There should be a new Broadway musical called Thrift Score: The Musical!
Here’s the pitch: a wanderin’ wastrel tries to furnish her apartment (in the nation’s capital! what an interesting and unexpected setting!!) without depleting her bank account. She’s racing the clock because… Well, because she needs things! It’s a universal story! And if this musical existed, this would be the beginning of the climactic song:
“I’m just a kid / dreamin’ big / lookin’ for love / lookin’ for things —
A sofa / a table / a little dog too;
Nothin’ is better than nothin’, it’s true;
But with the right dresser / I’d leap over the moooooooon!”
And then there would be this moment of discovery when I find the red dresser you see above. The music would get bananas and there would be a lot of lighting effects and strings.
So this thing was tucked into a corner in a resale shop in upper Dupont Circle. Here are the facts:
1. Crimson red is my favorite color.
2. Philip is among my favorite names, as Philip Larkin is my favorite poet and one becomes attached/sentimental.
3. I desperately need a dresser.
4. I dig weird.
The name on the dresser was “Philip” originally, but the other letters have dropped off. My love of this piece of furniture knows no bounds. Which is perfect. Because do you know what the Greek root phil- means?
Oof. Bullfight, Plaza de Toros, Madrid, Spain, 2007. Photo: Wikipedia
Language is a living, breathing thing. It morphs, it adapts, it sheds its skin. Being that this is true, I would like to propose that “thisclose” to enter the English lexicon. One sees this word being used in certain cases and I feel thisclose is legitimate, needed, and rather elegant. Allow me to make the case.
I am beside myself that in the past few years the word “literally” has lost its original meaning. “Literally” used to mean “actually,” so if you said, “The hotel room was so gross, I was literally barfing,” it meant that you were actually barfing because you found your hotel room unacceptable. You were saying that vomit was coming out of your head because the definition of “literally” meant “taking words in their usual or most basic sense without metaphor or allegory.” But some point, “literally” came to mean something like, “I was totally barfing over that hotel room,” or “I felt like barfing.” The way I see it, this is a bad morph. Whenever someone says, “I was literally over the moon,” I just stare at them and envision him or her actually flying over the actual moon.
But I have to get over it. Because that’s what language does. This is the nature of the thing. Language adds to itself, e.g, “That dude’s jacket is on fleek” and it subtracts, e.g., “That dude’s jacket is aces.”
Now that I’ve buried the lede, let’s go back to thisclose.
When there’s a close call, or when someone is on the verge of doing something but chooses not to do it, “thisclose” is precisely what they mean. Examples:
“I was thisclose to throwing my computer out the window.”
“I was thisclose to asking her out but I just didn’t have the nerve.”
“The bull was thisclose to skewering that dude and it was a shame because his jacket was on fleek, dawg.”
Right? (The pronunciation would be “THIS-close,” by the way.) Golly, I think it’s tops. You see it out there, but it needs to be official. It might be the word-of-the-year at some point (the Times chooses one of these each year, along with the American Dialect Society and the Oxford Dictionary and when they do that, it goes into the dictionary.) Maybe I’ll start a campaign, except I’d be crushed if this great word would lose out to “fleek.” As in:
“My favorite new word was thisclose to being selected but it lost out. I feel like throwing my computer out the window.”
There are many fantasy conversations we’d like to have. Maybe it’s a “Lottery Prize Official to Your Spouse” conversation that begins with, “Mr. Jones? I have very good news for you…” Perhaps a dream conversation for someone under eight years old might be, “Hello, is this Little Suzy? This is Elsa from Frozen.”
I have a dream conversation. I’m going to share it with you now, but in case this concept doesn’t fly, I’m going to spell it out for you: I need to rent my South Loop condo in Chicago. It’s a 2-bedroom, 2-bathroom, 1500 sq. ft. space. The apartment is furnished in mid-century modern style (for the most part), and the kitchen is recently remodeled, as is the master bath. There’s an exposed brick wall.
The building staff is amazing. Doorman. Hot tub. Community room. I could go on and would love to. If anyone — you or someone you know — is looking for a home in Chicago for the next year or so, will you please contact me? Having a referral from a reader is so preferable to a stranger. I will, however, be happy to talk to strangers, provided they are well-groomed. Email me at mary @ maryfons . com and we will have a little chat. I’m a great landlady; I don’t live in town, I’m not a meddler, and all maintenance and management is on-site. Contact me and I’ll let you know the rent amount. It is fair.
Okay, here we go. A phone call:
PAPERGIRL: Hello?
PERFECT TENANT: Hello, is this Mary Fons?
PG: Yes, it is.
PT: My name is Perfect Tenant and I’m very interested in your space. I’m a well-groomed adult professional. I might be a doctor or a lawyer or a person with Important Responsibilities, which likely means that I would not trash your home. I also might be a family man/woman with well-groomed children who are into books. This means they would likely not trash your home.
PG: Well, gosh! You sound like such an interesting person/family. What brings you to Chicago?
PT: A project that will take a year or so, maybe two. I/my family has a home in [INSERT PLACE, EAST COAST POSSIBLY] and we’re not looking to buy in Chicago, at least not yet. We’d like to rent a lovely place to live and we really, really like the looks of your condo. Is it rented yet?
PG: (fanning self.) No, in fact, it isn’t. Did I mention it’s two blocks from the Harrison Red Line?
PT: You didn’t! That’s fantastic!
PG: Would you like to see the space? I’m living in Washington, DC, but I’m sure my sweet medical students could let you in…
PT: You know, I actually don’t? I don’t need to see it. I trust you completely. I don’t know how to explain it, but you’re just a good person, and I’m a good person, and let’s just do it. I mean, why wait when something feels so right?
PG: Did you say you were married?
PT: [INSERT ANSWER HERE.]
PG: I see. Well, yes! I think this sounds great. You can move in June 16th and I’ll send the lease today!
PT: I just love it when things are this easy. Thank you so much. I/we love your style and we will take great care of your home.
PG: Gosh, this is the best day ever. Your email address?
No M&M trail mix. Perhaps the real hardship. Illustration: Sweet Media Publishing via Wikipedia.
I’ve been trying to get more sleep. Much, much more.
Over the past few years (eesh) I’ve been getting around five hours a night. But All The Studies show that this paltry amount of is hazardous to our health. Of course, this is deeply depressing; even when we’re resting, we’re doing something wrong. Thanks, culture.
But a friend encouraged me recently to stop trying to compete with Madonna (she proudly claims to get about 4 hours a night) and shoot for 8 to 9 hours. Oh, I thrashed. I protested. Eight hours?! But that’s eight hours of doing absolutely nothing! Didn’t he understand that life is an hourglass continuously leaking sand? Sleep is sleeping on the job! My friend looked at me with compassion and said something like, “Only someone who is sleep-deprived would say something so foolish.”
I took on the challenge and for about a week, I have slept eight hours each night, except for the night before last. This is because I was ripped out of sleep by an air raid siren.
Actually, it was a fire alarm in the Kennedy Warren. This building (which I fall more deeply in love with daily and I haven’t even tried the pool, yet) contains over 400 units. It’s a monster. I learned yesterday morning around 6:30am that this building is ready to evacuate the people inside all these apartments quickly by instilling abject terror in their hearts and minds. The most unbelievably loud, tormenting siren began to scream across into my home and across the building. It sounded like the world was ending, and then a man’s disembodied voice said, “Attention residents: smoke has been detected in the building. All residents must move toward fire exits immediately. Attention residents: smoke has been detected in the building. All residents must move toward fire exits immediately. Attention…” You get the idea.
My heart did a trapeze flip and I got up off my little sleep mat, promptly tripping on the hem of my nightgown.* I got up, fumbled for my robe, grabbed my cell phone, which I felt was really smart of me, and jammed my feet into slippers. I raced to the door and opened it, maybe expecting smoke? Certainly, I was expecting other people on floor ten to be spilling out of their apartments, hopefully in curlers and with…houseguests. But there was no one! Not a soul! I looked up one long hallway and down the other, but I was the only one out there! Talk about disorienting. I really thought I was dreaming at that point, but the siren was so loud it couldn’t be possible.
Then, with absolutely zero sense of panic, several people began unlocking their doors and sticking their heads out. A dog sniffed out into the hall. I was looking wild-eyed and insane in my robe, clutching my cell phone and these people were eating bagels. The air raid siren stopped and the woman a few doors down said, “You think that’s it?”
Then the disembodied voice said, “Attention residents: there is no danger of fire. Smoke was detected in maintenance room but has been repaired and poses no threat.”
Great. But I couldn’t go back to sleep.
*Yes, I DO wear a nightgown. I’m practicing being a grandmother because it’s never too soon.
Note 1970s cross-stitch in frame sitting on windowsill, which reads: “When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping.” This piece has traveled with me many years.
A major decision was made last week.
By the way, I’m good on big decisions. I don’t mean that I’m good at them. I mean I’ve had enough of them for awhile, as in, “No, please, Nonna — I’m good on kugel,” or “Wow, okay, I think I’m good on socks.” Small decisions I can handle, e.g., grapefruit or pears, to shower or not to shower, etc. Unfortunately, the universe keeps pitching big ones to me and what can I do but catch?
The major decision was to not go to Chicago to retrieve my furniture. I will rent my apartment furnished.
Whenever I thought about moving these items halfway across the country, my stomach hurt. I envisioned the getting of the large moving truck. I pictured the getting of the objects. I saw the freight elevator. I saw the drive from Chicago to D.C. And I saw the other freight elevator waiting for me on the other side and I saw the cost and I saw the problem of fitting things that live in a 1500 sq. ft. condo into an 800 sq. ft. apartment. It’s more precise to say that my stomach would hurt first and then my guts would churn and then my head would throb and then my left eye would begin to twitch.
But I clung to the “need” to do this. Why? Because of my attachment to these things of mine. I ain’t no Buddhist, but I seem to recall that, according to them, suffering is due to attachment. Attachment to expectations, attachment to people, attachment to one’s coffee table even if it is really, really fabulous — nesting glass and just… I can’t talk about it.
The moment I allowed myself to let go of my furniture, my objects (for another year, anyway) my spirits soared. No semi-trailer. No freight elevators. No worries about how it all would fit here — it all will not, no way, no how. I would surely end up selling my beautiful table, which is not what I want at all.
This was all excellent, except that the bed, the table, and the sofa I was planning on having in a couple weeks were suddenly not on their way. I’ve been living like a monk, you realize. I have a decent mattress/quilt/blanket pile that is remarkably comfortable for sleeping, but I have been sitting on a little mat with a throw pillow to have my breakfast. I have no chair, no couch. No bed frame. And so, once the decision to leave material things behind, I had to set about getting new ones. What do the Buddhists say about that, hm?
Yesterday, I got the most incredible, amazing deal on a bed from Overstock. And today, I went thrifting. Look at what I found! Wow, was there ever a lot of junk at that place. But I found, for around $200 total: a cool iron floor lamp (needs shade), a green easy chair in fantastic shape, a lucite stool (!), an actual vintage trash can for the bathroom, four darling, mismatched china plates (pink! gold! floral!) and a fruit bowl. I’m on my way.
When I went to put a can of tomatoes in my beans, however, I was stymied, as I realized I do not yet have a can opener.
Italian translation of Orwell’s “Animal Farm”, 1970. Photo: Wikipedia
From time to time, people email me for writing advice. I assure you, I am the wrong person to ask. The best writing advice comes from the giants, the legends, the authors you have to read in high school and should have read in college except you did not, preferring to do jell-o shots. Did you ever ask yourself, “But what would Willa Cather think??” Yeah, me neither.
One of the best writers of the last twenty or thirty years, in my view, was the late Christopher Hitchens. Whatever you think about his life, lifestyle, or politics, the man was so good at writing that when I read him, I am equally depressed and encouraged. I’m depressed because I am so bad at writing, comparatively; I am encouraged because words and sentences can be just that good.
Hitchens was a huge fan of George Orwell; he spoke of him often and wrote a lengthy biographical essay about him, which of course is awesome. You know Orwell: he wrote 1984 and Animal Farm (one or both of which you surely had to read in high school.) It was Hitchens who reminded me of how important and great Orwell is/was, so some years ago, I went after Orwell, myself. I re-read Animal Farm (dude) and did some Internet reading about him, too. Paydirt was hit, however, when I discovered Orwell’s five rules for writing. I actually did a piece on this for the Chicago “Salonathon” show and that can be found here.
Orwell’s writing rules changed my life. I’ll just toss out the first one tonight. Go find the others yourself if you’re interested: they are worth printing out and sticking to your forehead if you have any writerly aspirations. Orwell’s first rule is: Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
You may not, therefore, ever, ever write any sentence like the ones below.
1. “That’s the way the cookie crumbles,” she said, shrugging.
2. I like long walks on the beach.
3. Though Mayor Brown was reluctant, never say never: he’ll be tossing his hat into the presidential race this year.
I was reminded of the pain of ignoring Orwell’s first rule the other night at Washington Reagan baggage check. It wasn’t a written example (except that it is now.) A man saw a woman struggling to retrieve a heavy piece of luggage from the carousel. He got in there, lifted the bag with one arm, and set it down. The woman thanked him and as she walked away, wheeling her bag, this lady near me chirped, “I guess chivalry isn’t dead!”
Did she hear the tiny wheeze I wheezed when I heard her say that? Her comment was so dead, so flat, so totally banal, it was my involuntary reaction. She’s a nice woman. She knew not what she did. And I’m not the word police. But chivalry is, in fact, dead. The way we use the term in our time is like, the fourth definition listed in the dictionary. Language is fluid and bendy, I know, I know. But wouldn’t it be more dynamic to say/write, “Well, that was a nice thing to do,” or, “Is he single?”
Again, this advice is not coming from me. Even making suggestions based in Orwell’s advice makes me nervous. I’m sure actual writers will chuckle as they read this post, seeing entire paragraphs to cut and sentences that are the dog’s breakfast.
That’s exactly why I go over and over these rules. At least I’m trying, you know?
Put a paved road underneath his feet and you’re close.
If power animals exist, my power animal is a deer. I’m not sure about the existence of power animals but what do I know? I do know that over and over again in my life, I have close encounters with cervidae of various kinds.
Today, back home in Washington, I set out to fetch groceries. There was not much in my fridge beyond a hunk of Parmesan cheese (good) and watermelon I should’ve thrown out before I left town (bad.) There’s a fabulous little organic grocery store in my new neighborhood, but “fabulous” and “organic,” when applied to “grocery” and “store” means yams are $5.00/ea. Close to that, anyway. I consulted the oracle and found a Giant supermarket close to my building.
Apparently, I had my Google Maps set to Hermes; what I thought would be a twenty-two-minute trip was at least double that. The Giant really can’t be the closest supermarket to me but these are the misadventures you have when you live in a new place. You have to go to the wrong places to find the right ones.
I’m walking along (and along) the sidewalk in a pretty neighborhood. I’m sweating from the humidity and sun. And coming from the other side of the street — casual as anything — steps a deer. Large deer. Deer with antlers. This deer walked into the street and was therefore about ten or twelve feet away from me. Seeing each other, we stopped in our tracks. The deer looked at me and I looked at the deer and for a moment I wondered, “Do deer charge humans?” and I felt fear. We looked at each other for a good 2.5 seconds; I’ve replayed the encounter many times and believe that’s correct.
“You have got to be kidding me,” I thought. It was right there. Wildlife in the city and we were crossing paths. The deer — surely feeling fear, wondering if humans charge deer — took a running leap over a high fence into someone’s yard where I presume he began munching begonias.
There was a FedEx truck way down the hill who might’ve seen the deer up ahead. I tried to make eye contact with him as he passed. I opened my eyes wide to communicate, “What the —-?!” but I didn’t get an appropriate response, so I don’t think he saw it. This was a me-deer thing.
I’m not so sure power animals are real, but that was mighty powerful.
Russian bride and groom getting married in a dolphinarium, 2007. Photo: Wikipedia
It was perfect.
There was a roasted pig. And they got married right at the water’s edge. The sun wasn’t out, exactly, but it was slightly warmer than the day before. Everyone cried. Poetry was read. My sister was the most beautiful woman on the planet.
She now has a husband, my mother has a son-in-law, Hannah and I have a brother-in-law and the world has a new reason to be extremely optimistic.
The Internet is very slow. I must pack my suitcase. Good job.
Publicity still, Julia Dean and Howard C. Hickman in Matrimony (1915) Photo: Wikipedia
This place is an ant farm!
And by “ant farm” I mean that we are all working hard, carrying things, moving dirt, and ultimately serving the queen. The enormous tent is up. The lights have been hung inside. The rock walls that surround the property have been shaped up. I hand-picked all the dumb dandelions out of the yard yesterday and my sister Hannah gave the big firepit out back a total overhaul. Guests are arriving at the Island in twos, threes, and more and last night we had an unofficial gathering at the famous Nelsen’s Hall pub, which has existed since the 1800s. I think the bar is the original, but that seems ridiculous.
My intention to write of all this yesterday was sidelined by pure baccanalia courtesy of that pub. I think excess happens at weddings (and the days surrounding them) not just because it’s a big celebration but also because it’s rather heavy, honestly. Getting married is a really big deal and represents a closing of one thing and the opening of another. It’s a transition and transitions of any kind can cause a touch of unease in human beings. Mostly, though, everyone’s just stoked and full of love, thus they are full of cocktails.
It’s back to prep, now. The wedding is tomorrow at 4pm and as you can imagine, there is much more to do. The roast pig arrives tomorrow morning, the caterer of course gets here tomorrow, but there are a million things to secure, double-check, anticipate and check off the many lists that are posted everywhere.
My sister’s dress is gorgeous, much like the girl herself I promise pictures on Facebook.
Exhibit A. Bride and groom, Moscow, 1990. Photo: Wikipedia.
Not long ago, I publicly noodled on proper attire for my sister’s upcoming wedding. I have made my selection — simple, tailored black frock with pink Yves Saint Laurent heels — and it’s a good thing I have. The wedding is on Sunday!
Even now, I am trundling along on a train to Green Bay, inching closer and closer to the occasion. In a few hours time, I will be scooped up by my elder sibling who is coming in from New York. She has procured a car so that we can drive north to Door County. Once we reach the tip of the peninsula we will drive the car onto the car ferry and float over to Washington Island. And then it’s game on.
My sister and her betrothed have been up on the Island for a number of days, now, getting everything ready. The wedding is taking place at our home there and the kids will get married outside, though I’m not exactly sure where they’ve set up shop for that; they might be down by the water or maybe up closer to the house. Understanding the location of the actual ceremony is on my list of things to do.
The next few days will be dispatches from the wedding. Consider me your Girl Friday, reporting on The Wedding Of The Century. It’s gonna be good, I assure you: a magnificent wedding dress on an exquisite bride, well over 100 guests, a pig roast, and actual, literal fireworks. Seriously, there are going to be fireworks at my sister’s wedding. I know, right?
If you’re the praying kind, pray that it will not rain and that there will not be a bug issue. If you are not the praying kind, pretend you are for two seconds and pray that it will not rain and that there will not be a bug issue. Merci.
Step into my office. Seriously, this is where I’m sitting right now, on the couch facing the mirror.
Glory, Glory Halleuuuuujah, Glory, Glory Halleuuuuujah, Glory, Glory Halleuuuuujah — The Fons is marching on!
I am blissful. I am over the moon. I am a happy, happy child. Yesterday, in the yucky humidity with movers who were both terrifying and slow — I can’t talk about it — I moved my belongings into my gorgeous apartment in the Kennedy Warren. Regular readers know the timeline, but I cannot resist the recap, lest people think that this third move within one city means I am either a) insane or b) being pursued by the FBI.
1. I moved from New York City to a charming townhouse in Capitol Hill.
2. There were sewer rats in the walls and I had to relocate. Obviously.
3. The apartment to which I relocated is furnished — and expensive.
4. I decided to stay in Washington rather than head back to Chicago.
5. I sought out and found this dreamy place and promptly signed a lease.
You wanna know something fascinating? When awake, the human brain produces enough electricity to power a small light bulb! Okay, that wasn’t the fascinating thing I was going to tell you:
A few months ago, I had a yen to tutor students in writing in my spare time. My work with high school students is so rewarding; I know I could help budding writers (or struggling ones) develop their skills. So I applied to a tutoring company here in town. My interview was flawless. My application was impressive. But do you know that I did not pass the background check? It’s true. Me! A quilter! But it’s because I’ve moved so much in the past year! Isn’t that amazing? I’m not sure I’ve ever had a background check done on me, so it’s extra awful that I didn’t pass it. A simple phone call to the agency could probably clear it up, but apparently they charge you for that and I’m too exhausted by my schpiel to bother. But yes, the Powers That Be probably do think I’m running from the FBI. Maybe I should do something really horrible and make it official.
Anyway, I’m practically skipping through the building, running around and exploring everything. Because I don’t have my Internet service set up yet, I’m writing this from the South Lounge. I feel like I’m in the most beautiful hotel in the world, but I live here. There will be a trip to Chicago to get all my furniture, so I’m sleeping on a makeshift mat on the floor.
I had a fantastic night’s sleep. Well, except for the ruckus made by the criminals I’m harboring and the sound of the SWAT team banging on the door.
I do not have even half this amount to pack. I also don’t have my couch, yet. Photo: Steve Ryan, 2006.
My Facebook page seems to be down. I have sent an email to Facebook, but ironically, Facebook does not have an actual face. My filled-out online form may be swimming in the Facebook Sea. Until someone who is not a robot gets back to me, forgive me for the non-updates.
For now, enjoy the above photo of a house being packed up. Do you know what I did today? I packed up my house. My move is in two phases: move my things to my new place (Phase 1) and fetch my belongings from Chicago (Phase 2).
I’m very good at packing these days. Tomorrow night, I sleep in my treehouse. I sleep to wake to a view of the Klingle Valley. I wake to boxes to unpack, yes, but I wake to sunshine. I know, because I checked the forecast.
Goodnight, box. Oh, and the Facebook page. I’ll get to is as soon as I can, and that’s a gay-run-tee!
My sewing table, about two minutes ago. Its state has not changed. Photo: Mary Fons
I hung out with my new friend Carla last night at a cafe where everyone was way, way cooler than I will ever be. Carla and I were jamming on quilt world trends and interests. Carla is a proficient quilter and, in my view, has her finger squished squarely on the pulse of the Internet as it relates to quilts, quilters, and quiltmaking in America in 2015. I am not good at keeping up on all this because I am not good at keeping up on voicemail, let alone what hot UK designer is doing with partial seams. I’m not proud of it, but at least I know who to ask.
The conversation turned at one point to my own position in the quilt blogosphere. (I didn’t bring it up, please note!) It was uncomfortable to hear that in Carla’s estimation, I could do a lot better with sharing my quiltmaking process, the projects I have going, the day-to-day life I have as a person who regularly works with fabric and thread.
“It does seem that your projects sort of emerge when they’re done,” Carla said, munching a pear from her salad. “People like to see process. They want to know you better as a designer, I think, as a fellow quilter.”
Thus, a picture of my sewing table. My sewing table is also my table-table. I have no other table in this furnished apartment and it’s a good thing, too: to have a second table just for breakfast, say, I’d have to stack it on top of this one and then where would I put my washer and dryer? What you’re looking at up there is a fresh crop of fabric purchased in Kansas City; materials from the class I taught at the DC Modern Guild a couple weekends ago; my sewing machine; a candle that should not be there; flowers from my friend Jason that are very nearly dead but so beautiful I can’t toss, yet; and under all that, my mat, seam ripper, rotary cutter, a pattern I’m drafting, and previews of art for my upcoming fabric line.*
My design wall is directly behind the table and there are several things happening there, too. If PaperGirl were a vlog and not a blog, I would show you a full tour of my sewing area, but PaperGirl is not a vlog, will never be a vlog, and while we’re on the subject, I will never say “vlog” out loud, nor will I ever write it, ever again. Humans are capable of making good choices, as it turns out, and not allowing “v*og” into the vernacular is proof of this.
In the months to come, I plane to do a bit more curtain-drawing in this manner. There are big projects afoot and I’m champing at the bit to share about them. But don’t be surprised if one of these days “PaperGirl Too” pops up and Pendennis and I take you through how to make the quilt perpetually on my mind.
My flight from Kansas City to Washington yesterday was remarkable, as in, “I am compelled to remark” on my flight. If only I had a blog! Hey, wait a minute…
Approximately 96% of the people on the KC –> DCA Southwest flight were police officers headed to National Police Week in Washington. I sat next to a chaplain, behind a cop, and to the right of an undercover guy (more on him in a second.) If they hadn’t all been in such a good mood, I would’ve been nervous. There’s nothing like a planeful of cops to make you second-guess your record. That parking ticket in ’99. I didn’t pay it. I didn’t pay!! Don’t take me away, officers! I’m a good citizen, I swear!
It was an unofficial party plane, man. People were calling to each other across the aisle with questions like, “Are you guys staying downtown or in Arlington?” and “Is Rick coming or not? No? What a [bleep]!” Our plane probably sounded a lot like — and I say this with love — a tour bus leaving that very hour from, say, Little Rock with a group of middle school students on their class trip to Washington, DC. It was all excitement, anticipation, and fun. It got more fun when the stewardesses started beverage service, if you know what I mean.
President Kennedy signed into law a remembrance day on May 15th for servicemen and servicewomen who have died in the line of duty. That was in ’62; the first National Police Week began in ’82. There are activities and memorial events held in the city during this time; more than 40k police come to Washington to participate each year. The cops and service-people on my flight were, not surprisingly, mostly Kansas City-based and would represent their state during these events.
I don’t know that I’ve ever met a more congenial, raucous person than the undercover guy sitting near me. Physically he was a tank. If I took a running leap and body-slammed him (I would never do this nor recommend that anyone do this) I would bounce off with a “ping!” and be dead. He was covered in tattoos and had a goatee. He was using chewing tobacco, too, which I had never seen someone do on a plane. When my purse fell into the aisle, he picked it up for me. When he saw a baby board with her mama, he said, “Here comes trouble!” He talked to everyone in a six-seat radius and everyone was entertained — even the chaplain, who could’ve done without the profane words the guy wove (seamlessly) into his vocabulary.
When we landed, the stewardesses thanked the police for their service over the PA and wished them a good trip. Thunderous applause. We deplaned and I entered the jet bridge and walked up the ramp. When I got to the entrance to the gate, I gasped.
There to greet the plane was a line of policemen and policewomen in full memorial uniform. They lined both sides of the gate, standing silently to honor the officers coming off the plane. The black of the cloth was midnight dark, the gleaming metal of the badges, medals, and stripes polished to a shine. Everyone wore their caps or helmets. I didn’t feel worthy to walk through first (I was sitting at the front of the plane.) I bowed my head and blinked my eyes to stop the stinging.
I realize America’s police are under scrutiny right now. There are problems — big ones — and they must be considered and we must be fearless in our examination of process and ethics in this piece of our government. Regardless, we are in debt to the vast, vast majority of our civil protectors All around the airport, people were staring at the display, craning their heads to see, thinking there was a dignitary surely on the flight that had just arrived.
They were mostly right. But there were two hundred dignitaries, not just one.
Last night, I ate a rack of barbeque ribs. The entire rack. And I have no regrets.
I don’t clean my plate too often. There’s usually something I can’t eat or something I don’t like as much as something else (sorry beets, but I am eating blue cheese instead of you.) So when the waiter comes to take away my plate, he’s gonna have to scrape stuff into the garbage. Now hang on: I’m not wasteful, I’m just not a plate-licker. Last night was an exception.
Mom and I are in Kansas City lecturing to the hundreds (!) of attractive, talented women of the Lee’s Summit Quilt Guild. We arrived around five o’clock yesterday and had time to have dinner together. This would have been terrific no matter what day it was, but it was Mother’s Day! It was super to be with Mom on Mother’s Day.
We went to Kansas City’s Country Club Plaza district; if you’ve never visited, you must make it there someday. The area is four miles south of downtown and is all cobblestones, terracotta tiles and fountains. The folks who designed it modeled the whole thing after Seville, Spain, so you get the picture. Have I mentioned lately how much I love the work I do, work that allows me to travel the great United States? Well, I’m mentioning it again.
We went to Houston’s for dinner. Houston’s has been in Kansas City for well over thirty years, maybe longer. (Research tells me they have a handful of locations in other cities, now.) The wait for a table was over an hour, but Mom and I spied a couple stools at the bar and nabbed them.
I saw this man eating this slab of meat and every fibre of my being screamed, “Eat that! Please eat that as soon as possible!” I ordered the barbeque pork ribs and skipped the coleslaw and fries for a side of broccoli. I know, I hate me, too.
I ate that slab of ribs like it was the first meal I had had in a month. I didn’t do the flip-top head thing and insert the entire slab, whole, into my face. If I could’ve I might’ve. Those ribs were so buttery, so succulent, I’m weeping as I write this. The sauce was the perfect balance of tangy and sweet and the sauce seemed to have soaked through the meat as it cooked: this was not meat painted with sauce. This was meat doing naughty, naughty things with sauce. This slab of ribs was sacrilegiously, slap-yo-mama good. All right, maybe I just haven’t had decent ribs in awhile, but I don’t think I was just rib-deprived. These were the Lord’s ribs.
Anyway, I ate the whole thing, bone by bone. I sucked the things dry. The broccoli felt a little left out until I was done with my plate and then they got their big moment when I used the stuff to wipe up the sauce. I realize I may have painted an undignified, unladylike picture of me with BBQ sauce all over my face, panting over a plate of bones. This is my fault. I tried to dab the corners of my mouth with my white linen napkin but if anyone sitting close had looked at me closely, they would’ve seen wolverine in my eyes.
I go to Chicago next week (I know), then Wisconsin for my sister’s wedding (I know!) and then it’s to St. Louis for a BabyLock event. Looks like I need to attack polish sausage, cheese, and toasted ravioli, in that order. Until those pit stops, fasting on water is perhaps wise.
My apartment search began downtown, but I soon realized that in Washington, you get a lot less for your money downtown than in Chicago, far as I can tell. For about $2500 or so, you’re going to land roughly 600 square feet. (This is a lot of money for not a lot of feet, in case you haven’t apartment-shopped lately.) As is typical in an urban area, the further out you get, the more feet you get for the money, so explored the neighborhood of Cleveland Park, just a few metro stops from where I live now. I like the neighborhood — lots of trees, a popular main drag with intriguing cafes, an old movie house, and a sewing machine shop! I found a few buildings I liked and had an appointment to see them.
But I got turned around. I was headed the wrong direction on Connecticut Avenue and that is one long, diagonal street — not a great street to be on if you want to mix up your east-west because you got a long way to backtrack, girl. But sometimes what we think is bad is good (and vice versa) — and I’m pretty sure it was good that I got lost because I walked past a building that took my breath away. Let me describe it to you.
The building is massive. I have learned there are 429 units in the Kennedy-Warren and that it was built in the 1930s. A fountain burbles in the center of the cul-de-sac, producing this tall column of water that falls onto itself and into the pool. The building is Art Deco, so the lines are long and the details are graphic (I’m not sure that’s a very good way to describe Art Deco but it’s true, anyhow.) The color of the stone is blonde and there are so many green trees all around the courtyard that I felt like I was in a garden.
“Woooooah” I said, and wandered in.
A doorman opened the door for me and I walked into this head-slappingly gorgeous lobby. The interior of the KW is a throwback: it’s a slice of the past, chrome and sea foam green, chandeliers and settees. Wood. A mezzanine. I was looking around, mouth open, and sort of floated to the front desk. I asked if there were units available in the building and the lady said, “Yes, I’ll call the leasing office.”
Fast forward. I go with the agent to see a one-bedroom. 800+ square feet and not as expensive as downtown. The floors are wood. I’d be on the 10th floor. The cabinets in the kitchen are all the original ones from the 1930s (repainted, clearly.) The building is immaculate. And as I mentioned in my last post, my windows look out over (and into, practically) the Klingle Valley below, which sits directly beside the building; it’s also close to the zoo, which is appropriate for me, I think. The leasing agent gal said that when she lived there, she could hear the bleating of the zebras when the wind was just right. Zebras, people. Zebras.
Oh, and the building has a bar in it. Yeah. A bar-lounge. And there’s a movie room where they play classic movies once a month. There’s a ballroom. And my favorite room so far is the South Lounge, which is decorated like your cool, bachelorette grandmother’s living room. There’s an Art Deco pool on the 11th floor. There’s a patio on the roof. And did I mention zebras are my neighbors?
I applied and was approved. There’s a month of free rent for new tenants, which is good. When I went the other day to turn in my deposit and my lease, I went to look at my unit again and I just stayed in that empty place for a little while. It was quiet and full of light and I knew I had made the right choice, at least for now.
Look, it’s another move. And it’s gonna cost money. I’m bringing my stuff from Chicago. It’s real, and it’s on. But my sister’s wedding comes before the move. That’s the focus now — the wedding is Memorial Day weekend, which is basically tomorrow — and at this point, after this year, I have the tiniest belief that things tend to work themselves out.
This blog is honest. Everything I tell you is real, and it’s true. Okay, it’s my truth — everyone has their version — but I come to the mat every time with the real deal.
But of course I can’t tell the whole truth, all the time. Sometimes this is because it would be inappropriate — someone else’s privacy needs to be respected, my privacy needs to be respected, it ain’t ready for prime-time, it’s too racy, it’s an over-share, etc. — but sometimes it’s because I’m scared.
Telling just how hard it’s been to move through my life in the past few months, this is something I haven’t been as honest about as I could’ve been. There was a moment of it, but I’ve held back the truly wrenching experience that has been choosing my next step. I am a naturally decisive person, so this back-and-forth has been nothing short of excruciating. Deciding where to live in a matter of weeks — Chicago or Washington — has made me realize that to be a woman with no boundaries presents as many challenges as someone who feels stuck in one place. I have no baby who needs to be fed. I have no husband with whom I make major decisions. I don’t even have a desk job. To be so free, I say unto you, is not so easy.
I haven’t been entirely forthcoming about how my heart has ached. For love lost, love found, love lost again. No one wants to read some maudlin, whiny girl mope about her love life — and this maudlin, whiny girl wouldn’t dare write the stuff — but perhaps I have over-pruned. Sharing that I find myself aching, longing, thrilled, excited, devastated, and confused in matters of the heart almost daily might help someone else out there. If you are that someone else, it’s high time I tell you that I understand.
Today, I turned in my lease. I’m staying in Washington, DC for another year and I’d like to tell you how I finally chose this. You might think what ultimately pushed me in this direction is odd, but to me it was perfect, it was right on time, and I was so grateful I cried.
I’m working on memorizing a Longfellow poem called “The Day Is Done.” Please take a moment to read the whole thing sometime. It’s about a person who wants to hear a poem in the evening — but he doesn’t want anything fancy or difficult (e.g., Homer). He says:
“Read from some humbler poet Whose songs gushed from her heart As showers from the clouds of summer, Or tears from the eyelids start.
Who, through long days of labor, And nights devoid of ease Still heard in her soul the music Of wonderful melodies.”
That poem is why I’m staying in Washington. Oh, for heaven’s sake it’s more than that — perhaps I’ll detail more tomorrow so you don’t think I’ve lost my mind and am making choices entirely based on dead poets — but those verses were my tipping point.
Long days of labor? I know about labor. Nights devoid of ease? Yes, those. But through it all, I keep hearing these melodies. If I keep up the labor, if I’m not afraid of the night, I feel like the melodies will keep coming to me. And I can’t live without them. I wouldn’t want to.
So I’ll honor the melodies by laboring longer. I’ll give them new sights to see, here in the almost-South. I can’t wait to tell you all about the apartment I found on the 10th floor of a beautiful historic building. It looks over a valley so lush and green right now, you can’t imagine how beautiful it is. I’ll stay and watch the leaves in that valley turn to bronze and gold, then fall, then grow again.
Then we’ll see what the melodies want me to do next.
I can see my house from here! Photo: Wikipedia, 2006.
When I’m facing a challenge that seems impossible, or when I’m standing at a path in the woods that is diverging before my eyes, there’s a tool in my toolbelt I find handy. It doesn’t solve the problem for me, but it helps…with the drywall? Hm. Okay, the tool metaphor does not extend terribly well. I’ll just tell you what I mean. It’s not a complex concept — maybe it’s something people do it all the time — but if it’s new to you, perhaps it will help you with a challenge, also:
I pretend it’s the future and I’m telling someone what happened in the situation I’m currently facing. For example:
“Well, what can I say? It was a tough time in my life. I was heartsick. I left New York. I was in Washington in a kind of limbo, trying to decide if I’d stay or leave. But I trusted myself, I made what I believed was the braver choice and now look at me! I’ve never been happier.”
See what I mean? It sort of calms me down. Because it illustrates what we know will happen: we’ll talk later — casually, even off-handedly — about something that seems impossible to us now. Let’s try another one, perhaps more relevant to you than the above example:
“I never thought I’d buy an entire island. Who does that? But then I thought, ‘I am a billionaire. Why not enjoy it?’ So I shopped around and it was so extremely difficult to choose between the two I fell in love with and the legal stuff was an absolute nightmare — the French Polynesians are a real pain in the neck, trust me — but you know what? It was worth it. All the pain. All the flying back and forth. I almost gave up a dozen times. But I stuck with it. And now look at me! I’ve never been happier.”
You see what I mean.
In the next few days, I will announce the decision I’ve made regarding staying in DC or going back to Chicago. Curious? Me, too. It’s time to start telling the story.
Springtime in Flemming, apparently. Those horses are FREAKING OUT.
I was in a taxi the other day and my driver was cursing under his breath in a foreign language. I could definitely tell what words he was using. He was cursing at cars who were cutting him off, cursing at pedestrians who were taking daredevil crosses from one side of the street to the other. He was justified in his cursing, I’m telling you.
“People are crazy!” he said to me, throwing up his hands. “They don’t look! They don’t care if they die!”
I shook my head and said, “It’s true, man” though I think most people do not want to die; I’m very sure most people don’t want to die by Uber.
But then I remembered what time it was: early May. People are insane. They are. It’s because they are emerging or have emerged from the icy chrysalis they’ve been in since October. Spring fever is a real thing. People are giddy for the smallest reasons: no coat needed to go outside, a green thing in a tree, a pretty girl walking by in a skirt and sandals.
“You know what?” I said to the driver. “I actually think it’s the spring. Like, springtime. People are wild and crazy because they’re happy. It’s really dangerous, but they’re just happy, I think.”
The driver thought about this for a moment and he actually scratched his chin. “I think that you are right,” he said. “Crazy.”
This doesn’t look too bad. But you should probably try out that couch before you sign the lease. Photo: Wikipedia
What can be said about the sofas in our lives?
Not much. A sofa makes the news in your head or your household when you buy a new one. A sofa is exciting when you’re shopping for a new one. It’s exciting when you remove the old one and put in the new one. After a few weeks, though, the sofa recedes into the landscape of your home and that’s good because you have better things to think about. Hopefully.
But for me, for almost a year now, the object that is the couch* has stubbornly refused to leave my portfolio of active thoughts. This is because since leaving Chicago almost a year ago, regardless of the agony and the ecstasy of the entire adventure, it has been The Year of Terrible Couches. It’s like the Chinese “Year of The Goat” thing except no one is ever, ever born in The Year of Terrible Couches and we should all be thankful for that. Let’s celebrate by eating a fortune cookie. Done? Excellent. Let’s examine what I’m talking about.
When I was first in New York with Yuri, we had a furnished place for just a couple months on 10th Street and 2nd Ave. I filmed my book promo video while we were in that place. Then, when we officially moved to New York in June, we got a furnished place on St. Mark’s. Then, when everything became hard and sad, I moved into a furnished apartment in D.C. with rats in the walls. Then, the management company relocated me to the place where I’m sitting currently. That’s not one, not two, not three (I’m weeping, now), but four furnished apartments in a single year.
You do realize this is not my normal life, right? I am not a fan of chaos. Chaos, it appears, is extremely fond of me, at least this year. Thanks, chaos.
Here’s the thing about furnished apartments: they are lousy. If you have no furniture, maybe they are great. Any couch is better than no couch, right? Fine. But I have a couch. I have arguably the best couch ever. It’s in Chicago right now, being used by my adorable med school tenants. Why? Because moving to NYC was always going to be a yearlong experiment and what are you, nuts?! You can’t move a couch into Manhattan! You have to go there with your hobo stick and just figure it out from there, find someone who can take you to the IKEA in Jersey! Please! Anyway, my gorgeous couch in Chicago is wide. It’s leather. It’s sky blue leather with chrome legs. (I bought it at a sample sale at Design Within Reach.) It’s sleek and sexy, but it’s functional. You can take a nap on it. You can sit cross-legged and eat your lunch on it. You can watch a movie on it. And you can… Well, you can do a lot of things on that couch. Trust me.
The four couches that I have been subjected to over the past year… I can hardly talk about it. Do you realize how awful a couch can be? If it’s shallow, your back hurts when you try to sit back. If it’s a sectional that doesn’t have those grippy things on the bottom and your floor is slick, the parts separate and slide all around! Good grief! That’s a Beckett play! If the couch is so old it’s buckling (see: St. Mark’s) you are asking for early-onset arthritis. A bad couch is sad, indeed, and I realize this is as luxury a problem as luxury problems get. But what can I do? It’s been The Year of Terrible Couches and as the hourglass runs out of sand, as I am forced to make a decision to stay in D.C. or go back to Chicago, this much is true: The Year of Terrible Couches is about to end. If I go home, I get my couch. If I stay here, I’m going back for all my stuff, kids. If I stay in D.C., I am staying in D.C. with my couch.
Roses for sale. In Germany. Same thing. Photo: Wikipedia
Out running errands today, I stopped on the corner of U St. and 16th when the light turned red. I had a heavy bag of groceries and was bummed I missed getting across the street, but then I was glad that I hadn’t.
On the other side of the street, a man in business attire was holding a huge arrangement of red roses. Two dozen, I’d wager. It’s incredible how the eyes just zap! right to a bouquet of red roses. Everyone on all the four corners of that intersection caught sight of the flowers and of the guy.
So he’s waiting for the light, too — he needs to come across the street from the other side. And while we’re all waiting, he’s being totally accosted by the men who were standing on his corner hanging out.
“Oooooh!” one of the men laughed, “You in trouble now, son! What’d you do? C’mon! What’d you do? Somethin’ bad, man — that’s a lotta flowers.”
That man’s friend shook his head in mock anguish. “She’s mad, man. What is that, two dozen roses? Damn, dude — I hope it works, I honestly do. Good luck! Good luck, son.”
The man holding the flowers was as red as the roses themselves. He was smiling, embarrassed but shaking his head like, “Yeah. That’s pretty much what’s going on.” I put my hand over my mouth to hide my giggling. The flower guy knew the entire world was watching him get razzed, but I didn’t want to make it worse. The light changed and everyone crossed paths. As I passed the guys who were joking around, I gave them a big smile.
“He’s gonna get it,” I said, “Even with those flowers.”
“She knows what’s up!” one man laughed to the other. “Get it, girl!”
I’m in Philadelphia. Just one night to see a good friend.
Sometimes, when I have to make a big decision, I am comforted by going through options that are not on the table. In short order, I must make the decision, once and for all, whether I’m going back to Chicago or staying in Washington. Before I list a few options I can cross out, let’s review why I am in Washington at all. (It’s so interesting: when I tell people I live in D.C., they almost always go, “D.C.?? How in the world did you end up there?” I like to tell them that I’m planning to run for president, but then I say that I’m kidding and I go through the story.)
1. I lived in beautiful Chicago, in my home in the South Loop.
2. I met Yuri, a Russian bitcoin speculator with a heart of gold who can play classical piano. We began to love each other very much.
3. Yuri got a job at an exciting startup in New York City.
4. Working, as I do, for myself, I have the ability to work from anywhere. Having, as I did, fond feelings for New York, Yuri and I said, “Let’s go together! Just for a year, see how we like it.”
5. I rented out my condo for a year, put things in storage, and moved to the East Village with 1/3 of my worldly possessions.
6. I detested living in New York City. It felt like I was at a crowded outdoor music festival all the time. I really, really hate outdoor music festivals. I became depressed.
7. Yuri and I, though we loved each other very much, broke up for reasons that people always break up: irreconcilable differences. We became depressed.
8. Having no love for New York and no workable love in New York, and essentially being in exile from Chicago until my tenants vacated in June, I was in a sticky position.
9. A dear friend said to me, “Why don’t you have an adventure? You can live wherever you want for the next eight months. Where have you always wanted to live?” I answered without hesitation, “Washington, D.C.” I performed with the Neo-Futurists for a whole month at the Woolly Mammoth theater several years ago and loved the city on contact. I wanted to return someday.
10. I packed the 1/3 of my worldly possessions into a U-Haul van and drove to D.C., not knowing anyone but excited. And I have a terrible, beautiful love for the city and don’t want to leave, yet, but Chicago is my best friend.
If you missed the cliffhanger decision-making process when I decided to leave New York, start here.
When I verbally go through the steps, I make it quick, but I can’t skip a single one of them. If I don’t say my condo was rented out, a person understandably says, “Well, why not just go back to Chicago?” If I say I moved to Washington without explaining that I had lived there, however briefly, once before, they don’t understand.
But my lease is up in D.C. on June 15th. My tenants are leaving. The clock ticks. The clock stares at me. The time is now. And a new cliffhanger begins. (Insert wink here.) And now, if you’re still with me, a few options that I can rule out, at least, as I work out what the Sam Hill I’m going to do now that it’s flipping May:
1. I am not moving to Philadelphia, nice as it is.
2. I am not moving to Kathmandu.
3. I am not taking a job with streets and sanitation.
4. I am not planning to eat an entire German chocolate cake in a single sitting.
5. I am not planning to throw myself into the Nile.
This quilt is for sale from Rocky Mountain Quilts for $4,600. Log Cabin Maltese Cross from Pennsylvania, c.1880 62 x 68.
Since June of last year, I’ve been doing my Color Me Quilter webinar series. The enjoyable, informative, quilt geeky show happens once a month and helps you select fabric for your quilts. Many, many quilters have asked me for help in this area, and Color Me Quilter has helped a lot of you, which feels great.
There are just two months left of the series, though you can get bundles of my past webinars on the Fons & Porter website. Tomorrow, my presentation examines brown fabrics. I know, I know — brown does not scream “sexy.” It may not scream “modern” to you, either; by “modern” I mean “relevant,” not necessarily “modern” the way quilters use it — but modern quilters are using brown a lot these days, actually. I can pretty much guarantee you will be surprised, big-time at what you see tomorrow.
From Civil War quilts and their mega-popular reproductions to classic Amish quilts; from brilliant use of brown by today’s designers, such as Edyta Sitar to Amy Ellis; from timeless combos like traditional brown and pink to chic brown and black, you will be inspired and provoked to think about your own fabric palette and how brown plays a role.
Brown isn’t the new black, y’all: it’s the new brown.
It’s easy to join. Just go to the Webinar tab on my homepage and I’ll see you at 1PM EST tomorrow.
There were about thirty-five people at the meeting place when I got there; the man in charge said our numbers were lighter than usual, so we’d have to pull together to get it all done. Lucky for us, Girl Scout Troop 714 was there that morning, so really, we had the strength of the Light Brigade!
There were undergrads there, too, as well as folks working in conjunction with other charity organizations, and there were a handful of people like me who just came on their own. (About 1/3 of the entire group was helping for the first time.) Our first job was to take over 100 bags and dozens of boxes of non-perishable groceries from the back of a huge van and stage them in the parking lot. Then we all pow-wowed in a big meeting room so we could get the plan for the day and meet each other. After that, we were split up into groups.
I was teamed up with James, a twenty-something who helped start “Sonos Familias,” the Spanish arm of the organization, and Pete, a seventy-something who has been delivering groceries and paying visits to D.C. area seniors for twelve years. We loaded up Pete’s car with our share of bags and boxes; James got our list of names and addresses. Pete drove, I sat in back.
“Okay, the first house we’re going to,” Pete said, turning the wheel, “is Esther’s. Now, Esther is one of my favorites.” (Pete said this about every person we visited.) He told us all about Esther, how he makes sure she’s taking her insulin and how some weekends he’ll take her a bag of vegetables on his own dime. “Toward the end of the month, she needs it,” Pete said. Then he honked at a driver and made a creative left turn. “What a jerk!” Pete said, and then went back to telling me and James about Esther.
I listened to all Pete’s stories and looked out the car windows. We drove through parts of D.C. that I hadn’t been in, yet. Without doing something like this, how will I ever see the whole city?
Pete would wait in the car while James and I took bags and boxes to the doors. Some folks weren’t home or weren’t answering, but most people came to the door. Some wanted to visit a little, some didn’t. Everyone was grateful, everyone smiled to see us. The man in charge told us when we were in our huddle that a lot of these older folks had been in their houses for forty years, fifty years.
“They were in their neighborhoods when the civil rights riots were happening, through the crack epidemic in the ’80s. Now the neighborhoods are changing and it’s… I mean, if anyone earned the right to be there, to stay there, it’s them.”
James and I were buzzed into one house that was all shuttered up. From the outside, it looked empty. We stepped into an entryway that was dark but tidy. The whole place had a strange smell to it: a combination of face powder, dust, and canned green beans.
“Coming down,” a weak voice called from upstairs. James and I stood by the beautiful, dusty oak bannister and watched an elderly woman ride a chair lift slowly, slowly down the stairs. James and I were patient and talked to her while she made the trip. Pearl had big sunglasses on, compression socks, a housedress, and orthopedic shoes. Her dark skin was ashy and she didn’t have many teeth, but — and I’m not just saying this — she looked great. She was getting around. She was sharp. When James asked her how long she had lived here, she said, with great pride, “Forty-nine years, honey, right here.”
“We love this bannister,” James said. “It’s beautiful.”
“It was painted, you know, but that wouldn’t do, so I did it.”
I wasn’t sure I had heard correctly. “I’m sorry, Pearl, did you say that you stripped the bannister and stained it?”
“Yes, I did.”
James and I took the box of groceries to the kitchen, visited a while longer, and then went back out to the car to go to the next spot. The group meets several times a month. I plan to join them again, and probably a lot.
*The organization is remarkable not just for the service it provides but for its efficiency, history, and reach. If you’re in the D.C. area and think you might like to do some community service, I can’t recommend WAF enough.
I do not know or care what kind of fern this is. I couldn’t even put it into the post until I was ready to hit “Publish.”
I took a pleasant walk with my friend Elle, her baby Miles, and her husband Brian at the National Arboretum on Saturday. This was after my first experience delivering groceries to seniors with We Are Family, which you can read about here; a full report on that tomorrow.
The weather was chilly — I have a knack for going to gorgeous gardens under steely gray skies — but the stroll was perfect. Brian stayed in the car while Miles napped and urged Elle and I to start off ahead. We went to the Bonsai garden and I learned a lot about Bonsai trees, namely that they do not grow like that on their own. It takes me awhile, but I get there.
We were remarking on life and plants and I thought I’d share something rather personal and embarrassing with Elle, something I don’t tell many people because it is just so totally weird. But in the circumstances… Well, I went for it.
“Elle? I have this weird fear. Like a phobia.”
“Oh? What’s that?”
“I’m deathly afraid of ferns.”
Elle laughed, not cruelly, but in surprise. “Like, fern-ferns? Ferns.”
I nodded and tried to explain. “It’s the spidery-ness. The uncurling thing. They’re so big. And dark. Prehistoric, you know? They seem really, really old and really, really…intelligent. And they’re vascular. Like, they’re described as vascular plants. That is so…” but I shuddered and couldn’t finish my sentence. Elle granted that the fern characteristics I described had a slight creep-factor, but clearly she did not feel the same way about ferns.
Friends, I do hope you feel that when you read this blog you often come away having learned something of value, and not just about my hilarious family. But if you’ve never learned anything before, you’re about to: there is a name for my fern phobia. It’s pteridophobia. It’s a thing. It is so a thing that not only did spellcheck not freaking underline it — I’m not alone. In fact, there is a very, very famous person who also was pteridophobic. Would you like to know who that person was?
Sigmund Freud.
When I read this, I choked on my juice. Spluttering and coughing, I put my laptop to the side and jumped up so I didn’t get juice on my laptop or the couch, just on my pretty vest.
“What?!” I hollered. “Sigmund Freud was afraid of ferns??” I picked my laptop back up and wiped my chin. My eyes were big as dinner plates and glued to the screen, now; I clicked this and that tab, trusting but verifying. It’s true: Freud was deathly afraid of ferns.
Do you realize what this means?? Sigmund Freud was not just the father of psychoanalysis, he was also the father of phobic baggage. He made people feel worse about their phobias than they already did! Some nice guy was afraid of banana cream pie and then Freud got a hold of him and you know what happened to that guy. And here I am, a person with the same phobia Freud himself had?? And it’s ferns?? Do I not brood enough? Am I not hyper-analytical (emotionally speaking) enough? I am now bound to Freud in our irrational fear. We are sister and brother in weirdness, bound forever by unbearable terror when we step into a greenhouse full of…
Full of…
I can’t say it. Please don’t make me say it… Siggy! Siggy, I’m afraid… Run, honey! Run!!!
