family, Nature, Parenthood, Walking the Dog

Real Snow. Enough Now.

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Today we have a snow day with real snow, and lots of it.  The schools here in northern Virginia used up all their snow days back in January.  Yet there’s been very little actual snow.  Certainly we’ve had our fill of frigid temperatures and diverse forms of icy accumulation.  But as for the pretty fluffy white stuff, not so much.

Until this morning, when we woke up to over a foot of the real thing.  It’s more snow than we’ve seen here in four years, when we were treated to back-to-back blizzards, pre- and post-Christmas, that paralyzed the area.  Last night’s snow was enough to shut down all runways at Reagan National and Dulles Airports, enough for the government to call a State of Emergency, enough even for my husband’s office to close.  This gave him the chance, at long last, to fire up his essentially unused snow blower, the one he bought in 2010, just after those last big storms.

The street was a smooth, untouched, snow-covered ribbon this morning when Kiko and I headed out for our walk.  We were grateful to be able to follow the parallel impressions left by a car sometime during the night.  In the tire tracks, the snow didn’t flood up and over my boots, or envelop Kiko’s entire body.  Where the snow was completely untouched, my little dog was forced to bound through it with a sort of swimming motion.  He seems to thrill at that first plunge, but his exhilaration quickly dissipates.  Following his exertions, he slept for hours on the playroom sofa.  All day long I’ve been tempted to join him.  Wouldn’t it be nice if we all could be so lucky?

My daughter, of course, was delighted by the snow, and by yet another snow day.  As for Kiko and me, we’re ready for spring.

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My daughter, at home in her element.

Family, Parenthood

Early-Morning Irritability

I try not to use my blog to rant about life’s trivial annoyances. But today I’ll risk sounding like a pouty child. This morning, a series of minor nuisances really ticked me off.

It began around 6:20, when I applied myself, with much concentration, to the vexing mystery of the moment—how to get the little rubber ring to stay put on the lid of my daughter’s new thermos. I persisted, but had no success. The bell of the toaster oven dinged. Because I had devoted too much pointless effort to the thermos, the mini-bagels I had been toasting for D’s breakfast were burned beyond rehabilitation.

It was at this inopportune moment that my husband wandered blithely into the kitchen. He remarked, in all innocence, that he couldn’t understand why D, who is in the process of choosing the classes she will take next year in high school (high school!), needs to continue studying English. She can read. She’s a good writer. What more does she need to know about English?

That comment, following so quickly on the heels of my thermos and bagel difficulties, was the last straw. My poor fragile camel’s back cracked sharply in half. Some say, I responded, through slightly clenched teeth, that there is value in literature. While reading good books is unlikely to lead to a well-paid career . . .no . . . it’s likely to ensure the absence of a well-paid career, it offers some help in coping with life’s disappointments. I stopped there. I did not add this further petulant bitterness: that reading offers the possibility of occasionally eking out some small measure of joy in a world rife with uncooperative thermos rings, annoying toaster ovens and clueless husbands whose idea of enlightening reading is an online windsurfing forum. H wisely kept quiet until he left for work.

And then Kiko and I went out for our walk. Another lovely light snow had fallen. I expected that the walk would lighten my mood. But no. Paved surfaces were far more slippery than I had expected, and Kiko insisted on attempting a break-neck pace, determined to run, if not in the road, then as close to it as possible, where the cars were hurtling by us more aggressively than usual. The salt from the road frequently stung his paws, prompting him to limp flamboyantly, one foot in the air, yet without lessening his speed. I had to repeatedly kneel down to brush the snow from his paw pads. An icy, gusty wind whipped the snow into my eyes, and the blue glare of the sun on the white ground was blinding. My ears were wet and freezing under my scarf, while my hands were too hot in my mittens. I was reminded vividly of why I find skiing so unpleasant. Our morning outing was an ordeal to be suffered through.

On a happier note, it sure is good to be back home.  Alone, except for my silent dog, now sleeping peacefully in another room.

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H telephoned later, warning me about the icy roads and clearly trying to appease my irrational meanness.  I’m feeling better now.  As Gilda Radner’s Roseanne Roseannadanna used to say:  Never mind.

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It was a beautiful morning to be annoyed.

Art and Architecture, Family, Parenthood, Travel

A San Francisco Treat

For over twenty years now, my husband had been saying, “Sometime we need to go out to California.”  As a near-penniless grad student, he had given a talk at a conference in Monterey.  He had flown to San Francisco, where he managed to find an affordable motel (read seedy, verging on squalid) for the two days before his university per diem kicked in.  He became smitten with the city and the dramatic rocky west coast.  He’s been wanting to return ever since.  Yet the time was never quite right, and I wasn’t particularly enthusiastic.  Despite glowing reviews from him and several native and transplanted California friends, my stubborn, wrong-headed vision of the state persisted: thousands of miles of disaster-prone L.A. sprawl and superficiality.  My bias was no doubt influenced by my mother’s attitude.  In her opinion, California (unlike Europe, somehow), was simply too far away to merit serious consideration.  While I was growing up, she harbored a vague dread that one day, school, a job, or a boy would lure me to the opposite end of the country.  Now that my daughter is in high school, I can even more fully appreciate this concern.
One thing led to another, though, and we reached a family decision to head to the bay area this past winter break.  And I have to admit, I should have paid attention earlier to all those fans of northern California.   I understand now.  It’s every bit as good as they say. Maybe even a little bit better, because the weather was so gorgeous. We had prepared for fog, drizzle, gray skies and a damp chill in the air. Instead, we found sunshine, bright blue skies and afternoon temperatures in the mid-60s. With its palm trees, live oaks, cypresses, huge eucalyptus trees and lush flowers, the city has a tropical feel that, for me, at least, was completely unexpected.  It was a welcome break from the icy Virginia December we had left behind.

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The 19th-century Italianate tower of the Ferry Building sits sentinel on the beautifully reconfigured Embarcadero, (former site of the 1960s-era Embarcadero Freeway that collapsed during the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake.)
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A row of Victorian homes, delicately decorated and painted.
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Portico of the James C. Flood mansion in Nob Hill.  Built in 1886,
it’s one of few buildings to survive the 1906 earthquake and fire.

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A peaceful view along the waterfront, somewhere between
Fisherman’s Wharf & Ghirardelli Square.

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The Marina, with the Golden Gate Bridge in the background.
Nearby is Crissy Field, a must-see spot for my husband.  It’s where windsurfers gather when weather permits.
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On my list of sights was the monumental Palace of Fine Arts,
designed by Bernard Maybeck for the Panama-Pacific Exhibition in 1915.  It was rebuilt of permanent materials in the 1960s.
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A close-up view of the Palace of Fine Arts.

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A towering Victorian mansion on Alamo Square.

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Perhaps the most familiar row of Victorians in San Francisco, the
six “Painted Ladies” on Steiner Street across from Alamo Square.
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The less familiar, but just as beautifully painted sisters in the lower block of Steiner Street.
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Hibiscus adorns the entry of an Alamo Square home.
I loved the city’s tropical plantings.
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With Muni passes, we sampled the city’s many forms of public transportation. Vintage streetcars, like this one on Market Street, are better enjoyed from the outside, as they spend most of their time stopped. Best to catch a bus if you’re in a hurry.

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Cable cars offer a lively ride.  We learned to avoid the long tourist lines and hop on in the middle of the intersection. Our daughter was thrilled when she was assigned an outside perch as we sailed down one of the city’s steep, signature hills.

Family, Holiday, Parenthood

More Exercises in Extreme Gift Wrapping

Two years ago, I wrote about my husband’s flair for imaginative gift-wrapping.  (See Exercises in Extreme Gift Wrapping, December 2011.) H was born into a family of happy wrappers.  One of the pillars of their holiday tradition is the inventive wrapping of every single gift, no matter how large or small, no matter how humble.  A bracelet might be hidden in a box sized for an appliance.  If an object has a recognizable shape, it’s typically disguised in another box.  Multiple containers are frequently employed.  The family name is undoubtedly enshrined in a place of prominence in the gift-wrap hall of fame. 
My family’s approach to gift wrapping, on the other hand, may be described as practical and decorative.  Certainly, compared to H’s family, we are wrapping minimalists.  But then most of the world would be, as well.  I was unprepared for the sea of multi-colored gifts that flooded the living room on our first Christmas together at H’s parents’ house.

 

My husband has continued the tradition in his own way.  He no longer feels the need to wrap up a pair of socks in a refrigerator box simply to fill out the gift-scape under the tree.  His approach emphasizes visual impact and imaginative packaging.  In 2011, he enclosed three gifts for our daughter in large cylindrical tubes intended for setting concrete.  Last Christmas and this year, he followed up with gifts of strikingly unusual shape.   

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On the morning of Christmas Eve 2012, a modest triangular package appeared under the tree.  The tag read, “To D, from Mama and Daddy.”  Our daughter was thrilled to see that Daddy had been busy again down in the basement, working on a new packaging scheme.  She suspected that the pyramid would be only the first of a series of mysterious packages.  She was right, of course.

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On Christmas morning, the silver pyramid had become one of the arms of a five-pointed star, the center of which was a pentagon-shaped box.  Each point contained a small gift, while the pentagon encased a more substantial present.  Really, though, the items inside the boxes were almost incidental.  The real gifts here were the surprise factor, followed by the intricate process of unwrapping, a sustained big reveal.

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Above, our daughter sits among the unwrapped elements, the hinged plywood boxes my husband carefully constructed to form the star.  His engineering training and math skills equipped him for the endeavor. 

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This year, a slender, four-foot tall pyramid turned up by the tree a few days before Christmas.  The package prompted my daughter to respond in kind with a last-minute present we had for H.  The gift was in a long, narrow box.  She disguised the shape by adding a gable-like projection at the top.  No doubt about it, she’s her father’s daughter.  Although she claims it was unintended, she was nevertheless proud that her creation turned out to be just slightly taller than H’s pyramid.

On Christmas Eve, I awakened to the startling sound of drilling coming from under the bed.  I assumed H was busy working his holiday magic.  Once downstairs, I found an oversized blue Christmas orb suspended from the ceiling.  On Christmas morning, the final element of the mobile appeared: a silver-wrapped ring, about the size of a pool life-saver.

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The uniquely shaped items, as always, were saved for last.  The pyramid was another neatly hinged plywood box, large enough for D to sit inside.  The silver ring turned out to be a section of pool noodle, taped together, with a tiny gift wedged inside.  The blue Christmas ball was purely decorative.  H was pleased with D’s clever and meticulous wrapping of his gift.  He’s delighted to know that in his daughter’s hands, the family tradition of extreme gift-wrapping has a sure future. 

Family, Parenthood

Time Warp (Another Little Girl in Red)

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I was born to a family of savers and recyclers. Among the many boxes in my parents’ attic are several that contain my mother’s old sewing patterns, clearly marked and dated, from the 1960s on.  When Mama decided that my daughter needed her own Red Riding Hood robe like the one I had worn in the Christmas photo from 1965, she used the same pattern.  D loved her version and wore it for years.  Here she is at age three in 2002:  another little blonde girl in red, happy to be visiting her grandparents.

Family, Holiday, Parenthood

More Thoughts on Old-Time Trees and Trappings

As I think more about the photos of our first, unfortunate Georgia tree (see previous post), I understand better why it looked the way it did.  When my parents were growing up in small Kentucky towns, Christmas trees weren’t big business.  They were barely any business.  Getting a tree was an exclusively do-it-yourself endeavor.  Choices were limited, and the ideal of the perfect, cone-shaped tree didn’t exist, at least not in those rural areas. Maybe the fashionable Seelbach Hotel in Louisville decorated a neat, Tannenbaum-style fir, but then again, maybe not.  My mother remembers her father and brothers going out in the fields on their land in central Kentucky and bringing back a tree they’d cut themselves.  Daddy, from an Ohio river town in the northeast part of the state, recalls going with his dad farther up into the holler and chopping down a tree.  They got what was available, what they could cut, what they could haul.   Throughout Kentucky, in those years, the typical Christmas tree was a cedar.  Bushy and lacking much definable shape, their branches were fine, thin and fragrant.

 

It was only after they were married that my parents exchanged money for a Christmas tree.  As my mother remembers, they bought the first tree for their new house in Lexington from an old man who sold cedars he cut himself.   The photo below dates from 1964 and shows a full but rather ungainly cedar that was the standard of my early childhood.

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On Christmas morning in our house in Lexington, my hair still in rag-tied curls, I’m happily discovering Santa’s gifts of a “Debbie Eve” baby doll and a cradle.  We would head to my grandparents’ later in the day, for Christmas dinner.

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Christmas Eve, 1965, with Mama in the living room of my grandparents’ house.  Our smiles appear to be heartfelt.  We were right where we wanted to be.

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Christmas morning, 1965, at my grandparents’ house.
I’m in the new red corduroy housecoat Mama made me, holding my new doll Amy.  In my cloudy half-memories, this was a perfect Christmas day.  

Family, Holiday, Parenthood

Oh…Eww…Christmas Tree!

We had planned to get our Christmas tree last Sunday after church.  (We put up several artificial trees in early December, but wait until mid-month on the real tree.) At breakfast that morning, our daughter recounted the dream she’d been having upon waking: H and I had decided to surprise her by going out for the tree while she slept.  By the time she came downstairs, we had it set up and decorated.  It was not a good-looking tree.  D tried to hide her disappointment in not being included in the tree outing, in our choice of an unfortunate tree, in its awkward placement, and in our bad decorating.  When she reached out to touch it, the trunk collapsed in on itself like a patio umbrella stand.  It had been tall and ugly; now it was short and ugly.  Once fully awake, she was greatly relieved to find no tree at all in the living room.

 
Her dream reminded me of some old photos from my childhood featuring particularly unsightly Christmas trees.  D had seen them before, but had forgotten, so the impact was strong.

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These photos have mystified me for years.  They were taken in our first house in Atlanta, a little rental ranch in the Montreal Woods section of Tucker.  When I think back on the Christmases of my childhood and teen years, I set them in the home we bought two years later, in the Morningside area.  As I remember, it was graced annually with a nicely shaped, well-decorated tree, usually a Frazier fir.   Why, then, were these trees, from the more distant past, so very ugly?

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Upon recent re-examination of the photos, I assumed they showed two different, but equally unattractive trees, from consecutive years.  (Dates on our family photos are often missing or erroneous.) The first captures a hulking, bushy tree.  I look up at it with awed trepidation.  In the second, I sit forlornly beside a presence that resembles a raggedy, monstrous figure, small-waisted and large-hipped.  The broad expanse of blank white wall adds a further degree of bleakness.

Then I noticed that in another picture of the monster tree, I’m wearing the same black dress and blue barrettes as in the bushy-tree photo.  Could we really have had two such sad-looking trees in the same year?  Was the first so terrible that we took it down and swapped it for another, late in the season, when the pickings were even slimmer?  Maybe the first one kept falling over?  (I have vague memories of toppling trees on rickety stands.)  Or maybe the needles dried out within a few days?  I phoned my parents to see if they could offer any clarification.   They didn’t think we ever had two trees in a single year.  They did remember that we had some less than stellar trees in the Tucker years.

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It had to be the same tree, one with the added distinction of looking bad in various ways depending upon the angle from which it was viewed.  The same ornaments appeared in similar spots; the same aluminum-foil tinsel was draped haphazardly over long-needled branches.  In the photo above, Mama and I seem to be trying to put on a good show, to pretend gamely that we’re perfectly content in the presence of this strange tree.  Here we are, happy and well-dressed, holding these gifts expectantly.  We could be a family on a Christmas card.

Mama’s memory of that tree was as hazy as mine, but other details of that season she recalled vividly.  Ever since she and my father had married, they had spent Christmas with her family in central Kentucky.  My birth hadn’t changed this; Christmas would find us in the farmhouse with my grandparents, surrounded by aunts and uncles.  But that year, after our move to Georgia, we weren’t traveling.  We could have our own merry Christmas, just the three of us. We would.  We’d do it.

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We tried.  In the photo above, we continue with the Christmas card images.  Mama reads ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas, and I look giddy and act like I’ve never heard it before.  We’re both wearing new pink flannel PJs.  Our long hair is neatly brushed.  Beneath our fake smiles, you can see us grimly willing those visions of sugarplums to dance, dance, dance.
It didn’t work out. There were no sugarplums.  We missed our family.  We missed the big old house.  We missed our tradition.  It just didn’t seem like Christmas.  As a young child, I tended to carry an outsized burden of multiple anxieties, for no reason that could be explained.  That Christmas Eve, I was sad and inconsolable.  I couldn’t stop crying.  I was exhausted, but I couldn’t sleep.  Mama, loving and patient, sat with me, late into the night, holding my hand and offering assurance.  She had grown accustomed to this process, but usually it wasn’t quite so painful or long-lasting.

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Early the next morning, we packed up the gifts, the wrapped ones and those from Santa, bundled ourselves into the enormous blue Dodge station wagon, and headed to Kentucky.  The time would come, soon enough, for starting a new tradition.  That year, 1966, was simply not the time.

Community, Family, Friendship, Memorials, Parenthood

Goodbye to the King: Elvis the Cat, 1995 – 2013

Elvis the Cat was my friend Doug’s beloved companion.  Doug passed away almost two years ago, after a long, hard-fought battle with the rare disease syringomyelia.  (See Remembering Doug, February 2012.) During Doug’s last years, when his illness had deprived him of nearly all mobility, Elvis must have been an especially great comfort.  After Doug died, Elvis was there to offer love and support for Doug’s wife.  Now Elvis has gone on to his eternal reward.  He was eighteen years old.  Like Doug, he was a unique character.  Like Doug, he will be greatly missed.

 

During visits to my parents in Atlanta, my daughter and I enjoyed dropping in to talk with Doug, who never failed to entertain; his love of life remained robust no matter his level of discomfort.  If we lingered a while, we would usually be graced by Elvis’s regal presence.  He was reserved around all but immediate family, not one to dole out affection indiscriminately.  Elvis was especially wary of children.  As Doug advised D when she was a preschooler, Elvis didn’t appreciate loud voices and sudden movements.  She took this advice to heart, and it often paid off.  Elvis would first peer in from the hall, sizing us up with his cool yellow cat eyes.  Sometimes he decided we weren’t worth his time.  With a flip of his tail, he’d disappear.  Other times he gave us the OK and  approached tentatively, gracefully, on tip-toe.  D was delighted when he decided to settle in beside her, allowing her to stroke his abundantly fluffy black fur and hear his deep, growly purr.

Doug’s wife told my mother that although the house feels oddly empty, now that Elvis is no longer there, she has much to be thankful for.  She is grateful that Elvis was with Doug until the end, and that he stayed a while afterwards to offer solace as she began the process of adjusting to life without her husband.  Anyone lucky enough to be helped through a difficult time by the precious comfort of a pet must know the feeling.

Rest in peace, dear Elvis.  It was our good fortune to know you.

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Elvis, ignoring a cat toy, 2013.

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And beautifying the Christmas tree, 2012.

Community, Family, Parenthood

Welcome Home, Daughter!

My daughter is back. Once again,  I see her during daylight hours.  Briefly, of course.  She’s a teenager; just because she’s home doesn’t mean she’s going to be spending time with me.She hasn’t been far away.  She’s simply been at school.  In September, she auditioned for her first high school play, Romeo and Juliet.  She made it into the ensemble.  There were many, many rehearsals, which began immediately after school and lasted longer and longer, as opening night neared. We’ve been attending plays and musicals at the high school for years. Every production has been remarkable, and this was no different. I never fail to be amazed at the courage, talent and razor-sharp memories of these young actors.  It was a thrill to see our own daughter among the citizens of Verona who mingled in the square, gasped at the swordfights, danced at the Capulet ball, mourned the deaths of Mercutio, Tybalt, Romeo, and finally, sweet Juliet.  Perhaps, in years to come, as D pays her dues and builds up experience, she’ll earn an actual, named role.

 

The last weeks of the play and its preparation gave me a taste of what I may expect when D goes away to college.   It sounds callous and un-motherly, but I hadn’t really expected to miss my daughter.  After all, things have changed since she was in elementary school, when I’d meet her at the bus stop and she’d be truly happy, even excited, to see me.  In the afternoons, we’d work on some craft project, or take a bike ride, or play monkey-in-the-middle with Kiko and a tennis ball.  She’d talk freely about her day.  She’d do her homework at the kitchen table while I prepared dinner and was on hand to help if she ran into difficulties.  Back then, I usually knew the answers.  These days, I’ve learned to give her space and time to decompress.  I try not to come on too strong with expectant inquiries.  Don’t hover, I remind myself.  Don’t be too needy.  Remember that my attempts at humor are not appreciated as they once were.   Avert my eyes as her phone lights up every few seconds with an incoming text.  Refrain from commenting on the identity of the texter, should I happen to see.

With D gone for such long stretches, there would be less time for negotiating this tricky obstacle course, of showing adequate, but not excessive concern.  Less time to demonstrate that I’m neither prying nor inattentive.  Certainly, I thought, I’d be more efficient.  I would do more writing.  Maybe I’d finish the paintings of tree trunks and tangled vines that I began in the summer.  I’d be more thorough at cleaning the house.  Maybe even arrange to have lunch with a friend or two.

But I wasn’t particularly productive or focused.  I found my daughter’s absence more unsettling than I had anticipated.  Especially in the late, dark afternoons, it was odd to realize that she wasn’t hiding out in another room, watching How I Met Your Mother on her phone instead of buckling down to her homework.  I was uninspired.  No in-depth blog topic beckoned me.  I couldn’t muster much enthusiasm for painting.  I did catch up on laundry, but that’s about all.

Kiko was restless.  He quite obviously missed his sister.  Nearly every time I began to concentrate at my desk, I’d feel him pawing impatiently at my leg, nipping at my knee, or hear him preparing to chew on a stack of papers.  He’d bring in a rawhide and drop it at my feet.  When I’d toss it, he’d look at me questioningly.  Is this all there is?  Is it just you and me now, and this singularly unsatisfying rawhide? I’d search out his much-loved Foxy, squeak it, throw it, shake it.  Surely Foxy would bring him out of his doldrums.  Typically, though, it did not.  He’d stand there, unbudging, staring at me.

So we’d go somewhere.  We’d walk, or I’d think up an errand, one on which Kiko could accompany me.  From there, we’d walk in a less familiar area, one that would hold his attention fully with its many compelling smells.  It seemed that the colder, windier and generally more miserable the day, the more time we’d spend wandering.  But when we returned, Kiko could settle down for a while.  I’d find myself less at loose ends.  There was no doubt about it.  We both missed our girl.

Now we’re adjusting to home life together again.  Kiko was instantly reacclimated.  Now that he knows he can expect D home in the afternoons, he’s content to spend his days sleeping on the playroom sofa.  It’s been less of a snap for me.  I’d gotten out of practice, had forgotten some of the finer points of my balancing act as the mother of a teenager.  But I’m getting back into the swing.  Most of the time, and always when it’s cold and dark, I’m glad that my daughter is back under our roof.  I’m trying not to get too accustomed to her being here, because before long, another activity is bound to take her away again.  Maybe next time I’ll be better prepared for her absence.  But I doubt it.

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After a performance of Romeo & Juliet, D got a warm hug from a friend.  Often, when I glance at this dear little girl, with her pale blonde hair and bangs, I think, for an instant, that I’m seeing my own daughter, a child again.

Family, Holiday, Parenthood

Friendly Ghosts of Halloweens Past

My daughter is an ardent devotee of Halloween.  Evidently that first freezing trip to the pumpkin patch at ten months didn’t turn her against the holiday or its decorative trappings.  (See Looking Back on our Little Pumpkin, October 2012.)  During her preschool and elementary school years, her Halloween costume got plenty of mileage.  Around the start of summer, she began the costume discussion:  What would she be this year?  Soon the Halloween catalogues, sent to us by my mother, would come pouring in.  Once Mama and I had put the finishing touches on the outfit, usually in early October, she was in it.  As so many children do, she wore it repeatedly throughout the entire Halloween season, to parties and on many other occasions. These kids must know that dressing as a witch or black cat alleviates the tedium of mundane outings such as grocery shopping and dental visits.

After Halloweens One and Two as a Jack-o’- Lantern, our daughter followed up with Black Cat, Witch, Gypsy and Ghost Bride.  This year, she will be dressing as Daisy from The Great Gatsby, and hitting the neighborhood with a couple of friends, who, like her, plan to persist in trick-or-treating as long as they can.

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2002:  Everybody’s Crazy ’bout a Sharp-Dressed Cat

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2003: Good Witch-in-Training


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2004:  Gypsy Girl


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2005:  Ghost Bride