Today is the birthday of our eldest daughter, Dee. I have always loved the month of October, and her birth made it even more beautiful to me.
In honor of Dee, I post these pictures of this golden month that glows even when the days are gray and dreary, when even a walk to the mailbox across the street glimmers with a yellow- and russet-difused light, and the brisk air is filled with the nutty scent of autumn leaves.
Happy birthday, eldest daughter!
In the United states, today is Juneteenth. As someone who lives in one of the whitest states in the country, I hadn’t heard of Juneteenth until a few years ago. Here is a description from the New York Times:
On June 19, 1865, about two months after the Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox, Va., Union Gen. Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas, to inform enslaved African-Americans of their freedom and that the Civil War had ended. General Granger’s announcement put into effect the Emancipation Proclamation, which had been issued more than two and a half years earlier on Jan. 1, 1863, by President Abraham Lincoln.
The holiday received its name by combining June and 19. The day is also sometimes called “Juneteenth Independence Day,” “Freedom Day” or “Emancipation Day.”
In the days before electronic media, news traveled slowly. Hard to believe that it took two months for African-Americans in Galveston to learn that the Civil War had ended. But such was life in the mid-1800s, thus proving yet again that not everything about the good old days was good.
So happy Juneteenth! I hope all who celebrate will find a safe way to do so. In some states, it is a big day for cookouts and family reunions. (That ratty covid-19 just keeps taking.)
A little closer to home…Clif and I finally broke down and bought an air conditioner. We have lived in the woods for nearly forty years, and for most of that time, a fan in the attic pretty much did the trick. At night, when things cooled down, we would turn on the fan and all the hot air would be directed up and eventually out of the house.
But for the past ten years, summers in central Maine have become hotter and hotter. Once upon a time, our biggest worry for the Fourth of July was whether it would rain. Nowadays, it’s whether it will be such a blister of a day that we won’t be able to enjoy the yearly gathering we usually have. (Alas, not this year because of the aforementioned ratty covid-19.)
Last July we had thirteen days where the temperature was above 90° Fahrenheit. And here we are again, on June 18 with 90° weather. (We were there in May, too.) In what universe is it 90° in May and June in Maine? In this new universe of climate change, I guess.
Last August, when I went to get my hair cut, I told my hairdresser that we didn’t have air conditioning. I mentioned how hot and uncomfortable we had been in July.
My hairdresser said, “Laurie, it’s only going to get hotter as the years go by. You really should consider buying an air conditioner.”
I agreed, and her words stuck with me.
So this year we did it. Here it is, and as Clif has noted, it looks like a maintenance droid out of Star Wars.
We decided to get a free-standing unit rather than one that goes in the window because we figured it would be easier to wheel this into a backroom and store it for the winter rather than heft a unit in and out of the window each spring and fall. It is also a heat pump and energy efficient, which means we might be using it for heat come spring and fall.
Yesterday, just in time to make us glad that we followed my hairdresser’s suggestion, I read in the Times that “Scientists Predict Scorching Temperatures to Last Through Summer.”
We will be ready with our air-conditioning droid.
Yesterday was Mother’s Day, and the kids know exactly what I like—sweets and flowers. (I like to joke that I don’t have a sweet tooth but instead a whole mouthful of them: Sweet teeth.) Truly, I received an abundance of good things from my family, and I am oh so grateful.
Here’s a sample of what the kids gave me. The chocolates come from a local business called Scrummy’s, which I’ve written about in previous posts. The gift card is from Longfellow’s Greenhouse in the next town over from us.
Plus there were actual flowers,
and gelato, tea, and Ghiradelli chocolate. These last three, along with the above flowers, were ordered via Instacart from a local grocery store. Instacart is an excellent service that I can highly recommend for folks in the U.S. who are of an age where it’s recommended that they don’t go to the grocery store.
A brief explanation about how I handle treats: One day a week, I have a treat day, where I can indulge in as much as I want. That day, usually Sunday, is a day for candy, for popcorn with butter, for whatever else strikes my fancy. I have a stash, and I am good at not raiding it until treat day. (The candy I got for Mother’s Day sure livens up my stash.) The other six days of the week I stick to the straight and narrow and eat food that is good for me—mostly plants and not too much. Might sound a little weird, but this regimen works for me, and I have even lost weight during this time of the coronavirus.
But the biggest treat of all came late Sunday morning, when Clif and I Zoomed with the kids—Dee, Mike, and Shannon—for over two hours. How lovely to see their faces and to discuss all the things we enjoy talking about—movies, books, politics. Conversations with the three of them is always a delight.
In the course of our conversation, Mike recommended Crooklyn, a 1994 semi-autobiographical movie by Spike Lee. Intrigued by Mike’s description of the film, Clif and I decided to watch Crooklyn last night.
Crooklyn, set in Brooklyn in the 1970s, has been described as messy, and it is, just like real life. However, Crooklyn is also warm and moving, cruel at times, and brave in its depiction of family life. A true indie film, its pacing is what might be called deliberate and requires patience. But by the middle of Crooklyn, I was hooked on this movie about the Carmichael family and their struggles. (Clif was less enthusiastic about it.)
Then there’s the fantastic soundtrack, chockablock full of music from the 1970s, when I was teenager. I knew every single song featured in the movie, and I could even sing along with most of them. Truly, a blast from the past, even though I grew up in rural Maine, and the move is set in New York City. (Spike Lee and I were born the same year.)
Anyway, all in all, a wonderful Mother’s Day. Many, many thanks to Dee, Mike, and Shannon.
And to Clif, who made pancakes for breakfast.
In the United States, Sunday, May 10 is Mother’s Day, but because of the pandemic, most of us will not be able to get together with our children, no matter how close they live. Many of us will make the best of it through Skype or Zoom, and that is exactly what Clif and I will be doing on Sunday morning. Despite having bad points, technology really is a blessing. Being able to see and talk to my children makes me feel ever so much better.
Recently, as I was scrolling through my vast library of pictures, I came across Mother’s Day photos taken seven years ago. I was younger and in better shape. My hair was still dark. Liam was alive, and my daughter Shannon and son-in-law Mike lived in South Portland, an easy drive from where we live. (Dee, in New York, was too far away to join us, but she would come later in the summer.)
For a Mother’s Day treat, Shannon made her signature low-flour chocolate cupcakes with peppermint cream. Oh so good. I could have one right now.
The day was cool and green. We took the dogs for a walk and then had cupcakes and tea when we came back.
These pictures make me both wistful and grateful, aware of both loss and happy memories.
Life is like that, isn’t it?
“When you know that trees experience pain and have memories and that tree parents live together with their children, then you can no longer just chop them down and disrupt their lives with large machines.”
–Peter Wohlleben, The Hidden Life of Trees
Being a Mainer, I love trees too much to live in a place without them. All my life I have been surrounded by trees—first in a neighborhood, then in the country, and now in a small forest.
Around our home we have tall dark pines, massive oaks, solid maples that blaze in the fall, and slender beeches that keep their leaves all through the winter. When I sit on my patio and look up through the tree branches, I feel as though the trees are holding me.
Trees tell the story of the seasons. They harbor birds and give shelter to many other creatures. They provide food, oxygen, and shade. According to the writer Peter Wohlleben trees are even able to form a kind of society.
Why are trees such social beings? Why do they share food with their own species and sometimes even go so far as to nourish their competitors? The reasons are the same as for human communities: there are advantages to working together. A tree is not a forest. On its own, a tree cannot establish a consistent local climate. It is at the mercy of wind and weather. But together, many trees create an ecosystem that moderates extremes of heat and cold, stores a great deal of water, and generates a great deal of humidity. And in this protected environment, trees can live to be very old.
On a deep, psychological level, trees give us rich material for myths and stories, and Arthur Rackham’s illustration is a haunting example of this.
And who could forget Tolkien’s ents, sentient creatures that lived in a slow time of their own?
Is it too much to claim that trees embody the life-force of the planet? Not for this tree lover.
Therefore in honor of Earth Day, here are a few pictures of trees through the seasons, in my yard and around town.
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
And now for a complete change of tone. Shannon is our Earth-Day daughter, born on April 22 many years ago. This is a hard time for celebrating much of anything. Therefore I am posting a picture of happier times, when our dear Liam was just a puppy and Shannon was having a jolly trot with him along the public beach in town. Makes me smile just to look at it. Happy, happy birthday, Shannon.
Slowly, slowly, my schedule is returning to something approaching normal. I have resumed posting three times a week and am working on Book Four of the Great Library Series. (No title yet. It might be Library Regained. It might be something else. It all depends on how many Maya books I write.)
It helps that spring has come to our home in the woods. Yesterday, Clif and I put on our jackets and had tea on the patio. The temperature was 50°, but it felt fine to be sitting there.
Sherlock joined us. That chair was set out especially for him. Unfortunately, it seems that felines can contract covid-19. Even though we live in the woods, we do have neighbors, and we might have to keep the cats in this summer. Blogging friends, any thoughts about this?
On a happier note, there are lots of green shoots in the garden.
And I was able to get a picture of this handsome goldfinch, whose feathers are returning to summer yellow.
But sadness is never very far away. As we sat and had tea, I thought of our daughter in Brooklyn who is confined to a small apartment that is somewhere between 500 to 600 square feet. Dee hasn’t been outside for two weeks or so. She doesn’t complain—that is not her way—but when I asked her how she was doing, Dee did mention that she wished she had a small yard so that she could go out on nice days.
What I wish is that Dee were right here with us, and then she could join us on the patio and watch the fluttering beauties that come to our yard.
Alas, the time for that has passed, and Dee will have to hunker down in her small apartment until the worst is over.
Coronavirus News from Maine
From my very own town of Winthrop
Charlie Gove, 90, continues to volunteer at the Food Pantry. For over 14 years, I volunteered with this fine man. If you click on the link, it will take you to the Facebook page with the article. If you click on the article, it will enlarge, and you will be able to read the piece.
From Maine CDC
Maine’s number of cases of the coronavirus: 499
Deaths in Maine from Covid-19: 10
The News from All Over
From Mother Nature Network
We’re poised to see carbon dioxide emissions plummet to levels last experienced around World War II. That’s according to the Global Carbon Project, a network of emissions experts, earth scientists and economists, that tracks greenhouse gasses and advises policymakers on the issue.
From Dr. Sanjay Gupta
As the US heads towards the peak, Europe’s numbers offer some hope. Fatalities and infections seem to be slowing in Italy, Spain and France, among the hardest-hit countries on the continent — and in the world.
And wise words from Queen Elizabeth
I hope in the years to come everyone will be able to take pride in how they responded to this challenge.
The Latest Numbers
Global Cases: 1,280,046
Global Deaths: 69,789
My own take: Queen Elizabeth knows a thing or two about how a country can suffer. I am specifically thinking about World War II and her own exemplary service, in which she should take a great deal of pride.
Today I am going to take a break from writing about the coronavirus pandemic and focus on a few good things. How? Let me count the ways.
First things first: I started the morning with cinnamon toast made from homemade bread. Also, a mug of tea featuring one of my favorite dogs.
This year, March 19 is the first day of spring, the earliest in my memory. While in Maine rough winds might not exactly be shaking the darling buds of March, the snow is pretty much gone from our yard. Yesterday, Clif took down the Christmas lights, and he didn’t even have to clamber over a snowbank to do so. I swept the patio, removing piles of dead leaves and dirt. It might not be time to bring out the chairs and tables, but it sure is good to see a clean patio with just a little itty-bit of snow left. More like mid-April than mid-March.
Our library is closed because of a certain virus I promised not to write about. Has that deterred our intrepid adult-services librarian, Nick Perry, who leads the library’s book group and trivia night at Van der Brew? It has not. Nick has started a virtual book club and movie club.
Our first book will be Somerset Maugham’s The Moon and Sixpence. I Haven’t even started the book, but just from reading the description, my feminist alarm is already shrieking. Should be a good discussion.
The movie is going to be The Hours, which is based on the book by Michael Cunningham. Clif and I have already seen this movie and liked it very much. However, we saw it ten years ago when the movie first came out, and we will have to watch it again to refresh our memories.
Not content with these two nuggets of awesomeness, Nick has made a video of several movies that he likes and that are available on Kanopy, a library streaming service. Holy cats, Nick is good! His observations are right on the mark, and his delivery and pacing are pitch perfect. Nick is so good that he could be on NPR. Watch out Bob Mondello! But don’t take my word for it. You can see for yourself on this video.
If you are unable to get Kanopy through your library, many of the movies Nick recommended are available through other streaming sources.
Finally, today is Clif’s and my forty-third wedding anniversary. We will obviously be spending a very quiet one at home. Because I am a committed homebody, this is just fine with me. We have cake in the freezer, pizza, and rum for cocktails.
Tonight, we’ll settle down with one of Nick’s suggestions, Ernest & Celestine.
Small comforts in troubled times.
While it might be only five days until Christmas, it is just two days until the kids—all right, they’re really adults, but they will always be kids to me—come home. Tomorrow, Mike and Shannon will be leaving North Carolina on Saturday and spend the night with Dee in Brooklyn. Then to Maine, to Maine, they all come, and the whole crazy crew will be together until Sunday, December 29, when Shannon and Mike head back to North Carolina. Dee will stay with us until the New Year.
Clif and I are more than a little excited to have everyone home. The shelves, freezer, and refrigerator are bursting with good things to eat. There will be movies, of course, and board games and pizza with friends. And lots and lots of talking. I know the time will fly by ever so fast, but what a delicious feeling it is to be at the beginning of the festivities rather than at the end.
I will be taking a break from blogging until the New Year. With so much family and fun, I’m not sure how many blogs I’ll be able to read, but I’ll be back in the saddle come the beginning of January.
Two things to share before I sign off.
The first is from Suzzane’s Mom’s Blog, a wonderful source of offbeat news, most of it positive. Recently, there was a post about how in 1955 NORAD began tracking Santa’s progress. After all the upsetting news about politics and the climate crisis, this is sure to put a smile on your face. Go, Santa, go!
The second are some snowy pictures I took around our yard. I know that in different parts of the world, Christmas looks different, and that’s as it should be. The world is big, and there is lot of variety. But to northern New England, Christmas means snow, and here are some pictures I took around our yard after the last storm a couple of days ago.
Happy holidays to you all. See you in 2020.
This year for an early Christmas present, my daughter Shannon and my son-in-law Mike gave me Hingston & Olsen Publishing’s 2019 Short Story Advent Calendar.
This present is as delightful as it sounds and looks. In the box, there are twenty-four short stories labeled from 1 to 24. Each story is sealed, waiting to be broken on the appropriate day by the eager reader. As is described on the Advent Calendar website, “this is a collection of literary, non-religious stories for adults.”
So far my favorites have been “Save-A-Lot” by Anthony Doer; “An Errand in the Country” by Olga Grushin; and “Natural Light” by Kathleen Alcott. In fact, I liked Gushin’s story so well that I have requested her novel The Dream Life of Sukhanov through interlibrary loan, and it might very well be the first book I read in 2020.
Naturally, not all the short stories in the collection have resonated with me, and that is to be expected. But what a treat it is to settle into bed with the story of the day, and this sort of advent calendar is a perfect gift for those who love literary fiction.
Many thanks, Mike and Shannon!
In Maine, December is a dark, cold month. The days are at their shortest—dusk comes at around 4:15—and how lovely it is when the sun sets. A star twinkles in the evening sky. Everywhere, trees with bare branches stand in silhouette, framing the glowing moon as it rises.
December is a perfect month for sparkling lights and surprises, for getting parcels that you don’t expect. One such package came yesterday, from my blogging friend Judy of New England Garden and Thread. Judy’s creativity—her sewing and quilting—is a constant source of inspiration to me. How I enjoy seeing the posts of the various project she makes throughout the year.
And how pleased and surprised I was to receive this lovely gift from Judy.
It has pride of place in the living room, resting against books on a shelf by the couch.
Many, many thanks, Judy! What a wonderful addition to my Christmas decorations.
