From the Notebook

Last weekend the teenage girls that attend my church had a full agenda from Friday after school to a sunrise(ish) service on Sunday. My current calling, or job at church, is to work with these girlies, so I helped coordinate, and then attended all the activities. It was an opportunity to bond as a group (sometimes, time's benefits come as much from quantity as quality) while looking at things in the city a bit differently. They had a presentation from a fashion expert, watched An Affair to Remember, participated in a service project, ate breakfast at Norma's, had a private tour from a brilliant docent at the Met, attended a concert at Juilliard, learned about travel photography, consumed crepes, walked part of the Brooklyn Bridge and got to have dinner in a design studio in SoHo while learning about the nuances of design. Whew. My kids were well taken care of while I was out and about taking care of others' kids, but they felt that by attending the Met without them I had committed parentery (I just made that up -- instead of adultery... instead of an adult being unfaithful... a parent being unfaithful... oh, just bag it...). So with brand-spankin' new sketchbooks we headed over to the Met today so I could tell them "exactly" what the docent told me... 

Our theme of the weekend was: "What is Beauty" (Beauty is Service, Beauty is Art, etc...), so the docent very obligingly used our theme as the structure of her presentation. 

On our way to the elevators we stopped by a Kongo Power figure (I forgot to take a picture, but here's the link) -- a squat wooden fellow with pieces of metal sticking out of him. Our docent asked if he was a good representation of "beauty." Of course it was a trick question. She explained his purpose in a society: he was revered because of his ability to keep order. When somebody had done something wrong, he/she would go before this figure and make a pledge, or a promise, to not do that action again and then seal the pledge by driving in a piece of metal. This figure's job was to stand as a reminder for people to keep the peace -- he improved people's lives. The docent posited that because the figure was so admired he could be defined as beautiful.

Upstairs we started with Bougureau's work completed in 1873 -- the perfect example of academic art. Flawless and created with invisible brushstrokes, the academic artists used light and color to direct the eye of the viewer. With academic art there was usually a character-driven moral (in this case: don't spy on wood nymphs bathing, or they might find you out -- you filthy satyr -- and try to drag you into the water where you will drown because of your goat legs).  

And then came the Impressionists. She took us to what she said was one of the Met's treasures: Monet's La Guenouillere. The Impressionists sought to capture, and in so doing ennoble, real life. Here was a scene like one we have all seen, with no one character standing out, but yet all characters being important in that strangers/those we share space with, are a part of our reality. Further: nature. Nature played a large role in the Impressionist movement. Huge, deep brushstrokes to capture the refraction and reflection of light and movement; not an idealization of water, but the actual feeling of water.  This brought on a movement, and changed the way people thought about not only art, but beauty.

Degas. Beyond the sculpture are the paintings of ballerinas that Degas is so well known for. His ballerinas were not porcelain-perfect, but rather real gals hitching up their wrinkly tights. He captured them, not as ideals, but as real working people who were often damaged, or tired (and according to a movie I saw about Degas, he contributed to the working gals being damaged and tired). Cad or not, he was an artist that championed the beauty to be seen in the real details (said a different way: the turning away from the thought that beauty was something created, rather than captured). Like Uncle Walt (Whitman), he found sweat and the modern world art-worthy. (Note: his ability to carry the theme of humanity being reflected in details, and vise-versa, was brilliant -- In Dancers Practicing at the Barre you can see how the dancer on the right has the same lines as the watering can (which would have been there to keep down the dirt and dust).)

We stopped by to look at Van Gogh's Wheat Field With Cypresses and learned that cypresses represented eternal life and were often planted around cemeteries. A detail that Van Gogh would obviously have known, as he was obsessed with cypresses. In this picture he also painted wheat fields, which was symbolic of life with its many cycles/seasons, and poppies -- symbolic of the resurrection. Our docent pointed out the wheat being pushed by the wind to the right, and the olive trees being pushed to the left... and the cypresses standing tall and straight. The brush strokes, true to Van Gogh's style, are thick and deep. She said that the painting had a sculptural quality -- something that cannot be reproduced -- thus requiring trips to the museum to see the actual work in order to get a true sense of the movement and energy. Capturing life and vitality. And beauty. 

By way of conclusion, our docent stopped us by a movie playing on a large screen. James Nares took thousands of photos of the streets of NYC and created an hour long movie of kids running, and people looking grumpy (or thuggish, or vacant, or amused, or ethereal), and signs, and piles, and garbage cans. The music, as well as the soothing rhythm of the stills sliding along as a video are mesmerizing. Our guide said that she was ending the tour with this exhibit because it was a contemporary take on the Impressionist ideal: art is about capturing and celebrating the small details of real life, as well as the eternal qualities of the natural world. 

Thanks to my notes, I was able to give my kids a fairly comparable tour. They were satisfied, we got some soup and rolls at the cafeteria in the American Wing, did a couple of sketches, and then had to leave in order to make it to their last science class. 

While the kids liked the science class, we will not miss the forever-long weekly schlep to the location. As if the subway trip wasn't long enough, in order to gain sunlight again we had to go up what we called "the escalator of despair." While I know that London's tube has some crazy long/steep escalators, for NYC this one was pretty despairing. 

We became acquainted with Washington Heights, an opportunity that we probably would not have had otherwise. And the kids really liked the final activity of the class today -- dissecting owl pellets. We now how two random baggies of rodent bones hanging around the apartment. The small details of life.

Balzac asked: "What is art?" He answered: "Nature concentrated." 

Finally. There Is a Post With Good Writing.

We were standing in that Swedish farmstead yard when the thought came to me that we needed to read My Antonia this April. I recorded it here, and having just searched for it, so as to link it, I sit here stunned. Six months ago. April was on the other side of the world then, and now there's just one day left of it. 

I tried to get the kids excited about it, I really did. The problem was the competition. I was trying to read it simultaneously with The Dad's reading of Swallows and Amazons (in anticipation of our upcoming trip to the Lake District). They were smitten by The Dad's choice (understandably -- Ransome could not have written a more charming book), and so became increasingly icy with me every time I suggested a break in order to read some of Cather's novel. Finally, we hit on a compromise -- I would silently read of Jim Burden's consuming of, and longing for, his Bohemian girl (and Cather's similar intimacy with Nebraska), and when I came to a passage that they might like, they would graciously allow me to read out loud.  

It only kind of worked. Once I became submerged into the world of grass the color of wine, and an independent girl tripping along in striped tights, and the intoxication of living ... well, I kind of forgot to think about what smaller parts could exist and mean something away from the whole. 

What I did read to them:

"All the years that have passed have not dimmed my memory of that first glorious autumn. The new country lay open before me: there were no fences in those days, and I could choose my own way over the grass uplands, trusting the pony to get me home again. Sometimes I followed the sunflower-bordered roads. Fuchs told me that the sunflowers were introduced into that country by the Mormons; that at the time of the persecution, when they left Missouri and struck out into the wilderness to find a place where they could worship God in their own way, the members of the first exploring party, crossing the plains to Utah, scattered sunflower seed as they went. The next summer, when the long trains of wagons came through with all the women and children they had the sunflower trail to follow. I believe that botanists do not confirm Fuchs's story, but insist that the sunflower was native to those plains. Nevertheless, that legend has stuck in my mind, and sunflower-bordered roads always seem to me the roads to freedom."

"The rabbits were unusually spry that afternoon. They kept starting up all about us, and dashing off down the draw as if they were playing a game of some kind. But the little buzzing things that lived in the grass were all dead -- all but one. While we were lying there against the warm bank, a little insect of the palest, frailest green hopped painfully out of the buffalo grass and tried to leap into a bunch of bluestem. He missed it, fell back, and sat with his head sunk between his long legs, his antennae quivering, as if he were waiting for something to come and finish him. Tony  made a warm nest for him in her hands; talked to him gaily and indulgently in Bohemian. Presently he began to sing for us -- a thin, rusty little chirp... When the bank on the other side of the draw began to throw a narrow shelf of shadow, we knew we ought to be starting homeward; the chill came on quickly when the sun got low, and Antonia's dress was thin. What were we to do with the frail little creature we had lured back to life by false pretenses? I offered my pockets, but Tony shook her head and carefully put the green insect in her hair, tying her big handkerchief down loosely over her curls."

"When spring came, after a hard winter, one could not get enough of the nimble air. Every morning I wakened with a fresh consciousness that winter was over. There were none of the signs of spring for which I used to watch in Virginia, no budding woods or blooming gardens. There was only -- spring itself; the throb of it, the light restlessness, the vital essence of it everywhere: in the sky, in the swift clouds, in the pale sunshine, and in the warm, high wind -- rising suddenly, sinking suddenly, impulsive and playful like a big puppy that pawed you and then lay down to be petted." [OH! The English teacher in me thrills at that sentence -- the craft mirrors the content!  A sentence that uses punctuation to sustain itself, so it can continue to rush forward, and ebb and flow without being stymied... I am clasping my hands to my heart.]

"There was a basic harmony between Antonia and her mistress. They had strong, independent natures, both of them. They knew what they liked, and were not always trying to imitate other people. They loved children and animals and music, and rough play and digging in the earth. They liked to prepare rich, hearty food and to see people eat it; to make up soft white beds and to see youngsters asleep in them. They ridiculed conceited people and were quick to help unfortunate ones. Deep down in each of them there was a kind of hearty joviality, a relish of life, not over-delicate, but very invigorating."

The funny thing is that I didn't even share with them THE part of the book that makes it a necessity to read in April (book three, section three -- for those of you wondering).  And I've decided to be okay with that. The scheme has been about compromise and gaining wisdom -- realizing that very few things happen, or are learned, all at once and for keeps. Rather, it is about layering. A layer has been established. Someday they will read the book in its entirety and another layer will be added. Then someday he/she will go to a play with the right person and walk out in the rain on an April night and there will be lilacs -- another layer. 

For now I will content myself with a memory I have of one of my favorite literature professors. She brought up a book and with snapping eyes said: I am jealous of those of you who get to read it for the first time. 

We didn't read My Antonia as a family, but I get to be jealous of my kids, for there's still that first time for them... for the book, for other books, for lilacs in the rain in April... 

Wrapping Up, Checking Off, Creeping Out, and Making a Toast

We are starting the season of "wrapping up." As mentioned earlier in the week, we've wrapped up the writing workshops, today The Boy finished his first knitting project,

and this afternoon The Girl concluded her pottery session. Since we knew that it would be the last time we would be visiting that neighborhood for a while we made an afternoon of it. The Girl wanted to get some time in at Bankstreet Bookstore, so we went up early and hung out before pottery. Since our bookstore visit had been fulfilled, after we dropped off The Girl, The Boy and I decided to use our time wandering the cathedral and grounds of St. John the Divine. St. John and we are no strangers to each other, so initially it started out as an exercise in checking-off all of our regular stops:

Wandering the beautiful grounds/gardens

Check.

Peacocks.

Check. We didn't find the white one, but we saw both blues... One kept getting really ticked off at the pigeons. The pigeons were kind of too stupid to know what all the feathers and twitchings and foot-stamping and chattering sounds meant. They were unflappable, it was like: Eh. One more weird New Yorker. 

Inside: The FDNY memorial for the twelve firefighters killed in a fire on 23rd street in the 60's. We heard tourists once assuming it was for 9/11 (because people do leave trinkets and notes for the hundreds that died that day -- so in a way the public has somewhat altered it/it's purpose). It's strange to look at the memorial and realize that at the time of its conception there was no context for the loss that the FDNY would take on forty years later -- the two towers weren't even built. The Boy has always been intrigued by the memorial, so we pay our respects each time.

We also look up -- to see rainbows and floating color coming from the stained glass, and carvings that surely have fine details that are never seen, but are there because of dedication to God, to a religion, to fine art, to a strong work ethic...

There were some new and unexpected finds. At a simple wooden alter I found the prayers for the unemployed:

And an orchestra was in the main hall practicing; the music swelled and occupied space like something warm and dense. 

And then unexpected encounters that we weren't, collectively, happy with. Until July there is a striking art installation there -- throughout the entire ground floor in various side chapels, and nooks, and crannies. It is poignant and strong and has many lush and deep images and details. That having been said, for those of us who aren't as knowledgable about apartheid and its aftershock, the effect comes across as creepy. I don't dislike creepy, and I was trying to explain to The Boy (and The Sister) that provoking feelings of discomfort, or sadness, or alarm, or anger is how artists can help -- they use the power of emotions for social/idealogical change. BUT, my students weren't buying it. And I actually agreed. While I would have probably really liked the installation in a different venue, I didn't like it in the cathedral. I think I "got" some of the religious/sacrificial/hypocrisy themes, and yet rather than making me feel new, or thinking bigger/deeper, it made me feel disengaged, or like I wanted to exit the darkness of the cathedral that had seemed protective, but now seemed scary. Putting the installation in a structure that is considered by some to be a refuge, or a place of reverence, is a strong move intellectually -- but I think a tenuous one emotionally. Which I'm sure is all part of the artistic vision and intense irony that those who coordinated the exhibit were going for... And yet... 

Two things: 1. The Boy requested that we NOT go back to the cathedral until after July (when the art leaves) -- I fear that his love of the cathedral might have been dampened, and 2. I noticed that things seem a lot less depressing when you have a funny teenager in tow pulling faces and making wise-acre remarks. I seriously love teenagers. Especially the one that lives on our couch. 

After pottery, and after meeting up with The Dad we actually went inside Tom's Restaurant (of Suzanne Vega, Seinfeld, and President Obama fame). We walk past it going from the pottery studio to the book store and The Boy has been enticed by the signs promising 22-ounce milkshakes. We decided that the last class of pottery would be "the night," so for the past couple of weeks whenever we've been around liquid he's been like: "Would you say this is 22 ounces?" This evening, with our milkshakes held high, he led us in a toast: "To [The Girl]!" -- for introducing us to the neighborhood through her pottery...  That part was fun, and the people who own the place seem really nice... but I don't think that we need ever go again. 

But we will hopefully be back to the neighborhood in a couple of months when The Girl starts up pottery again -- she loves it so. And The Boy is going to continue knitting in whatever capacity will fit into our future schedule. Some things you experience once and that's enough (or more than enough); some things -- once introduced -- can always find a space in your life. 

My Uncaged Birds

The public school kids started the math portion of their state tests today. I was sending a million good vibes to all of our little number-2-pencil-yielding friends. I'm glad that all of the thinking about it is about done for the year for them. Usually, it's not an actual event that is so very draining, but all the lead-up. 

We spent a great deal of time outside today. In the morning we picked up where we left off when the weather turned cold, and resumed our running club outside. In the afternoon after completing an errand thirty-five blocks north, we decided to walk our two miles home via the park. We went to some birding areas and chatted with some birders (they always look at my Fellini-inspired eyeliner suspiciously, but once we establish ourselves as genuine bird-enthusiasts they decide that I'm not an other and we get all friendly -- like an animals-do-the-darndest-things TV special when the group of bunnies take in the kangaroo... or not like that at all...).  We saw a handful of palm warblers, and heard the sweetest sounding bird ever... we have yet to identify it. And a lady casting about peanuts showed us a tree that had three baby squirrels running in and out of their nest and playing with each other. It was a really nice day. 

And since it's still April, and we're still talking poetry around here:

From Maya Angelou's "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings": 

The free bird leaps
on the back of the wind
and floats downstream
till the current ends
and dips his wings
in the orange sun rays
and dares to claim the sky.

Not Perfect, But the Best We've Got to Work With

On the bargain table in Barnes & Noble I found a Daily Dose of Knowledge: History for $5.98. I read a study that said that familiarity is key to comprehension. Students that have heard of a subject/have an experience with a topic are more apt to pay attention when it is brought up again, and if they are paying attention they are more apt to appreciate it and authentically learn. Soooo... at dinner I read one of the daily pages and we chat about it, but I don't really care if the moppets actually seem to "get" anything. My goal is just to expose in the hopes that something gets tucked away that might come up and help them authentically appreciate something some day. I wish I was one of those smarties that could just sit down and start a conversation about interesting things, but I'm not. One, my brain is a sieve, so I forget most things (that is one way that this blog has blessed my life -- it's the first time I haven't felt like I've lost my personal history), and two, most of the time my inclination is to be quiet. A characteristic that probably developed by being alone at home a lot as a kid. But I don't like that inclination, and I don't want my kids to develop it. Happy homes and strong relationships seem largely built on words and noise. So, if I need a book to help get the conversation started, and a blog to help me remember that we had a conversation, so be it. Hopefully with these efforts things will come more naturally, and stick more readily with the next generation. 

Day 1 in the book was about the signing of the American Constitution (September 17, 1787). I liked that it reminded the reader that at the time the Constitution was NOT totally embraced -- everybody knew that it wasn't perfect. Like the plague of DC today, so many compromises were made that nobody felt good about it in its entirety. Benjamin Franklin acknowledged that it wasn't perfect, but he said it was "the best" out there. Thirty-nine of the 55 delegates signed. Reading about this reminded me of our cool Constitution/Declaration of Independence lesson we had in the Fall with our friend who has since moved back to London. She told us at the time that she "celebrates" Constitution Day on September 17th. I thought of that after reading our Daily Dose and decided to get my phone to put it on my calendar, thinking that this year we, too, would celebrate. Zipping through the months to get to September made me feel... weird. 

A Different Light

Today was the conclusion of the writing workshop. I've been reflecting on how it all came about. In the Fall, I was asked to teach an essay class for teens at the space where my kids were taking a theatre/movement class. All I was planning on doing during that time was hanging out in the waiting room and reading anyway, so why not? Only a few students signed up, but at the end of it all of them requested another class, and a couple of them asked if I tutored. I hadn't planned on it, but why not? 

The tutoring: one student is a very, very advanced musician, and brilliant academic (she was so sharp that I consistently forgot that she was only 14). Her dad handed me a brutal looking spreadsheet with all of the top boarding schools/prep schools on the East Coast and a couple of top privates in Manhattan -- and their coordinating requirements for admissions. Over the course of several weeks she and I fine-tuned her essays and short-answers, and I wrote some letters of recommendation. She worked her tail off, often revising pieces many, many times. She got in to all of her top choices, even though some of them have a <10% acceptance rate. Once her application packets were complete and our tutoring days were over, unexpectedly another family asked me to help out. It is a brother and sister. Their first language is Hebrew and they are Orthodox and so gracious about sharing their culture with me -- the entire family is authentic and embracing and open. I love working with the two kids -- the girl is creative and loves to write and will sit with wide eyes asking questions and soaking up suggestions and writing in her notebook as fast as possible. She is working on a novel -- based on the trials that her grandmother went through beginning with the invasion of her country by the red army. The boy is unbelievably charming. He is a self-professed non-writer, preferring instead to work on his computer programming and the app that he is about finished creating.  And yet, he will accept every suggestion with a huge smile, and a, "Sure, sure. I can do that." The other student is a gentle soul -- lovely and ethereal. In the past year she suffered a medical condition that caused her some cognitive set-backs, and she and her family have been working hard to get her back to where she had been before she goes off to college next year. I worked with her on organization and clarity through literary analysis, grammar reviews, mini-lessons, and essays. Being welcomed into homes and families, and being given the responsibility and trust to tutor these kids has been a fascinating, and often touching, side journey that I wasn't expecting when this home schooling adventure began. 

Aside from the tutoring, I was also asked to lead the creative writing workshop. It has been an engaging run. I've been surprised at the passion and talent that the students bring. I've liked their interaction with each other and the way that they actually care about what I, and others in the workshop, say and share. Their maturity and overall pleasantness and sweetness has impressed me. Again, teaching some random teenagers that I had no previous connection with was never part of the plan, and yet it has added a depth to this year that I have come to greatly value.

So, today was the last day of the workshop. As such it was actually a "reading." Everybody brought what they wanted to share, and I brought some sparkling lemonade and cookies, and one boy brought his mom and sister. After the reading we sat around in a circle and chatted about writing in general, and what they wanted me to teach next year, and there was a robust conversation about Dr. Who that somehow led to whether or not the new Sherlock was better than the other Sherlock show called, Elementary. Again, purely and utterly fun and fascinating to see such enthusiasm and intelligence. Anybody who is anti-teenager need only stop by one of these writing workshops. 

As I was pouring and passing out the lemonade one of the students suggested a toast... to me. Ahhh... One student gave me a hug (it was unexpected, ergo incredibly awkward, but still sweet). It was important that my kids were there, for I think it was beneficial for them to see that I'm not just a nag who makes up assignments to harass them... I actually had a past life wherein I learned a skill that some people appreciate. 

They are strange, and important moments when we catch glimpses of our parents in a different light.

We Ate Well

Perhaps one of the most trite (because of overuse), yet true (cliches are cliches for a reason), phrases is: "You are what you eat." The conventional meaning summed up is that if you eat healthy food, you are a healthy individual... and conversely if you eat unhealthy food, you are unhealthy. But I think it can mean more than that. I think an analysis of what you eat can say a lot about your sensibilities and world views and experiences well beyond your nutrition education. 

As mentioned yesterday, Edward Gorey was friends with a man named Jack who owned a restaurant named Jack's Outback (not outback as in Australia, but outback as in you can't see it from the road... because it's out back...). When Jack was alive, the system was to go in and write out your order on a ticket, put it on the wheel, grab silverware, and pick up your food when the cook, or Jack, shouted to do so. Apparently Gorey didn't throw away a lot, so a friend found his tickets for breakfast and lunch for an entire month and put together a visual piece that showed the whims and fancies and cravings and decisions of the man. Jack died in 2006, so now the frame of order tickets is in the Gorey museum.

It is now a more traditional set-up: you seat yourself, and the server comes and takes your order. We went this morning for breakfast. The food was very good, our server was attentive, and The Girl loved that there were two golden retrievers (one named Jack -- thus changing the name of the restaurant to Jack's Outback II) that were wandering around outside and amiable to gestures of love and appreciation... or at least one of them was, the other (Andi?) was waiting at the backdoor, presumably for some scraps. 

After breakfast we headed back to the Cape Cod National Seashore visitor's center to wander through the museum, watch the movie about the shifting sands of the cape, and get completed Junior Ranger booklets signed off.

Before attending church we stopped by to see the Nauset Lighthouse -- preserved and moved 300 feet back from the eroding cliff in 1996.  We also saw the Three Sisters Lighthouses. After being decommissioned each went on to have a different history before being reunited. I think that's a nice pattern for siblings. Together originally, then off to follow individual pursuits, but eventually coming back to be together again, for within a sibling is a great potential for true understanding and appreciation.

For lunch we went to Marion's Pie Shop in Chatham. Mostly it's a take-out place, but we got some hot soup and ate outside in the bright chairs. The soup was nice, but really it's the treats that bring people in by the droves. We tried the orange rolls (like cinnamon rolls, but with orange zest and a citrusy glaze), and the pecan bars. Both very good, and we have a Key Lime pie in the fridge for tomorrow... Though I'm not sure how fabulous of an idea it was to bring a refrigerated pie back all the way from the cape... if we don't all kick it tomorrow, I'll guess it was an okay idea.

And then the slog home. I drifted in and out listening to the kids harass The Sister in the back seat. She is such a sweet, good girl. Our family is honestly going to feel like there's a void when she leaves this summer... I know that it's her turn to go out and follow her individual pursuits, but while she's doing that I will miss her... and hope that someday we live by each other. 

Before reentering the city we stopped an hour and a half out in New Haven. Considering that our first adventure of the trip was stopping at Brown, we ended up making an Ivy League sandwich. Yale has gorgeous buildings, but the town kind of suffocates them. I have a hard time getting a clear handle on "the campus."

We went to the Italian neighborhood -- to Wooster Street -- and, since we were early enough that the line wasn't too gruesome, had pizza and old school soda at the Frank Pepe Pizzeria Napoletana.

We drove along Hillhouse Avenue -- which the guidebook said was declared by Charles Dickens to be the prettiest street in America. Eh. I've seen better. Though it was nice and wide, and is lined with beautiful mansions (that are now all owned by Yale).

We passed a quaint street canopied by blooming trees. It was truly lovely (Dickens must not have visited in the Spring, or he might have altered his judgment). There were people all about it taking pictures. 

And now we're home. And glad to be. As we always say, we are happy to travel, and happy to come home. 

Just as what we eat simultaneously shapes and explains who we are, so does travel.