I MISSED A DAY

Oh well. So much for NaBloPoMo.

Today I am attempting to clean up my desk and my house and the OMG piles of paper everywhere.

And, because sometimes I roll that way, I'm listing weird shite on eBay, like a petticoat from Laura Ashley that I wore in high school. It was meant to be worn peeking out from under one of those Victorian-meets-prairie cotton flannel dresses.

And it has now been kicking around my house, unworn, for far too long.

Last year, I fell into a headline trap and bought a pair of those Rothy's shoes. I so liked the idea of them, but I just didn't like the way they fit me.

Them? They're going on eBay too.

How about you? Are you a throw it away person, a give it to Goodwill person, a hold onto it until someone needs it person, or a let's put it on eBay person?

Because, Science

November isn’t just NaBloPoMo, it’s also Lung Cancer Awareness Month; as a result, my sister has been posting about lung cancer on Facebook every day.

Here’s what she wrote there on Tuesday:

LCAM, Day 13.

I am an atheist. Some would call me a nonbeliever, but that’s incorrect. I believe in a lot of things, just not in a god. You know what I really, really believe in? Science. 

I have spent the past month, leading up to the past three days, immersed in the science of medical research. It has humbled me beyond all comprehension - the funding applications I was charged with reviewing contained the densest, hardest reading I have ever done. Truth be told, I did not understand most of the science. But the scientists and researchers do - and I am in awe of their work.

I am alive today - my awesome cancer friends are alive today - not because of prayers or divine intervention or miracles. Because of science.

​

---

[What she's been participating in is the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs, as a consumer reviewer. She's awesome and I'm proud of her.]

Scent Memory

Odors are powerful. One whiff and your brain whirs, oh yes, I remember that.

I grew up on Long Island, and, as a result, I have traveled through Penn Station often. We would take the train in and out of Manhattan, on visits to museums or expeditions to Broadway shows. Later, I’d change trains at Penn for Amtrak, to get back and forth to college. Summers, I commuted - a daily passenger.
Penn Station then and now always smells to me like donuts. Sweet, oily, distinct. Stale beer and indifferent popcorn, occasional piss, late night vomit - they layer grace notes into the donut aroma. But a whiff of that particular donut small will always jolt me back to hours spent waiting at or traversing through Penn.

For years now, I’ve commuted daily through Grand Central Terminal. It’s a palace, a wonder, a temple, especially as compared to Penn Station. Penn is low-ceilinged, subterranean, warren-like; GCT soars, replete with daylight in the main upstairs hall. GCT has never smelled specific to me. Yes, it's briny in the Oyster Bar and smells of solvents near the shoeshine and there are pockets of coffee, onion bagels, diesel fuel, flowers. But there’s no one smell that says “I am in Grand Central”.

The powers that be are building a whole new station under GCT - the Long Island Rail Road will one day stop there, 14 stories underground, providing “East Side Access” (because Penn Station is so far away). It’s supposed to be open and running four years from now.

Recently, one of the stands in the lower level food hall changed hands. I can’t remember what was there before, but now it’s a fancy-pants donut shop. The result, for me, is that now, willy-nilly, GCT smells like Penn Station. It's like the Doughnut Plant is a harbinger of the arrival of the Long Island Rail Road.

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Be Prepared

I, curmudgeon, am usually exasperated by tourists and strollers and tourists with strollers at rush hour? OMG.

This morning, the downtown express was unusually uncrowded, and the family of four tourists plus two strollers wasn't in the way.

And the father? He caught my eye, because attached to his baseball cap he had two hair elastics and one barrette.

It warmed the cockles of my cold black heart to see how well prepared he was for the inevitable hair emergency that was going to befall his three-year-old daughter.

Kudos, stranger!

[I did find myself singing Be Prepared to myself. Because, curmudgeon.]

Words from the girl, and other matters of importance

"This womanhood stuff is disgusting!" (pause) "But maybe my tits will get bigger."

Wielding a bowl and a pair of chopsticks: "This is the best way to eat hot Cheetos, because you don't get red dust on your hands."

"Japan is attacking!" Me, blank look. "You know, white underpants, red blood...?"

* * * * * * *

I don't know about your house, but in ours, there are two female people and one male person. This results in rather too many conversations at the dinner table about matters of the uterus, many attempts to make Daddy squeamish, and long groans at how awful it all is. The final straw - for my husband, anyway - might have been the Diva cup discussion over breakfast.

We have also had conversations about how lucky we are here in these United States, where most of us have easy access to sanitary pads and tampons, and where menstrual cups and period underpants exist, and where we have high tech apps that predict just when to expect to have the painters in.

That said, there are plenty of women and girls in the US who have have trouble getting menstrual supplies. Schools do not always recognize that teen-aged girls may need pads or tampons, because their cycles may be erratic and their period arrives when they're unprepared, or because they haven't the money to buy the goods. Prisons and jails often fail to supply adequate quantities of pads. Shelters may not have supplies available.

Happily, New York City passed a landmark law "to ensure access to menstrual products in public schools, shelters and corrections facilities." And Free the Tampons "believes that every bathroom outside the home should provide freely accessible items that people who menstruate need for their periods. We think menstruators shouldn't have to worry about an unexpected physical need becoming an overwhelming emotional ordeal." And just last week, Nevada became the tenth state to lift the "tampon tax" - meaning that there's no state sales tax on tampons and sanitary pads.

Women and girls are not so lucky in other parts of the world.

In Kenya though, ZanaAfrica supplies pads to girls who need them.

And in India, Arunachalam Muruganantham, the Indian sanitary pad revolutionary invented a simple machine that enables village women to produce their own pads for sale.

What is important about our dinner table conversations is that we are having them. There is no shame in a bodily function like menstruation; and failure to discuss only leads to misinformation and stigma, and - in fact - is a human rights concern for girls and women.

Remember: human rights are women's rights and women's rights are human rights.

The Birds And The Bees

The astute reader may have surmised that I am cleaning out my drafts folder. What better project than #NaBloPoMo?!

If you have children, and are in need of literature with which to guide them vis-à-vis the birds and the bees, I would like to heartily recommend the following three books by Robie H. Harris and Michael Emberley.

Ages 4-8
It's Not the Stork!: A Book About Girls, Boys, Babies, Bodies, Families and Friends

Ages 7-10
It's So Amazing!: A Book about Eggs, Sperm, Birth, Babies, and Families

Age 10+
It's Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex, and Sexual Health

They are funny, dispassionate, and inclusive.

On the Inanity of Plastic Bags

I am amused by the shite I have found in my drafts folder.

How about this?

Title:.
The plastic bag songs

Text:.
Katy Perry
"Firework"
Do you ever feel like a plastic bag
Drifting through the wind, wanting to start again?
Do you ever feel, feel so paper thin
Like a house of cards, one blow from caving in?

Train
"Drive By"
Oh I swear to you
I'll be there for you
This is not a drive by
Just a shy guy looking for a two-ply
Hefty bag to hold my love

Right. Apparently I was briefly obsessed with pop songs referencing plastic bags. There are a lot of them! Why do I care? Because it's inane? Because it is inane!

I do like that the internet is like one enormous concordance. You want songs about "plastic bags"? We got 'em. Prefer "hefty bags"? We got them too.

Honestly, though, do you ever feel like a plastic bag, looking for a hefty bag to hold your love?

Oy.


​

My Favorite Baby

It’s the girl’s 15th birthday. She's lovely. She rides, she sings, she's got a 4.0 grade in trig so far this year.

A couple of weeks ago, she told me she wished she’d been born a year earlier, so she could start learning to drive. “My friend N. is getting her learner’s permit next week, and D’s getting hers at the end of the month. I wish I was turning sixteen.”

I gently pointed out that if she’d been born a year earlier she’d have been a different person.

It’s a funny thing to think about. If you hadn’t been made of that egg and that sperm, who would you be?

And then, somehow, because it seemed related, I told her that I’d had a miscarriage, before she was born. She took it all in stride, as she does most things, and went back to SnapChatting while controlling the car's music. (I liked it when she sat in the back seat and I had total music control. At least I don't hate everything she puts on.)

Yesterday, I was again reminded that miscarriage is one of those taboo subjects - so many people have had one, but until you raise your hand and say "here too", you don't know. Because, it turns out that Michelle Obama had a miscarriage, and went on to use IVF to conceive the two Obama children.

"Reflecting on it now, Mrs. Obama says she wished she knew other women had experienced miscarriages as well — a lesson that would have helped lift the shame she associated with it."

Let's remember to talk about the hard things. It's better when you don't feel alone.

Oh, and wish me luck. She's having 10 girls over for a slumber party tonight.
​

In Which I Demonstrate That I Am Going To Hell

Once upon a time, back when the girl was a baby, I used to lurk on the Urban Baby message boards. It was like front row seats to a train wreck, a delicious mix of schadenfreude and wickedness. I weaned myself of that bad bad habit, but now there's Facebook, specifically the local "moms" page. It's almost as entertaining as Urban Baby used to be, and it's not anonymous.

I used to copy my favorites into a draft post, titled "Best of [   ] Moms". Then I felt bad and stopped doing that. In fact, I stopped lurking because it generally just infuriated me. But I never did delete the draft.

Typos, inanity, excessive punctuation, and a constant searching for honest and reasonable tradespeople: life in the suburbs.

• Would love a recommendation for an eyebrow specialist for my 12 year old for her Bat Mitzvah. Thanks. (No 12 year old needs her eyebrows done.)
• HOSE OR NO HOSE...Black or Nude
• Need some pet insurance advice, please..Our dog came from a good breeder so hoping there are no hidden genetical surprises and am thinking of higher deductible but have no idea. Sorry for inane question on a Sunday morning. (Genetical?)
• Does anyone know a good and cheap handyman that can fix a leaky faucet to a closet door? (Since when do closet doors have faucets?)
• (About middle school kids) These are their formidable years, when bonds and relationships are created. (Formidable!)
• Is anyone interested in buying a pair of brand new UGGs. Long story, but my 12 year old bought them on eBay and ended up with two pairs. She bought them for $90. Let me know if your interested. (Um, why is your 12 year old shopping on eBay?)
• Help mom's : Who to call to get my auto vacuum in the house fixed???? (Car vacuum or central vacuum?)
• I am looking for great closet stretching companies. Any recommendations? (How do you stretch a closet?)
• Can anyone recommend a reasonably priced built-in guy? (I think we all want a built-in guy.)
• Looking for a reliable and honest cleaning lady. Any recommendations would we helpful. Thanks !
• What are people giving for a cash gift at a black tie wedding? It's pretty fancy at the Mandarin Oriental and I'm not sure what the appropriate amount would be. (Sputter...the wedding venue does not the gift determine.)
• Hi. Can anyone recommend a reliable local psychic that does NOT use tea leaves (I am allergic) or a crystal ball (long story). Thanks in advance.
• Has anyone sprayed their lawn for tics? If so has it been effective and which company did you use? (Let's hope the lawn doesn't have Tourette's.)
• i need an excellent creative local accpontant to do my complicared tax return thanks
• Looking to get wood floors refinished. Has anyone hired someone great for this? Thank yo
• DOES ANYONE KNOW OF SOMEONE WHO PAINT ON MY WALLS .LIKE AN ARTIST TYPE OF PAINTER?

On Bra Shopping and Nomenclature

Of all the things that I can think of that are not at all fun, bra shopping is right up there on the list. Over and over, though, people say that Nordstrom is a great place to buy a bra. And I am here to say that they do indeed have excellent customer service. I took the child there a couple of years ago, prepared for a horrendous experience, and I got the nicest down-to-earth woman who took one look at her and said "wait here". A couple of minutes later she turned up with the perfect bra in the right size. I was kind of dumbfounded.

Since then, I have been back to Nordstrom on my own account several times. Every time, though, there's the struggle between my desire for a bra without an underwire, and the fact that nearly all of the bras for sale have underwires. I have given in a couple of times, and ended up with underwire bras that aren't terrible. And once I got a bra with vertical side stays that I ended up removing with an X-Acto knife (because they dug into me something awful). But the holy grail is out there, I know it.

The last time I went, I went because I'd lost weight and the two "best" bras that used to fit no longer fit - the molded cups had sad little air pockets within. So, I hauled myself down to the mall, where you have to pay $3 or $4 to park the car, which always just seems to me to be an abomination, I mean, don't they want you to stay and shop and buy and not feel nickel and dimed by paying for parking? It's a suburban mall, not a parking garage on 44th Street in the theater district! I digress.

The nice and knowledgeable saleswoman at Nordstrom found me a couple of bras that fit. Underwire. Boring. And then I found myself saying to her, plaintively, do you have anything more fun? With that, she disappeared, returning with an armload of this that and the other thing, including some things without wires. It turns out that if you want a wireless bra, you need to ask for a bralette. And if you ask for a bralette, you will have your pick of ridiculous and delightful fluff. I walked out of there with a sober beige bra with side stays (as yet unremoved), a sober black underwire bra, a lacy silver grey bralette, and a lacy royal purple bralette. I mean, I never learned how to be a real girl, but as long as I'm going to have to wear a bra, it might as well amuse me, right?

And reader?

It's all because of nomenclature.

Askew, or Why To Avoid Fast Fashion

I bought a shirt at Target over the summer. I almost never buy clothes there for myself, but it was a cute black and white striped sleeveless shirt, made in a linen knit, with a faux placket detail at the neck and little vee-slits where the side seams meet the hem.

I shouldn’t have bought it. It was cut off square, and every time I wash it, it gets more askew, trying to spiral around me. The side seams twist clockwise, the left to the front, the right to the back. The center back seam veers off center. The front placket skews to the right. No amount of pulling or shaping or blocking will fix it, because the fabric was cut badly.

Every time I wear it, and I do because I’ve found the right cardigan buttoned just so hides the most egregious flaws and lets a bit of the black and white stripes show, I think of my mother. She’d have held it up in the store, noticed that the grain of the fabric was off kilter, declared it flawed, and she wouldn’t have bought it - as cute and as cheap as it was.

Because she sewed, she knew that "the fabric of a garment should be cut either straight along the grain, or in the case of a bias cut, on a clear angle, usually 45 degrees, which allows for the fabric to stretch. If it isn’t cut properly, the garment can pull out of shape with wear." And she taught me enough to know what to look for.

In this case, cute won over prudence. I should have known better.
​

Vote!!

I know. Broken record.

In NY the polls are open from 6 in the morning, to 9 in in the evening. Go. Our country depends on you.

Your vote is your voice. And voting is a right, a privilege and a duty. Do it.

#voteblue

Vote!

Tomorrow (Tuesday November 6th) is Election Day, if you're in one of the many places that doesn't yet have early voting. Please, for the health of our country, vote for the Democrats.

#VOTEBLUE

Carried

Sunday morning, and we are driving to Long Island to visit the newest baby in the family - my brother’s child, my daughter’s cousin.

My daughter is doing French homework in the back seat and I failed to bring a book of my own, so I’ve plunged straight into the book she’s reading in English class: The Things They Carried.

“What’s it about?” asks my husband. “The things they carried” chime Mir and I. They carried guns and photos and gravity and dope and flak jackets and bandages and pebbles.

I progress past her bookmark at page 19 and finish the first story. And make the mistake of mentioning the letters he burned. “I hadn’t gotten that far!” she wails from the back seat.

What do I carry? Lip balm and bandannas and a hair brush even though I nearly never brush my hair except before I leave the house in the morning and before I go to bed. A letter from a friend who died last year and a list of Broadway shows I’d like to see and a tiny micro tool, because you never know.

Last week, the girl rummaged around in the downstairs coat closet and found my old black suede Gap bomber jacket which I bought in the late 80s and haven’t worn in forever. It has a dark green satin lining with paisleys and a small zippered pocket on the left breast. “Check the pocket, there’s a baby inside.” She unzips the pocket, with its sharp toothy brass zipper that feels dangerous as you slip your hand past, and bingo. Tiny plastic baby.

It is a comfort to me that tiny plastic baby is still in the pocket and ever will be, even though I can’t remember where tiny plastic baby came from. But every time I wore that coat, or moved it to a new closet, I checked for tiny plastic baby, “ah yes, there she is”. Carried.

Not Walking the Walk

The Lungevity walk-a-thon was supposed to be last Saturday - but anticipated bad weather forced them to postpone the event a week. So it's today. And again, the weather is yucky. And alas, my sister had plans to be out of town this weekend, and I have stuff to do, and so neither of us are actually going to walk in the actual walk-a-thon.

But.

I personally have raised nearly $2,000, and my sister's team has raised nearly $16,000, and overall, the event has raised almost $134,000. And that's really good. Because - as you know, anyone can get lung cancer - not just smokers.

The facts:

To me, one of the most shocking of those facts is that "lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death, yet only 6% of federal research dollars spent on cancer research are spent on lung cancer".

If you can and would like to contribute, we'd be deeply appreciative. If you're a research-the-charity-before-you-give person, Lungevity has a four star rating from Charity Navigator.



Thank you.

What They Don't Tell You About Teenagers

You know that small children will smear ketchup everywhere and wreak havoc on the knees of their clothes.

What you don't know is that you will one day have teenagers, who use over-the-counter acne medication, and wash their hands inadequately, and RUIN YOUR TOWELS.

And because we only have one bathroom, I have to look at this every day.

Benzoyl peroxide is of the devil.

Pa Rum-Pum Pum Pum

It's the first of November.

I sit down on the train, next to a woman doing a crossword puzzle, but not the same one I will be doing after I've finished reading the hard news. I think to myself "crosswords unite" and settle in.

Muffled deep in her bag, her cell phone rings - but not the usual default ringtone. No, it's...and she pulls it out of her bag, thus unmuffling it, her cell ring tone is “Little Drummer Boy”.

I have lost the “Little Drummer Boy” challenge before it’s begun.

I did, however, lean over to her and tell her that her ring tone had made my day.

Because honestly? I love me some Christmas music - even if it is only November 1st.
​

In Which We Adapt An Iconic Recipe

The cake of memory is the NYT plum torte. Summer is not complete without it. And yet, made as perennially printed by the Times, it is not especially low-carb friendly, clocking in (according to VeryWell's calculator) at 43 grams per serving.

In an effort to tamp down the carb count and lower the glycemic index, I replaced some of the sugar with coconut sugar, and all of the white flour with half spelt, half almond meal. And because I had some sad, mealy, end of season peaches, I used them instead of plums. The result? Lovely. Full flavored, nicely textured, and 2/3 of the carbs as the original. Whole grains, for the win. Sure, it's still not "low carb", but sometimes one really needs a little sweet, especially while watching the Great British Baking Show after dinner.

Peach Cake

1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup coconut sugar
1/2 cup softened butter
1/2 cup spelt
1/2 cup almond meal
1 teaspoon baking powder
Pinch of salt (optional)
2 eggs
1 1/2 peaches, sliced
Cinnamon sugar

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• In a mixer, cream the sugars and butter. Add the flours, baking powder, salt and eggs; beat well.
• Spoon and spread the batter into a greased 8" pan - either a springform, or a regular pan with a disk of parchment in the bottom. Arranged the sliced peaches in a neat fan around the batter, and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.
• Bake 55-60 minutes. Let cool on a rack for 10 minutes, remove from pan and let cool on a rack until it's time to slide onto a serving plate. Serve plain, or with whipped cream if you're fancy.

Because I am a completist...

And because Phryne Fisher is just the escapist ticket these days.

No, I didn't read them in order. (I'm not that compulsive.) It doesn't really matter, but there is some character development from book to book.

The TV show is great too.

36 hours

The shadow
flying over there
is the plane
I am on.
We converge
with a shudder
and the rumble of
wheels on the ground.
Together again.




The girl and I just went to North Carolina for 36 hours, just like the New York Times travel section columns! We were there for a family wedding - but carved out enough time to go shopping, eat barbecue, have breakfast with old blogging friends, and tour the Governor's Mansion.

And today, I have spent the day moving papers from here to there, tying a little baby quilt, making weird seedy hardtack, and in the pile of papers, I found this little ridiculous poem that I'd jotted down once upon a time - on a trip to Detroit, in point of fact.

Flying is weird, and requires magical thinking, but I'd never have gone to North Carolina for 36 hours otherwise.

The Annual #FuckCancer/Happy Birthday Post

83, she would’ve been, today. I think of her every day. I think she would’ve been delighted that we went to visit the island from which her father‘s family had come, off the coast of Germany (and I can’t believe she never went there). I think she’d be horrified and dismayed by the revelations of bad behavior at the New York City Ballet. I know she would be angry and sad at the political state of this country right now. She would love my beautiful daughter, with her big heart and burning desire to succeed and her grandmother’s love of riding - which skipped a generation. (I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve been on a horse, and one of those was a mule.) She’d be tickled that I planted a New Dawn rose that scrambles up my back deck, and wholly supportive of my repair & recycle sewing projects.

[Remember the external fixator?]

I miss her.

#fuckcancer

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If you are inclined to remember Moky, perhaps you’d support my walk-a-thon effort. My sister - who also has lung cancer - has again put together a team for a Lungevity event next month. Join us IRL (!), or by making a contribution. Lungevity does good work funding scientific research, educating on early detection, and providing patient support to help "people live better with lung cancer and dramatically improve on the current 18% five-year survival rate". And, they have a 4 star rating from Charity Navigator.
​

Click the Donate button below, or use this link to Lungevity.



Thank you.

A Four Penny Dreadful

As you will remember, from time to time I rail about charitable solicitations that have annoyed me - especially when there are live stamps or actual dimes involved.

Yesterday brought a new iteration of the live stamp mishegoss.

Yes. The organization glued four penny stamps onto a business reply mail envelope. In other words, the organization just wasted four cents on that mailing because if the BRM comes back, the post office is going to charge them whatever they charge for a BRM (first class postage plus a surcharge which varies depending on how many pieces come back), and if the envelope doesn’t come back, the four cents is gone like the wind. And, since the return rate on charitable solicitations is generally low (like in the single digits low), nearly 95% of those penny stamps are going in the garbage.

You may say “but I’ll add my own stamp so the charity doesn’t have to pay”. Whatcha gonna do, use a Forever stamp that you have sitting around, or rustle up 46¢ worth of stamps? You’re unlikely to do the latter, so it’s a waste of 4¢. Plus, in my experience, even though some postage paid BRM envelopes say something like “use your own stamp and help us more”, like this one does, the post office does not always recognize that. You put your stamp on, the post office may well charge the charity the BRM rate anyway. (I have seen this happen; it’s one of the reasons we’ve given up on BRM mail in my office.)

End result?

International Rescue Committee is off of my list.

Cautionary tale for you?

Don’t put a stamp on a Business Reply Mail envelope.

Tabbouleh, variant

My mother's stock in trade dish for the annual Labor Day potluck was always tabbouleh. Bulgur, mint, parsley, olive oil and lots of lemon juice.

Yesterday, I needed a side salad to go with some pork chops. I had a little bit of bulgur, a half a can of chickpeas, and a cucumber, so I whacked together a tabbouleh variant. I posted a picture on Instagram, because it was cheerful, and someone asked for the recipe. There wasn't one. So:

Tabbouleh with Chick Peas

• 1/3 cup of dried bulgur
• 2/3 cup boiling water
• 1/2 can of rinsed chickpeas
• handful of cherry tomatoes, halved
• 1/2 a cucumber, chopped
• 1/2 a sweet red pepper, chopped
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• handful of parsley, chopped
• handful of mint, chopped
• salt
• pepper
• 2-3 T. olive oil
• 2-3 T. white wine vinegar

Put bulgur in a bowl, add boiling water and cover. Let stand for 10-15 minutes. Drain if necessary, and return to bowl. Add all other ingredients, and mix. Taste and season as necessary. If you want to be fancy, chop the onion and soak it in the vinegar while the bulgur is steeping. That'll take some of the bite out of the onion. This is enough for four people as a side dish.

Reflections On Traveling in Northern Europe In August 2018

There are wind farms everywhere.

There are many solar panels deployed.

Nearly every single toilet is dual flush.

We stayed in six hotels. In five of them, you had to put your key card in a slot inside the door in order to "turn on" the electricity in the room. No card, no lights. No card, no iPhone charging.

Hotel hallway lights were on motion sensors. Open the door, and the lights go on. Walk down the hall, and the lights go on in segments ahead of you.

In five of the six hotels, there were no amenities of the sort you find in all American hotels - just a wall mounted soap dispenser near the sink, and one in the shower. No conditioner, no lotion, (no souvenirs). In a couple of hotels, the product was the same at both the sink and the shower. In others, it was hand soap by the sink, and shampoo/body wash in the shower. When it comes down to it, is there a difference?

In five of the six hotels, the queen/king bed came with Two. Separate. Duvets. One for each of us. In all seriousness? This is genius. No stealing of covers possible. I may have to institute this at home.

Walking is everything.

There are nearly no overhead wires. Occasionally in the countryside, you see distribution lines. But all of the general electricity and telecommunications is delivered via buried lines. In the city, overhead lighting is suspended from cables.

Traffic is frequently calmed via chicanes - a little zig-zag just to slow you down. I think some chicanes would be useful in my town.

Roundabouts are everywhere.

Denmark is nearly cashless - although I had some cash, I didn't need it and could have gotten away with having none.

Translated signage will never not make me laugh.

Cluny Brown

There's a periodic book column in the New York Times, called "The Enthusiast", described as "an occasional column dedicated to the books we love to read and reread." Several months ago, the column's subject was Margery Sharp - an author heretofore unknown to me (despite a whole mess of children's books that seem like books I should know). Charmed by the description of "Cluny Brown", I put it on hold at the library. And waited. And read some other books. And finally, a couple of weeks ago, "Cluny Brown" was mine to borrow.

I picked it up and was irrationally pleased to find that it was in that increasingly rare library binding: indestructible buckram. The cover is brown on beige, in a sort of feathered marble pattern.

The title is stamped on the spine in no-nonsense capitals.

And best, because it's a book that's been in circulation since about 1972, it's got a due date card pocket inside the back cover. Which, in my considered opinion, is the best place to store your bookmark.

So much pleasure from the merely physical aspects of the book. And! But! Happily, it is a wonderful book. Cluny is an idiosyncratic character of the highest order, and moves through life in a rather different plane than those around her. A plumber's niece, she has the temerity to take herself to tea at the Ritz "all on her own, to see what it was like."

At the end of Chapter 4, a foreign visitor has arrived at the Devon country house at which Cluny is now in service as a parlormaid.

Thus layer by layer, without any conscious effort, the oyster that was Friars Carmel smoothed and overlaid its grain of sand, producing, like a pearl, a distinguished Professor, met at a British Embassy, recovering from an operation, and fond of horses.

No such process, naturally, was applied to the new parlormaid.

Indeed, her entrance, at the beginning of Chapter 5, is spectacular and distinctly unparlourmaidlike:

Cluny Brown arrived at Friars Carmel in a Rolls-Royce.

Cluny simply doesn't act in the ways in which people expect a plumber's niece parlourmaid to act. She's delightful, and so is the book.

Yes. Yes I have.

For reasons of my own, I changed my diet a couple of months ago. Mind you, I am not dieting, I am not on a diet. If I were on a diet, I wouldn’t be having that glass of Sauvignon Blanc with Rachel Maddow every night, now would I?

No, I changed my diet to address a health situation. I’ve done this before - I went on a strict low-fat diet when I was pregnant because my gall bladder up and rebelled and a low-fat diet is what held surgery at bay, because like any sane person I was trying to avoid a gall bladder removal while enceinte. It’s one of those things that’s doable, but better to avoid, IYKWIM.

The inadvertent side effect of the change in diet is that I’ve lost weight. I don’t know really know how much, because I don’t own a scale, but several pairs of jeans are now sporting Frankensteinian alterations. (Let’s put it this way: I can’t go out in public with my shirt tucked in, unless I’m wearing a cardigan, if I’m wearing those jeans.) And people - friends, co-workers, acquaintances - have commented. “Have you lost weight?” “You’ve lost weight.” “Hey, skinny!” “You look great!”

And here’s what makes me decidedly uncomfortable. Every time I hear that “you’ve lost weight”, I also hear an unstated condemnation. “You needed to lose weight.” “You were too fat.” Telling me I look great means I didn’t look great before?

It is unsettling.

Mind you, I’m not unhappy about the weight loss. It’s not because of a “bad” “condition” like cachexia - it’s because of the food choices I’ve been making. I’m down to something like how much I was when I got pregnant 15 years ago, and I’ve been higher than my delivery weight for a few years now.

But, like friend on Facebook said recently, “The assumption that any weight loss is chosen freely and a cause for celebration is a big cultural enshrinement of fatphobia and I'm so done with it.”

Not too long ago, I came across a blog post that talked about this very issue: weight loss is not always desired, not always healthy, not always good. Thinner is not necessarily better. Kim Bongiorno says “Why feel shame about our beautiful bodies? Each is different, and it’s wonderful”.

She says it a lot better than I can, and I urge you to read her post.

Or read Roxane Gay. She curated a series on Medium, called Unruly Bodies, exploring all of this stuff.

If you’d rather, read Gay’s book Hunger. She writes beautifully about so many things: race, privilege, body image, personhood, education, intelligence. But how she talks about being fat - really fat - is powerful stuff, especially at the intersection of public opinion and internal struggle.

p. 120 (chapter 31) - "When you're overweight, your body becomes a matter of public record in many respects"...[people make comments]..."They forget you are a person. You are your body, nothing more, and your body should damn well become less."

p. 137 - "What does it say about our culture that the desire for weight loss is considered a default feature of womanhood?"

p. 175 (chapter 51) - "I have two wardrobes." "...every day...These are the clothes I feel safe in." "My other wardrobe, the one that dominates most of my closet, is full of the clothes I don't have the courage to wear." "When I slide back into my uniform, that cloak of safety returns."

p. 205 - "This is no way to live but this is how I live."

Our bodies are ours. Think twice before you say something about weight loss or weight gain. Do you really want to mention the dark circles under someone's eyes? Like my niece said once, “Commentary on my looks or anyone's is not welcome banter.”

Although, I’ll not be unhappy if you notice that my hair is a little bit purple, because that - dying my hair an eccentric color - amuses the hell out of me.

Crazy Trip™

I have a friend who is wont to fly off to an exotic (or domestic) locale, for merely a long weekend. She calls those Crazy Trips™. This weekend, we emulated her.

The child is attending a two week summer camp, in upstate New York, roughly midway between Buffalo and Rochester. She needed to be dropped off yesterday, a Sunday, so I came up with the glorious idea of driving to Niagara Falls on Saturday, and staying overnight. Because, in all my born days, I had never been to Niagara Falls.

So off we went, early in the morning. We dropped our stuff at our overpriced mediocre hotel and headed straight for Canada. The falls are indeed spectacular, and indeed better seen from Canada.

Horseshoe Falls, from Canada

Note red navigation buoy near falls. If you're navigating near there, I think you're toast.

After a side trip driveby of scenic Niagara on the Lake, we retreated to our depressing hotel, where the TV set defaulted to Fox News.

In the morning, we walked down to the Niagara Falls State Park (proximity being the only saving grace of the mediocre hotel), and got on line for the Maid of the Mist because I am a sucker for a good tourist attraction, and the Maid of the Mist is, as my friend Yale said to me on Facebook, "the shit". I grinned like a fool for the entire little trip into the waterfall.

Horseshoe Falls from Maid of the Mist

American Falls in the foreground, as seen from the cantilevered viewing platform at the top of the elevator down to the boats

Then we hit the road.

My demand for the weekend had been Niagara Falls; my husband's was an exploration of the Erie Canal. Lockport was the location of a double set of five locks when the canal was originally built; later, a modern two step set was built alongside. The old locks are partly extant, and on weekends, a team of volunteers demonstrate the workings of the hand-moved wooden gates. Happily we got to Lockport at just the right moment - a paddlewheeler and two kayakers were coming through the 100 year old "modern" lock, and the volunteers were putting the adjacent antique gates through their paces.

Antique canal lock gate, at Lockport

One of my favorite bits was the pair of men in t-shirts labeled STAFF. On closer inspection, they turned out to be staff of the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum, some two hundred miles to the east. I asked one, "busman's holiday?" He grinned and copped as such.

Even though we'd seen Lake Ontario from Niagara on the Lake, we decided to detour north before heading for camp. We ended up in Olcott, a tiny adorable town with a 25 cent carousel and a Wurlitzer Band Organ. Why yes, I did have to stop and make a video.

Because it was awesome, and it was right there.

Boxes of Wurlitzer Band Organ rolls

Finally, we walked over to the shores of Lake Ontario. I wasn't prepared to go swimming, but I did have waterproof sandals on, so in I went. It's the first time I've been in a Great Lake.

Lake Ontario

To the child's great happiness, we concluded our sightseeing and headed straight to camp.

Signed, sealed, delivered, a whirlwind 24 hours.

Summer Kitchen

For, I dunno, the past 10 years, I've been saying to my husband that I want an electric oven installed in the garage. You see, I love to bake and I especially like to bake in the summer when there are summer fruits like rhubarb and peaches and other things that demand to be made into cobblers and galettes and pies and crisps. And, in my mind, it's totally logical to have an oven in the garage, because the garage door opens into the kitchen, and the last time the kitchen was renovated (before us), all the cabinets were recycled into a work area in the garage (and another in the cellar).

And the reason that I don't bake so much in the summer is that the house is only very lightly air-conditioned, specifically window units in the two upstairs bedrooms and nothing on the first floor, and who wants to turn on the oven in the summer heat?

Finally, over the weekend, I had a brainstorm. Since it didn't seem like I was getting a real oven in the garage anytime soon because running a 220V line was going to be complicated and expensive, I thought hey, they make big fancy toaster ovens, that'll do.

A modicum of internet research and an online order later, I am now the proud owner of a toaster oven big enough for 9 slices of toast, a whole chicken, or a 13" pizza.

Let the baking commence!

Recycling

I engaged in some gonzo gardening today. The quince had grown up and over on one side, and the privet and a burning bush had grown up and over on the other, and the little path of grass down the side of the yard to the lower terrace had become a tunnel. Besides the fact that the grass didn't much like all the shade, the tunnel wasn't quite head high, so it was an ordeal to transverse.

Out came the loppers. Chop, chop, chop and I had a pile of branches to haul down the hill. As I came back up, my heart stopped: there was a bird's nest in the grass, wrenched out of the quince.



I didn't find any evidence of eggs, so I am hoping that it was an unused or vacated nest.

But when I picked it up, my heart sobbed again. Besides grasses and twigs, one of the building materials for the nest was the cellophane wrapper from a pack of cigarettes.



Shall I be glad that the bird was so cleverly thrifty? Or sad that the cigarette wrapper was there for the taking?

The glass, she is half full and she is half empty.

It Takes Three To Land A Steelhead

Back in 1998, I went on a fishing/camping trip with my father, my husband, three other family members, three guides and a baggage barge guy who set up camp every night. We were on the Deschutes, in Oregon - a beautiful river that flows north from Bend to the Columbia. We traveled downstream in boats, but stopped to fish; fishing is only allowed from the bank.

I'd been skeptical about spending four days on the water, and three nights in tents, but it turned out to be the perfect vacation - there were no decisions to be made except whether to change your underwear. And that was a serious consideration, because it was cold enough that your wet boot laces were iced up every morning.

At one point, we had a hella exciting run with a fish, which my father wrote up for some fishing oriented magazine - but they never published it. Because he was writing for publication, he left out a key detail: at some point we scrabbled into the boat and chased that fish downstream.

A couple of weeks ago, he mailed me a copy of what he'd written, followed by the photos. Since it never did get published, I'm sharing it now.

Here's what he wrote, nearly twenty years ago.

---

While steelhead fishing on the great Deschutes River in Oregon this past October, my daughter, Maggie, and I had a singular experience with a beautiful, wild, male steelhead. Maggie was fishing upstream of me with Dan Bastian of Rising Trout Guides and Outfitters in Bend, Oregon. We were near Kaskela, about 18 miles downriver from Warm Springs, at the foot of the Mutton Mountains. She was working a brown stonefly nymph with a trailing small green rock worm, tied by Bill Sheppard, who was also guiding with Dan on the trip. The green rock worm was tied on a #2457 Tiemco hook, size 12, with a rainbow crystal bead behind the eye, a light green vinyl body and a grey ostrich herl behind the bead.

Maggie was having some success with the nymphing rig and Dan took the rod to demonstrate how she could cover more water by making longer casts and mending the line. On his second cast there was a terrific slashing strike; immediately, the fish made a heroic, acrobatic leap. Dan clearly saw the green rock worm in the mouth of a beautiful, very colorful, steelhead.

The fish hit the water and took off downstream like an express train. I heard the commotion behind me and looked back to see Maggie and Dan in the river. I heard Dan ask Maggie "are you ready?" and saw him hand her the charged rod. The rod, a four-piece six-weight Sage with a #2 Ross Gunnerson reel, was pointing straight downstream. The reel sang as I watched the line and backing disappearing after the steelhead.

I headed upstream for the camera and as I pulled abreast of Maggie I shouted "raise your rod tip!" She tried but could not. I dropped my rod, vest and wading staff and joined her in the river. Try as she might, Maggie could not lift the rod; she calmly turned to me and said "Pop, the line is all gone." She showed me the reel; the backing was down to the spindle. I took the rod and ran.

I was struck by the fact that the hook, the leader, the line and the backing all held; there was a straight pull between me and the fish. I stumbled downstream and finally began to gain backing. I was able to get out of the river and make better progress on dry land.

At one point, as I ran on, the fish slipped into an eddy downstream and seemed to stop. In a blink the rod shot straight up, the backing twisted around the rod near the tip top and the rod came apart at the top section. In a word - a "mess." Trying to stay calm, I untangled the backing and reassembled the rod; I took up the strain and felt that the fish was still on. Off I went.

As I rounded a bend in the river, Maggie, Dan and his McKenzie River boat caught up to me and the fish moved into a wide, shallow area of calm water. Both the fish and I were out of gas.

Dan got out of the boat, Maggie got the camera and together we landed, photographed and released a very beautiful, wild Deschutes River steelhead.

On examination, we found that the green rock worm was impaled in the pectoral fin of the fish, the tippet on the rock worm was broken and the stonefly nymph was in the fish's tail. We surmised that when the steelhead first jumped, it hit the leader with its tail and broke off the rock worm, only to hook itself on the stonefly nymph. The fish's hectic, powerful rush downriver was explained by it being foul-hooked in the tail. We carefully removed the hooks, rested the steelhead and sent him on his way. We all agreed that it was fortunate that the gear held and we were able to free the fish of the hooks and line.

I hope that this fish will reproduce and put his determination and indomitable will into future generations so that the Deschutes River will continue to be an exciting, as well as beautiful, place to fish in the years ahead.

---

Thanks, Pop.

Doulas, Mortality and Racism

Did you read the cover story in yesterday's New York Times magazine? It's titled "Why America’s Black Mothers and Babies Are in a Life-or-Death Crisis" and it is a compelling, and heartbreaking, and horrifically shocking tale of infant and maternal mortality in the US, in particular in black women and babies. Read it. Read it and get fired up. This is wrong. Here are a few excerpts:

Black infants in America are now more than twice as likely to die as white infants — 11.3 per 1,000 black babies, compared with 4.9 per 1,000 white babies, according to the most recent government data — a racial disparity that is actually wider than in 1850, 15 years before the end of slavery, when most black women were considered chattel. In one year, that racial gap adds up to more than 4,000 lost black babies. Education and income offer little protection. In fact, a black woman with an advanced degree is more likely to lose her baby than a white woman with less than an eighth-grade education.

The United States is one of only 13 countries in the world where the rate of maternal mortality — the death of a woman related to pregnancy or childbirth up to a year after the end of pregnancy — is now worse than it was 25 years ago. Each year, an estimated 700 to 900 maternal deaths occur in the United States…Black women are three to four times as likely to die from pregnancy-related causes as their white counterparts, according to the C.D.C.

The reasons for the black-white divide in both infant and maternal mortality have been debated by researchers and doctors for more than two decades. But recently there has been growing acceptance of what has largely been, for the medical establishment, a shocking idea: For black women in America, an inescapable atmosphere of societal and systemic racism can create a kind of toxic physiological stress, resulting in conditions — including hypertension and pre-eclampsia — that lead directly to higher rates of infant and maternal death. And that societal racism is further expressed in a pervasive, longstanding racial bias in health care — including the dismissal of legitimate concerns and symptoms — that can help explain poor birth outcomes even in the case of black women with the most advantages.

I don't know about you, but I am appalled. Part of me wants to quit my my job and become a doula, or an advocate for women's health, or a midwife, or something. Since none of that seems all that practical, I searched up the organizations mentioned in the Times article as working in this sphere. I'll make some donations; maybe you want to too. Because I like doing my due diligence, the link to the 990s for the non-profits is included.

Birthwaves
990

BirthWaves provides families with doula services after the loss of their pregnancy or infant. Services will be provided by unbiased, nonjudgmental and caring individuals who are trained to offer bereavement support. BirthWaves does not discriminate based on race, religion, income or any other social or economic status.

Physicians for Reproductive Health
990

Physicians for Reproductive Health unites the medical community and concerned supporters. Together, we work to improve access to comprehensive reproductive health care, including contraception and abortion, especially to meet the health care needs of economically disadvantaged patients.

Sisters Keeper (Mother Health International)
990

Mother Health International (MHI) is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization dedicated to respond and provide relief to pregnant women and children in areas of disaster, war and extreme economic poverty. We are committed to reducing maternal, infant and child mortality rates by creating culturally competent and sustainable birth centers using the midwifery model of care. We currently work with midwives in areas where the burden of perinatal mortality is extremely high. In each country we have clinics staffed by traditional midwives who work side by side with local nurse midwives and visiting ‘resident’ midwives from around the world.

Sistersong (Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective)
990

Sistersong’s mission is to strengthen and amplify the collective voices of indigenous women and women of color to achieve reproductive justice by eradicating reproductive oppression and securing human rights.

The last organization isn't actually a non-profit; it's a collective. They do ask for donations, though, and they are the organization that helped Simone Landrum birth her last child, her third child and fourth pregnancy.

Birthmark Doulas

Birthmark Doula Collective is a birth justice organization dedicated to supporting, informing and advocating for pregnant and parenting people and their families in New Orleans.

Pregnant woman need appropriate health care, babies need to be born alive, and endemic racism has to stop.