Category: Uncategorized (page 7 of 11)

Cherry, peach, apple.

For me, these words conjure thirst quenching juices, a summer road trip to Door County, Wisconsin, an Autumn farmer’s market where I chose Honey Crisps and Pink Lady’s to devour, and pies, oh yes, buttery crust pies complimented by warm, sweet-tart fruit filling. I can barely write that last part without my mouth watering.

Now, I gratefully have another reason to sample the pleasures of cherries, peaches, and apples…moonshine.

Our friend Mercedes just returned from a North Carolina holiday to gift us with four Mason jars of her brother’s private still. We haven’t tried them yet, because honestly, we are a little afraid of their potency, but Mercedes has reassured us that with the right mixer, we will enjoy them easy.

A part of me wants to try them pure, because long ago, I did try a sip of some Kentucky shine. I remember that it felt like drinking fire, and I didn’t hate this feeling. And there’s a history of bootlegging in my family, so it seems fitting, like taking a little sip of history, recalling the U.S.’s relationship with alcohol. It might taste a little bitter, like how what was once so forbidden, illegal, and a product of the poor has now worked its way into popular culture. If memory serves me, it will taste hard, like the terrible, shameful parts of our history. But it might taste smooth too, like the music and literature of the South.*

Yup. This shine will be complex.  I’ll drink it soon, and I’ll search for cocktail recipes to see what I find. I’m sure the hipsters have come up with something, and I write this with sincere gratitude for their creativity.

Bottoms up!

*With Funny Duchess, I do try to avoid any political slants, but I’ve just finished reading an excellent collection of essays called We Learn Nothing by Tim Kreider. I must admit that his tone and voice have slipped into this post a bit. I highly recommend his work. Obviously, it stays with you. Thank you Tim for making me laugh and think.

My mother-in-law and I are in our very own, two-person Book Club. We average about one book a month. Because she lives across the country, we pick a date after we’ve both finished reading, and then we have marathon conversations over the phone. We use sticky notes to mark the passages we love, and we end up favoring the same words. Our books make us laugh, think, and cry. Some books take us over, leaving us almost speechless.

We tend to gravitate toward writers who charm us with great characters, vivid descriptions, tasty sentences, and unique approaches to telling the story. Below is a list of some of the books we read in 2015. I’ve included favorite impressions of each one. Enjoy!

The Wolf Border by Sarah Hall…One of the best passages in this book occurs in the beginning. The main character has a flashback to when she was a little girl living on a wolf reserve. She walks along a fence line in the dark, and she can sense the presence of a wolf walking on the other side, in step with her. She is fascinated and flattered that the wolf wants to be with her in this way. What follows is a story about her work as part of a team to reintroduce wolves into northern England. The author draws parallels between wolf and human behavior, and her descriptions of the landscape made us both want to go to northern England and Scotland.

The Transcriptionist by Amy Roland…The premise of this novel is fantastic! The main character, Lena, works as a transcriptionist for a big city newspaper. She meets a blind woman on a bus. They converse, and Lena feels eerily like this woman understands both her sense of invisibility and her love of words. Soon after their meeting, Lena transcribes an article where she learns that this same woman has committed suicide by walking into a lion’s den. The woman’s remains become a focus for Lena as they have been both literally and figuratively ‘lost.’ Amy Roland crafts quite the story, where Lena’s search for the blind woman’s body and background simultaneously teaches her about herself and forces her to change her life for the better.

Late Nights on Air by Elizabeth Hay…This book is set in a small, remote Canadian town, and the plot focuses on the people who work at the town’s only radio station. Elizabeth Hay’s characters are well-developed and memorable, and we loved how much attention was paid to how voices over radio waves are powerful and connective. There is one extended passage toward the latter part of the book where the main characters set off on a hike that takes them into a dangerously cold region. This passage was all at once beautiful, terrifying, and sad. It resonated with us as was one of the strongest parts of the work.

Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver…Beautiful, terrifying, and sad are adjectives that could describe much of Barbara Kingsolver’s work. In the past, my mom-in-law and I have read The Poisonwood Bible and The Lacuna. Like Flight Behavior, both of these share the same vivid, haunting settings and characters that feel like they could walk beside you. Because Barbara is a biologist, there is always a theme of environmental awareness in her work, a deep respect for nature. Flight Behavior knocked us out. We couldn’t put sticky notes on anything, because we would have marked every page. Her writing is that good.

And speaking of writing that astounded us…

H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald was our favorite work of 2015. My mom-in-law described the process of reading Helen’s work perfectly…it was a “feast of language.” She writes a memoir poetically. She writes about hawks with profound love. I loved birds of prey before I read this book, but now every time I see them, I am so much more enamored. H is for Hawk is about how being with an animal can heal you, teach you about your own humanity. It is about a gorgeous, fierce hawk… how she behaves, how she hunts. It is about a woman trying to cope with the grief of losing her father, how she loses her mind and finds it again. H is for Hawk is about nature, in all its tender beauty and rawness.

Being in Book Club restores my love of English. It motivates me to keep writing, to aspire to the levels of the authors I admire. I think if I might “speak” for my book buddy, Book Club connects her to family, and it exercises her brain, keeps her sharp and witty. Plus, it’s just fun. We love it, and we look forward to the pages we will cover in 2016 and beyond!

Tucked among the suburban houses in these Hudson River villages, nature is preserved. I’ve written about the East Irvington Nature Preserve just up the hill from our house. This is one of many hidden sanctuaries throughout Westchester County. Recently, we visited Juhring Nature Preserve in Dobb’s Ferry.

Here’s a description of Juhring I found online:

“This 76 acre preserve is Dobbs Ferry’s largest park. The woodland preserve has several hiking trails. Dogs are allowed.

The estate was named for John C. Juhring III, a landscape architect, who acquired the property in 1909 and whose Belden Avenue residence was at one time contiguous to the current 76 acre parcel. By the early 1960s the land was owned by Edward J. Tobin and Reuben Chase, both investors, who were planning to subdivide the property into 115 lots. Public outrage prompted the village government to acquire grants from the federal and state governments to purchase the property as open space. The only stipulation that came with the federal and state grants was that the land remain undeveloped, open and available for the public to enjoy.” -www.thesalmons.org/lynn/walks/

I love that there was public outrage in the name of trees. I love that the village government was organized enough to get grants to keep the land undeveloped.

I wish that the area surrounding our East Irvington Preserve was not being cut down for an impending apartment complex. In areas that are growing and thick with people, houses are needed, but I sought refuge in that park, and now it’s loud with bulldozers. Sigh. Things change.

Along the trail at East Irvington, there was a large beehive hanging low on a bush. In the early Fall, Benjamin leaned in to take a picture, and a bee flew out at him. The hive was active. We visited a few weeks ago, and it was in pieces on the ground. I cried. I know hives are abandoned when it’s cold, and a strong enough wind could have pulled it apart. I know it could have happened naturally, but this looked purposeful. It made me angry and sad. All I could do was hope that the bees were long gone before the violence occurred.

When things upset me, I try to find comfort in knowledge. For 2016, I vow to finally and completely read a book called Wilderness and the American Mind. My friend Nick recommended and loaned this book to me, but I only read parts of it before I returned it to him. Then, at his wedding, he and Allen offered books as party gifts. Wilderness and the American Mind was among these treasures, and I tucked it into my party bag. I want to know the history of our continent’s natural places and how we “Americans” (really Europeans) changed our opinions of wild places. I know, from the little that I did read, that our ideas about nature have fluctuated from fear to romanticism, to thinking that all the resources are for our use to thinking we should leave nature alone, preserve it, enjoy it for its beauty. This push-pull attitude toward nature seems to continue, depending on politics or money or other exhausting human things.

As I write this, I am recalling a moment with my niece when she was three years old. We were taking a walk in my parent’s neighborhood, and we came across a dead black racer snake that had clearly been squished by a car. First, she asked why the car didn’t see the snake. She rationalized that she would have seen the snake from her carseat, and she would have prevented his dying. The only way I knew to comfort her was to say that now the snake was food for ants, and for every dead snake there were more alive ones in the swamp. She seemed satisfied with this answer and looked intently at the ants as they carried away the body. We walked back to my parents, and as luck would have it, a black racer was swimming in the pool. She looked at me as she often did, smiling and excited, “You were right, Aunt Shella. You were right!” I never felt more grateful.

And when Benjamin and I were on another lovely trail, the Old Aqueduct, we saw a different hive, safe and high in a tree. For a moment I was comforted thinking that for every ending, there is hopefully a beginning, somewhere else.

I used to live in a neighborhood called Seminole Heights in Tampa, Florida. When I was there, about fifteen years ago, I ate at Angelica’s or Nicko’s Fine Foods Diner. Sadly, Angelica’s is no longer there, but I remember it fondly as a welcoming place, filled with Frida Kahlo inspired art and offering some of the most delicious Mexican food I’ve ever tasted. Nick’s had the perfect diner atmosphere, great breakfasts, and the best chicken gyros.

Now Seminole Heights is experiencing an explosion of new restaurants. When my friend and I were there in November, we had dinners at Fodder and Shine (www.fodderandshine.com) and Ichicoro Ramen (www.ichicoroya.com). Both places were excellent! At Fodder and Shine, I had the Pot Likker Poached Shrimp, and at Ichicoro I had a seafood appetizer that was almost too beautiful and delicious to describe. It was presented as a long platter with rows of shrimp and scallops and salty seaweed “chips” on the side. Say what you will about the hipster revolution, but I like what they are bringing to the table. Tasty and pretty!

As a side note, I was extra glad that I visited the ramen restaurant. While my friend and I sat at the bar waiting for a table, I recognized a familiar face among the wait staff. This lovely young woman was one of my best students, one of the most creative writers I had the pleasure to meet in my years as a teacher. It was so good to see her, reconnect, and learn that she is happy, healthy, and in love with her neighborhood.

There were no sit-down-and-write coffee shops in Seminole Heights when I lived there, so it was great to see these popping up as well. I wrote at an outside table at Mikey’s Cafe and Bakery (www.cafe-bakery.com).  Mikey’s makes scrumptious sandwiches served with crispy dill pickles. Yum! Lane, one of the charming co-owners, chatted with me. He talked about the neighborhood with such love and respect and this was very nice to hear. Mikey’s is located between a pet supply store and a bike shop. While I wrote, I was treated to a parade of cute dogs and people walking and biking past me.

I didn’t go visit my former apartments or any of my other old haunts like Nick’s or Maurico Faedo’s Bakery, the antique shops, or the vintage clothing stores. I was afraid I’d feel too sentimental. When I did wander a bit, I almost stepped on a ring neck snake, and I saw kitties everywhere.

Ring necks are adorable, docile snakes. This one tried her best to posture for me, raising her head, trying to make herself appear bigger than her tiny body. I resisted the urge to pick her up and instead respected her warning by walking quietly away. She slithered into the neighbor’s garage, and I wished her well.

I remember someone once told me that Seminole Heights used to be a pecan grove. When people first built houses there, back in the early 1900s, there were a lot of rodents due to all those sweet pecans. People got themselves some domestic predators to solve the problem. I had two cats, Magic and Tramp. Both my toms scampered from porch to porch in Seminole Heights. It felt good to honor their memories and know that the neighborhood is still populated with felines.

It’s a strange feeling to be somewhere familiar and changing, but visiting Seminole Heights reassured me that the Florida I knew lingered… on the front porches of the houses, on the cobblestone streets, in the charm of the people who called me ‘darlin’’ and ‘hon,’ and in the animals who continue to grace the former pecan grove. Sweet. My sweet Florida.

Halloween may be a made up holiday. It may have been co-opted, Hallmarked, and sugared like a lot of U.S. holidays, but I transcend this. For me, Hallows Eve is more than all of this. It’s about acknowledging the metaphysical, ideas of other worldliness, the possibility of ghosts. It’s about witches and history, a collective human history and a personal, family history.

Both my maternal great grandmother, Martha, and her father Valentine (my great great) practiced cupping. Cupping, as I understand it, is an ancient healing practice where hot cups are placed on the skin to draw blood to the surface. Similar to acupuncture, cupping activates blood flow, helps with pain, and promotes healing. The practice of cupping was controversial, at least for Valentine and Martha. I don’t remember who told me this family story, but apparently the banker in the town where Valentine lived asked him to heal his leg. The man was suffering from gangrene, and the doctor in the town wanted to amputate. Valentine healed the banker’s leg, but when the townspeople got wind of this, they threatened to hang Valentine as a witch. Martha continued cupping in secret, and some of her family disapproved, saying she was basically practicing medicine without a license.

So on Hallows Eve, I think about healing. And witches. I honor the millions of people who died in Europe and those who died here in the States. I treasure the fact that I come from witches, that I am open to “alternative” medicine. I try to focus on the things that need healing in this world, namely the imbalance we humans seem to still have with our natural environment. I remember that we need pollinators, predators, trees, clean air, and water. I focus on how we humans need healing when it comes to our ignorance and intolerance of each other’s differences. I try to slow down my fears and open my brain. On October 31st, I reflect until I come up with ways that I can take personal action. For me, this is the beginning of my New Year’s resolutions.

I am told that Martha was a fun, mischievous person. I like that I am like her. On Hallows Eve, I have one costume, and I wear it proudly and playfully in the woods.

Our trio of little villages is bonkers for Halloween.

Washington Irving’s house is just down the road from us. You can tour it by candle light. You can visit Irving’s grave and the grave of his notorious character, the Headless Horseman, in the Old Dutch cemetery in Sleepy Hollow. Among the activities that occur throughout the month of October, among the haunted hayrides, haunted houses, and performative retellings of Irving’s stories is my personal favorite, Blaze.

Tickets for Blaze go on sale on September 1. By the end of the day on September 1st, and I swear this is true, tickets are nearly sold out. This event happens every night for the whole month, and it brings in approximately 4,000 people per night. Here’s why it is so popular and amazing…

Blaze is an outdoor exhibit of jack-o-lanterns, and these are no ordinary pumpkins carved with scary or whimsical faces. Viewers meander through the grounds of Van Cortlandt Manor to observe over 7,000 jack-o-lanterns hung from trees as bats, bees, and butterflies, scattered along the ground as spiders or baby dinosaurs emerging from their eggs, hidden in bushes as cats, arched as constellations, stacked as totem poles, and arranged onto shelves as pottery. These are the smaller scaled pumpkins. There are also huge dinosaurs, sea serpents, life size mummies and witches, and a giant spider web. Blaze is my kind of the spectacle!

I have to credit the folks who write about this event. The Historic Hudson Valley has a great mission, and they “sell” Blaze beautifully. Check out more details from their site: http://www.hudsonvalley.org/events/blaze

Blaze is touristy, but having grown up near both Wisconsin Dells and Orlando, tourism is fine with me, especially if it involves being outside on a crisp, autumn night and seeing something so creative. I hope to make Blaze one of my many Halloween traditions.

Red against blue in October …may it stay behind my eyes all winter long.

This is Maple, the sweet tree that lives outside our living room and Benjamin’s studio.

She gave us this yellow.

Thank you, Maple.

At the end of October, wind and rain shook the trees loose, and now the ground is covered in yellow, red, and orange leaves.

It was sad and beautiful to watch.

When Autumn* begins, this is how I feel. The light is gorgeous, truly mesmerizing. I can’t place the day when it shifted this year…most likely late September, early October, but the light softened. The air cooled, and I felt melancholy and nostalgic. As my neighbor and I sipped tea, looking into the back woods from her garden, she said that Autumn light was her favorite.

It is beautiful. But as Everett Reuss has written in his travel journals, nature sometimes offers beauty so hypnotizing it hurts. It’s as if this season is saying, “Here. Take a good long look. Soak up these hot colors as much as you can. Get them in, and keep them behind your eyes, because there are some months of grays and browns coming, and you’re going to need this memory for your sanity.”

Maybe this is just what I hear Autumn saying. I am partial to the restless light of Spring and the energetic light of Summer. I like the wake up feeling of these seasons.

Still, Autumn light is exquisite, dreamy, sleepy, and perfect for writing poetry. Her colors are gifts. Therefore, with this triptych of Benjamin’s photos, I honor this sad and beautiful.

*Yes, I capitalize the seasons. I love the German grammar rule of capitalizing all nouns, and I choose to selectively highlight my favorite nouns.

Nature constantly offers gifts.

On this last bike trip, we had pedaled out into the middle of the salt marsh and sat on a bench that provided a view of Gordon’s Lake. As we were admiring the horizon, we saw what looked like a dragon fly fluttering toward us.

But she was not a dragon fly. She was a praying mantis, and she landed on the pine tree behind me, just over my right shoulder. I sat very still. I wanted Benjamin to be able to get as close as he could to take a picture.

He approached, and she turned her head to look straight at the camera. “Like a alien,“ he said. Given my husband’s love of science fiction, I knew he meant this as a compliment.

This insect has been both feared and revered throughout human history.

In a Byzantine text, she is described as an old woman, with a thin, dried up stick of a body. Because of her tendency to kill her mate, the mantis has been symbolized as a femme fatal. In China, she inspires a martial arts pose and represents courage and fearlessness in poetry. Greeks site her as having the supernatural power to show travelers the way home, and Egyptian texts have credited the mantis with being able to guide the souls of the dead to the underworld.

I favor the more positive views of her…obviously. I especially like the idea that she symbolizes mindful movements and stillness, how she is believed to appear to us when we have filled our lives with too much noise, business, and activity, how she reminds us to hear the still, small voice inside of us.

Before our bike trip, I was feeling closed in. As charming as I find my new region, it is congested. The roads are narrow and winding and butted up again hills. People here have a sense of personal space different from my own. They get extremely close- tail gating on the road, shoving at book sales. Of course, it’s not everyone, but it’s happened enough to note.

I was also feeling cluttered in my own head. I was thinking too much about the business end of writing. I know it’s important to research and consider things like: agents, lawyers, editors, publications, and deadlines. I know these are important, but I was letting these thoughts distract me from a actually producing content. I was blocked.

And then a good sized insect, with a wealth of mythology attached to her, landed near my neck.

I noticed. I heard her. She said, “Kick out the noise. Forget the business. Get quiet. Spend time with your poems and your novel, and write. This is all you have to do for now.”

So I am…

Thank you, Lady Mantis. Thank you.