Fich looks hungry. And when I say hungry, I mean that she is bobbing gradually at the top of the tank, giving me this look like, feed me. So I extract one of these tiny crisps from the container that Berit spilled most of onto the floor. A bit of a loss, but at one crisp per day, even with 80% of the container gone, we still have a several month supply. A fish is not what you/d call a high investment pet.
So I take one of these crisps, and I am carefully crumbling it between my thumb and forefinger, dropping just the tiniest crumbs into the water as slowly as possible so that Fich can eat each one, rather than have most of them descend beneath the blue rock floor before she gets a chance to find them. I’ve got some weird Frank Zappa orchestral fusion on the hifi and am kind of zoning out on that and the fish when I hear a deep and resonant voice intone my name. “Hey, Mark.”
I'm the only one in the house, but again I’m so completely zoned into that total Fich/Zappa meditative state of mind - you know what I mean - that it doesn't phase me, and for a minute, I don't look up. I just remark internally how it’s interesting to hear a deep and resonant male voice say my name, perhaps with the undercurrent of an assumption of some spirit of the universe acknowledging my presence. Finally.
But I do look up, and it's Serge, the young man who currently lives in my basement. I forgot about Serge. Serge sleeps during the day and works at night. Like the elves. So I forget about him. That he exists. I tell him as much, explaining that I’m in the Fich zone. Serge asks about the music, and we talk about Frank Zappa for roughly 30 seconds of the 17 minute song before he leaves for work. I join Fich in an afternoon snack and sit down to write this.
September 13, 2018
July 2, 2018
Heading to Hilton Head
Griffin is sitting in front of me on our flight to Atlanta. I can see Bennett one row up and off to starboard. The girls sit together on the same side three rows behind me. The seating is unideal, but at least we are on the plane. We left late this morning, circumstances I want to attribute to Rowan's last minute orthodontist appointment, but there was also the usual mayhem of me making a bunch of last minute preparations to leave the house for a week - less so this time though since Serge will be there and Ann will come to hang out with the cats. Also, I spent a few tense minutes looking for the hat I wanted to wear, Bennett and I missed the turn-off to Pike's Peak shuttle parking, and Griffin had to be stopped by the TSA to have his can of instant pink lemonade tested for explosives.
"The electronic fuel service record broke." That's what the pilot said. This process for ensuring that our plane is adequately fueled had somehow failed, and now we needed to revert to a paper process to record the necessary details. That's annoying, I thought, but how long could it possibly take to fix the situation. On that point, the pilot and crew were vague, but as it turns out, about three hours. Three hours sitting in a metal tube with a couple hundred of your closest friends. Babies cried, adults complained, everyone steamed and sweltered.
As suggested, I rebooked our flight from Atlanta to Savannah, and we just made it to Atlanta in time to catch that later flight. We were descending into Savannah at around 8:30 pm, me looking out the window again mesmerized by the shapes that humans make upon the Earth, an endlessy fascinating geometrical hodgepodge only perceivable from the air.
"The electronic fuel service record broke." That's what the pilot said. This process for ensuring that our plane is adequately fueled had somehow failed, and now we needed to revert to a paper process to record the necessary details. That's annoying, I thought, but how long could it possibly take to fix the situation. On that point, the pilot and crew were vague, but as it turns out, about three hours. Three hours sitting in a metal tube with a couple hundred of your closest friends. Babies cried, adults complained, everyone steamed and sweltered.
As suggested, I rebooked our flight from Atlanta to Savannah, and we just made it to Atlanta in time to catch that later flight. We were descending into Savannah at around 8:30 pm, me looking out the window again mesmerized by the shapes that humans make upon the Earth, an endlessy fascinating geometrical hodgepodge only perceivable from the air.
June 30, 2018
Less than one percent Cherokee
Great night tonight with the in-laws. Pam's cousins Mark Larson and his wife Mary, and Reed Larson and his wife Sharon, were in town and we all had dinner together. Mark, Reed and Jeanie are the children of Miriam, Grammy's sister, and Mary Alice is the daughter of Joan, Grammy's other sister. Grammy was the youngest of the three.
I'm writing this, kids, because neither you nor I will remember how this all fits together, and one of you is going to have to take on the mantle of family historian for Mom's family. Mark did a basement slideshow that I thought was going to be really tough for the kids to get through, but it turns out that Berit was pretty into it. Maybe she'll be the historian.
At dinner, all of the kids talked about their jobs. Griffin regaled everyone with stories from the Lucky Pie kitchen, Row talked about the trail (which Mark related to since he has volunteered on the Superior Hiking Trail) and Berit talked about working with adults with disabilities. The kids got along great with everyone. Reed and Sharon told us that Renner, their son, and his wife are about four years married now and she is pregnant and due in August. They live in Chicago were Renner does something in communications. For the Sierra Club. Evidently, Mark and Mary's daughter (Bridget?) also lives in Chicago and they pass each other occasionally en route to work.
Kip showed us the results of his AncestyDNA test, indicating, as we knew, that he was 90% Scandinavian and then some other stuff, including 3% Finnish and less than 1% Native American. How less than a percent Native American got in there is a freaking mystery to me, given the fact that his people all immigrated to North America in 1850.
As fun as the evening was, when the slideshow was over, Griffin, making it obvious that he was taking an urgent phone call, came back with a story that he had been in a game on his computer when we rushed him out of the house, and he had left Bellatrix locked in his room. He knew this because Evan, his friend with whom he had been gaming, could hear her meowing via Discord, the VOIIP software they use to speak with each other. It's an incredible thing when your buddy can call to tell you the cat is locked in your bedroom and you'd better leave the grandparents' house at once to rush home and let her out.
I'm writing this, kids, because neither you nor I will remember how this all fits together, and one of you is going to have to take on the mantle of family historian for Mom's family. Mark did a basement slideshow that I thought was going to be really tough for the kids to get through, but it turns out that Berit was pretty into it. Maybe she'll be the historian.
At dinner, all of the kids talked about their jobs. Griffin regaled everyone with stories from the Lucky Pie kitchen, Row talked about the trail (which Mark related to since he has volunteered on the Superior Hiking Trail) and Berit talked about working with adults with disabilities. The kids got along great with everyone. Reed and Sharon told us that Renner, their son, and his wife are about four years married now and she is pregnant and due in August. They live in Chicago were Renner does something in communications. For the Sierra Club. Evidently, Mark and Mary's daughter (Bridget?) also lives in Chicago and they pass each other occasionally en route to work.
Kip showed us the results of his AncestyDNA test, indicating, as we knew, that he was 90% Scandinavian and then some other stuff, including 3% Finnish and less than 1% Native American. How less than a percent Native American got in there is a freaking mystery to me, given the fact that his people all immigrated to North America in 1850.
As fun as the evening was, when the slideshow was over, Griffin, making it obvious that he was taking an urgent phone call, came back with a story that he had been in a game on his computer when we rushed him out of the house, and he had left Bellatrix locked in his room. He knew this because Evan, his friend with whom he had been gaming, could hear her meowing via Discord, the VOIIP software they use to speak with each other. It's an incredible thing when your buddy can call to tell you the cat is locked in your bedroom and you'd better leave the grandparents' house at once to rush home and let her out.
June 28, 2018
High Fructose / Astrology
Last night at dinner, Rowan said she felt like she hadn't seen us all together in months. This felt like a bit of an exaggeration, but it was enough of a heartfelt statement to give me pause, make me think that I at least needed to pull them in for dinner together a couple of nights each week. Griffin hung out with us long enough for everyone to say their rose and thorn; after that, Rowan regaled Berit and I with one of her favorite topics - astrology, and how it applies to members of our family. She knows each of our sun, moon and ascendant signs, and she is fairly conversant on what they mean for each of us. When she's not, she quickly accesses that information in the notes on her phone. A lot of the personality traits were spot-on - Berit's Leo, Rowan's Capricorn, my Scorpio - but some, like what the description of Virgo for both Pam's sun sign and my rising sign - were way off, it seemed. Still, I enjoy hearing about it, and I really enjoy how into it Rowan is.
Tonight, Bennett was here, and we all hung out for dinner again - looking at Bennett's High Fructose art magazine volume, singing Billy Joel, answering Griffin's trivia questions and eating food. Rowan scared the crap out of Griffin, leaping up from the backseat of the car when she and Berit went to pick him up from Cabaret rehearsal.
Tonight, Bennett was here, and we all hung out for dinner again - looking at Bennett's High Fructose art magazine volume, singing Billy Joel, answering Griffin's trivia questions and eating food. Rowan scared the crap out of Griffin, leaping up from the backseat of the car when she and Berit went to pick him up from Cabaret rehearsal.
April 1, 2018
New York, Days 2 and 3 - Friday and Saturday
On Friday, we traveled from food place to food place. It started in Brooklyn with Berit, Rowan, Bennett and I heading out for bagels and coffee first thing. We hung around with Patty, Drew and Fiona the rest of the morning until it was time for them to head to Fiona’s dentist appointment. Our family headed into Manhattan to catch lunch at Ellen’s Stardust Diner, a restaurant in the theater district where wait staff, presumably comprised of performers, sings to the diners. This is what Berit really wants to do. Unfortunately, when we arrive there is a line around the block, just like when we tried to go there last time. The problem is that our family is just not willing to wait that long for anything, and it doesn’t look like Ellen’s Stardust Diner ever doesn’t have a line like that.
We’re at a loss as to what to do now. We wander around aimlessly a bit, and we get Ray’s pizza to help ward off the hunger and rising frustration. Patty texts and wants to come in to meet us, so we arrange to meet at Union Square to walk around the East Village. Griffin plays a game of chess with one of the chess guys (“I felt like Dad - taking too long for each move.”), we walk through the farmer’s market before inexorably finding ourselves in Dylan’s candy. The trip to the candy store becomes a quest for the ice cream store. Rowan had showed us a video of Thai rolled ice cream Thursday night and there’s evidently a place nearby. Remember in the previous paragraph when I said our family is just not willing to wait for anything. That doesn’t apply to Thai rolled ice cream. We waited entirely too long in what appeared to be a short line - probably 45 minutes. The kids took videos of their ice cream being made, and Griffin split his with me. Rowan wasn’t entirely pleased with her matcha and strawberry choice, but there you have it. The rains came. We ran through SoHo or NoHo or whatever it was through Astor Place and the three rhinos (The Last Three), Griffin’s favorite statue ever, back to the subway and Brooklyn.
Friday night found us at Patty and Drew’s playing phone games with each other.
We had a better plan on Saturday. I made a solo trip to the Bagel Hole before gathering Bennett and Berit to head down to the meeting (on Presidents Street between 6th and 7th avenues). We talked to Joyce’s friend Gail there, but we headed back quickly after, stopping only briefly at the tiny flea market to buy a King Crimson album. Back home we gathered the others and headed off on a sojourn into Bushwick, a Brooklyn warehouse district populated by artists who have turned the area into a graffiti city.
The day was perfect - sunny and just a bit chilly. We exited the subway at a little vintage shoppe called “Friends” (fry-ends), where Griffin marveled at the inanity of small sticks wrapped in pieces of ribbon for $10. Some of us quickly left the building and stood outside watching a dad chase his two leopard skin-clad boys up and down the sidewalk (their names were Freedom and Panther) before the others joined us and we ambled our way happily up to Roberta’s, a pizza joint thcraftat has been lauded by some as the best pizza in New York. We managed to snag a picnic table in the bustling outdoor area where customers of their takeout side can enjoy their pizza with libations. We enjoyed our pizza and libations in the sun and then spilled out onto the sidewalk to begin our Drew-guided graffiti tour.
We were all pretty awed by the quality and the variety of graffiti up and down the streets of Bushwick. I would be hard-pressed to describe them to you in any meaningful way or even tell you which were my favorites. We walked around the city for maybe an hour or two, stopping in the mid-late part of the tour for coffee drinks. Done with the graffiti, Griffin nicely asked if it was ok if he stayed at the coffee shop, and Berit, also tour-tired, turned around and joined him when she found that he had been allowed to drop out. The rest of us continued down a few more streets, one of which included an amazing optical illusion resembling the shifting bricks of Diagon Alley, and then we too decided that we’d filled our heads with enough street art for one day. We were all pretty tired, and when we arrived back home after six, Rowan and I sequestered ourselves in the small front room to read and nap (respectively) before we all ordered burgers, fries, shakes, salads and delicious Brussels sprouts from Bareburger.
Today is Easter. I’ve been out here doing my morning meditation and stretching while Fiona watches bad YouTube videos on the K
We’re at a loss as to what to do now. We wander around aimlessly a bit, and we get Ray’s pizza to help ward off the hunger and rising frustration. Patty texts and wants to come in to meet us, so we arrange to meet at Union Square to walk around the East Village. Griffin plays a game of chess with one of the chess guys (“I felt like Dad - taking too long for each move.”), we walk through the farmer’s market before inexorably finding ourselves in Dylan’s candy. The trip to the candy store becomes a quest for the ice cream store. Rowan had showed us a video of Thai rolled ice cream Thursday night and there’s evidently a place nearby. Remember in the previous paragraph when I said our family is just not willing to wait for anything. That doesn’t apply to Thai rolled ice cream. We waited entirely too long in what appeared to be a short line - probably 45 minutes. The kids took videos of their ice cream being made, and Griffin split his with me. Rowan wasn’t entirely pleased with her matcha and strawberry choice, but there you have it. The rains came. We ran through SoHo or NoHo or whatever it was through Astor Place and the three rhinos (The Last Three), Griffin’s favorite statue ever, back to the subway and Brooklyn.
Friday night found us at Patty and Drew’s playing phone games with each other.
We had a better plan on Saturday. I made a solo trip to the Bagel Hole before gathering Bennett and Berit to head down to the meeting (on Presidents Street between 6th and 7th avenues). We talked to Joyce’s friend Gail there, but we headed back quickly after, stopping only briefly at the tiny flea market to buy a King Crimson album. Back home we gathered the others and headed off on a sojourn into Bushwick, a Brooklyn warehouse district populated by artists who have turned the area into a graffiti city.
The day was perfect - sunny and just a bit chilly. We exited the subway at a little vintage shoppe called “Friends” (fry-ends), where Griffin marveled at the inanity of small sticks wrapped in pieces of ribbon for $10. Some of us quickly left the building and stood outside watching a dad chase his two leopard skin-clad boys up and down the sidewalk (their names were Freedom and Panther) before the others joined us and we ambled our way happily up to Roberta’s, a pizza joint thcraftat has been lauded by some as the best pizza in New York. We managed to snag a picnic table in the bustling outdoor area where customers of their takeout side can enjoy their pizza with libations. We enjoyed our pizza and libations in the sun and then spilled out onto the sidewalk to begin our Drew-guided graffiti tour.
We were all pretty awed by the quality and the variety of graffiti up and down the streets of Bushwick. I would be hard-pressed to describe them to you in any meaningful way or even tell you which were my favorites. We walked around the city for maybe an hour or two, stopping in the mid-late part of the tour for coffee drinks. Done with the graffiti, Griffin nicely asked if it was ok if he stayed at the coffee shop, and Berit, also tour-tired, turned around and joined him when she found that he had been allowed to drop out. The rest of us continued down a few more streets, one of which included an amazing optical illusion resembling the shifting bricks of Diagon Alley, and then we too decided that we’d filled our heads with enough street art for one day. We were all pretty tired, and when we arrived back home after six, Rowan and I sequestered ourselves in the small front room to read and nap (respectively) before we all ordered burgers, fries, shakes, salads and delicious Brussels sprouts from Bareburger.
Today is Easter. I’ve been out here doing my morning meditation and stretching while Fiona watches bad YouTube videos on the K
March 30, 2018
New York, Day 1 - Thursday
Wednesday at 1:15 pm, we pullled out of the driveway, Bennett at the wheel, with Griffin having just asked if he could bring his Rollerblades to New York. Joe’s Bagels to pick up dinner and off to the airport. At security, they searched Griffin’s Skittles-filled coat pockets and ran their testing devices over Rowan’s gum. At the gate, I take first shift with the luggage. When everyone gets back, I go for tea but am immediately called (texted) back because they’ve started boarding. Good fortune smiles on me when Rocky Mountain Cafe has Tazo Tea, and I make it back as everyone is getting in line with boarding group three. On the plane, my Burmese seat neighbor, indicating Bennett and I, comments how nice it is “two daddies traveling together.”
John Jack, our Lebanese Uber driver, picks us up on the upper level at LaGuardia in his big black Chevy Suburban and ferries us away from the construction mess of the airport - due to be complete in 2022. Not enough space, he tells me, careening around cars as we head onto the QBE, the bridge that quickly becomes a parking lot. We bail off to the right. “ We’re going local,” says John Jack, and we head into the Brooklyn night of a neighborhood crawling with men with long, dark beards, trench coats and wide-brimmed hats. Orthodox or Hasidic Jews - I’m not sure which. Rowan comments on this, and John Jack explains that they run everything. “You want to be president? You got to get their blessing first.”
Patty and Drew welcome us to their colored flag-festooned home, and Berit, Bennett and I stay up talking with them a while.
I don’t sleep great on the air mattress with Griffin, but I’m fortunate to keep falling back into sleep. In fact, it’s 10:30 before I get out of bed, and it’s 1 pm before we leave the apartment. Patty is working today, and our family is headed into Manhattan this evening for The Book of Mormon, so we make it a Brooklyn day, joining Drew and Fiona on the G train Williamsburg. Drew’s off to the dentist, and we split off from them onto the L train to head to the Brooklyn Flea Market in Williamsburg. It’s not there, but we find its supposed location at the East River Park on Kent Street. Griffin has sequestered himself from us with his headphones, and I know he’s hungry and tired (angry too, it turns out), and I know we’d better get some food. The girls have stopped in a shop called Bulletin, where Berit buys a SMASH A PATRIARCHY wristband, and we gather them up and go to the nearby taco truck - BEST TACOS IN AMERICA. We walk our food back to the East River Park and feast at the wooden picnic tables there. Rowan and I walk down to the river bank to take moody teen photos before we all head back to the train.
On the way back to Park Slope, while we wait for the G train, Griffin discovers a card magician and points him out to me. We go back to him, and he has me draw a card. Six of diamonds. He has me tell him what it is, and then he repeatedly makes it disappear and reappear, alternately changing it into the ten of clubs, which eventually, he rips up and then causes to reassemble itself within the confines of my fist. It’s all very well done, but our train is arriving and we’ve got to run. We keep the card and he hands us his business card. Justin Syte.
Back in Park Slope we ready ourselves and head back out to catch the F train to Manahatta. We don’t get it right - Bennett and I both leading us astray - and we walk around in a square. Still we make it to Rockefeller Station in plenty of time to get fast food prior to the show. The girls get long bread caprisi sandwiches at a little indoor cafe and Bennett, Griffin and I get hot dogs from a street vendor. Coffees all around.
We’re at the Eugene O’Neill Theater well in advance of showtime, and we fall into the line outside with everyone, taking obligatory selfies as we file in. Row R, seats 108-112 is at the back of the Orchestra section, but still incredible seats. The Book of Mormon is a great show - funny the whole time and the music and dancing is wonderful. After the show, we split up. Bennett and the girls go back, and I keep Griffin behind to try to help work out tension that has been building. I don’t know if my approach was the right one, but he blows off steam and, as I said to him, we’re all just doing the best we can. He and I follow the others, grabbing an F train back to Brooklyn. At one point, Griffin looks at our rapidly filling train car and notes that we’re not going to be able to see or hear our stop with all of these people. We’re seated next to the door between cars through which a whole bunch of riders have just streamed through, but we look through the windows and see that the next car is mostly empty. We get up and head into it, quickly realizing the reason for the mass exodus - someone has vomited in this car, and the rank bile odor is unbearable. Griffin and I hold out for the ten seconds until the next stop before running around to the next car. “Don’t go in this one,” he warns a boarding passenger.
Tomorrow is a latter day.
John Jack, our Lebanese Uber driver, picks us up on the upper level at LaGuardia in his big black Chevy Suburban and ferries us away from the construction mess of the airport - due to be complete in 2022. Not enough space, he tells me, careening around cars as we head onto the QBE, the bridge that quickly becomes a parking lot. We bail off to the right. “ We’re going local,” says John Jack, and we head into the Brooklyn night of a neighborhood crawling with men with long, dark beards, trench coats and wide-brimmed hats. Orthodox or Hasidic Jews - I’m not sure which. Rowan comments on this, and John Jack explains that they run everything. “You want to be president? You got to get their blessing first.”
Patty and Drew welcome us to their colored flag-festooned home, and Berit, Bennett and I stay up talking with them a while.
I don’t sleep great on the air mattress with Griffin, but I’m fortunate to keep falling back into sleep. In fact, it’s 10:30 before I get out of bed, and it’s 1 pm before we leave the apartment. Patty is working today, and our family is headed into Manhattan this evening for The Book of Mormon, so we make it a Brooklyn day, joining Drew and Fiona on the G train Williamsburg. Drew’s off to the dentist, and we split off from them onto the L train to head to the Brooklyn Flea Market in Williamsburg. It’s not there, but we find its supposed location at the East River Park on Kent Street. Griffin has sequestered himself from us with his headphones, and I know he’s hungry and tired (angry too, it turns out), and I know we’d better get some food. The girls have stopped in a shop called Bulletin, where Berit buys a SMASH A PATRIARCHY wristband, and we gather them up and go to the nearby taco truck - BEST TACOS IN AMERICA. We walk our food back to the East River Park and feast at the wooden picnic tables there. Rowan and I walk down to the river bank to take moody teen photos before we all head back to the train.
On the way back to Park Slope, while we wait for the G train, Griffin discovers a card magician and points him out to me. We go back to him, and he has me draw a card. Six of diamonds. He has me tell him what it is, and then he repeatedly makes it disappear and reappear, alternately changing it into the ten of clubs, which eventually, he rips up and then causes to reassemble itself within the confines of my fist. It’s all very well done, but our train is arriving and we’ve got to run. We keep the card and he hands us his business card. Justin Syte.
Back in Park Slope we ready ourselves and head back out to catch the F train to Manahatta. We don’t get it right - Bennett and I both leading us astray - and we walk around in a square. Still we make it to Rockefeller Station in plenty of time to get fast food prior to the show. The girls get long bread caprisi sandwiches at a little indoor cafe and Bennett, Griffin and I get hot dogs from a street vendor. Coffees all around.
We’re at the Eugene O’Neill Theater well in advance of showtime, and we fall into the line outside with everyone, taking obligatory selfies as we file in. Row R, seats 108-112 is at the back of the Orchestra section, but still incredible seats. The Book of Mormon is a great show - funny the whole time and the music and dancing is wonderful. After the show, we split up. Bennett and the girls go back, and I keep Griffin behind to try to help work out tension that has been building. I don’t know if my approach was the right one, but he blows off steam and, as I said to him, we’re all just doing the best we can. He and I follow the others, grabbing an F train back to Brooklyn. At one point, Griffin looks at our rapidly filling train car and notes that we’re not going to be able to see or hear our stop with all of these people. We’re seated next to the door between cars through which a whole bunch of riders have just streamed through, but we look through the windows and see that the next car is mostly empty. We get up and head into it, quickly realizing the reason for the mass exodus - someone has vomited in this car, and the rank bile odor is unbearable. Griffin and I hold out for the ten seconds until the next stop before running around to the next car. “Don’t go in this one,” he warns a boarding passenger.
Tomorrow is a latter day.
August 11, 2017
Connection is the Whole Point
Connection is he whole point, said Berit, which I agree with. Which sentiment she may have even gotten from me at some point in time, though I can't claim to be the only person in her life who holds that view. But we spent our week connecting with others.
On Monday night, Gwen showed up with Rowan (2) and Jade, ages six and two. Griffin and I took a night walk on the beach with them. Upon entering the beach, we found a crowd lining a path from a sea turtle nest to the ocean. We might have stayed and watched the event, but when the sea turtles would hatch was unclear, and we're just not what you'd call patient people. So we walked the beach, following a couple with a high intensity flashlight spotting 3-inch wide hermit crabs. I flicked one and it bolted for Griffin's feet, making him scream like a 15-year-old boy.
We played in the surf and sand on Tuesday. Crazy wind and waves and we we found ourselves in a rip current being pulled outward. We dug for coquinas, pulled them out of the sand and dropped hem back on it to watch them dig their way out of sight. I napped for a couple of hours in the afternoon, and in the evening Gwen put the girls to bed early. We got make your own pizzas at Lowes.
Wednesday morning we hung with Gwen and the girls as they got ready to head out on the road o Connecticut. Rowan continued to help Griffin with the 550 piece jigsaw puzzle. After they took off, we spent a little time at the beach before heading down to Calabash to eat fried shrimp at The Seafood Hut. As John F-D told me, "Failure to eat fried shrimp in Calabash borders on criminal activity."
Thursday was our big day. In the two weeks prior to this vacation, Griffin was in a theater camp. The show was Legally Blonde, and G and his opposite, Risa, ended up dating. Well, the show ended on a Friday night, and on Saturday, Risa and Griffin were each bound for family vacations.... Both on the North Carolina coast.
So yesterday, we drove to Southport to catch the ferry over to Bald Head Island where Risa's family is spending he week. This is the part where we decide that connection is the mos important thing and, rather than burrow ourselves more deeply in the sand, we take the opportunity to spend a day with a family we've never met.
On Monday night, Gwen showed up with Rowan (2) and Jade, ages six and two. Griffin and I took a night walk on the beach with them. Upon entering the beach, we found a crowd lining a path from a sea turtle nest to the ocean. We might have stayed and watched the event, but when the sea turtles would hatch was unclear, and we're just not what you'd call patient people. So we walked the beach, following a couple with a high intensity flashlight spotting 3-inch wide hermit crabs. I flicked one and it bolted for Griffin's feet, making him scream like a 15-year-old boy.
We played in the surf and sand on Tuesday. Crazy wind and waves and we we found ourselves in a rip current being pulled outward. We dug for coquinas, pulled them out of the sand and dropped hem back on it to watch them dig their way out of sight. I napped for a couple of hours in the afternoon, and in the evening Gwen put the girls to bed early. We got make your own pizzas at Lowes.
Wednesday morning we hung with Gwen and the girls as they got ready to head out on the road o Connecticut. Rowan continued to help Griffin with the 550 piece jigsaw puzzle. After they took off, we spent a little time at the beach before heading down to Calabash to eat fried shrimp at The Seafood Hut. As John F-D told me, "Failure to eat fried shrimp in Calabash borders on criminal activity."
Thursday was our big day. In the two weeks prior to this vacation, Griffin was in a theater camp. The show was Legally Blonde, and G and his opposite, Risa, ended up dating. Well, the show ended on a Friday night, and on Saturday, Risa and Griffin were each bound for family vacations.... Both on the North Carolina coast.
So yesterday, we drove to Southport to catch the ferry over to Bald Head Island where Risa's family is spending he week. This is the part where we decide that connection is the mos important thing and, rather than burrow ourselves more deeply in the sand, we take the opportunity to spend a day with a family we've never met.
August 7, 2017
Ocean Isle Beach, Day One
I'm too tired for this. I should be writing in the morning. That's the only time that works for me. Instead, here I am trying to fill minutes as I drink my tea and wait for Berit and Griffin to come back from getting ice cream. Rowan is not doing sugar, and I am supporting her in that by also not doing sugar. Mostly. This isn't easy, but it is likely the best thing for me. There is agave in my tea, and I just ate a handful of cherries, so it's practically ice cream anyway.
Ocean Isle Beach is the sleepiness beach town on the face of North Carolina. One of the southernmost points on the Outer Banks, Ocean Isle is a stone's throw from its polar opposite across the South Carolina border - Myrtle Beach, which I imagine we'll visit sometime this week to mix it up.
We got in yesterday, utterly wrecked from the red eye from Colorado. Intact after about eight hours of sleep-deprived travel, we fell into our beds and slept into he mid-afternoon when I got up and persuaded Griffin to leave his laptops to walk to the beach with me.
"Think about the ocean, Dad. Billions of years old with all the creatures that have lived in it during all that time. Do you think it's more ocean or more pee?"'
Griffin and I go back and wake the girls before heading out for an epic food shopping spree at Walmart. It was a mistake. There's a Lowes Foods closer, but somehow I've mistakenly goten it into my head that we have o go to Walmart to shop. It took us at least an hour and a half, but we got out of here with a bunch of staples for the week, headed back to 47 Anson Srreet and ate pizza.
Today was a beach day. We swam, rode waves, played a little ocean Marco Polo, and walked the strand. Griffin became obsessed with finding the telltale air bubbles beneath the receding waves and digging up a hermit crab.Then he noticed one of the birds with a small clam and realized that it was clams that they were chasing beneath the sand. We became fascinated with digging these coquinas up and then putting them back on the sand to watch them burrow back underground with their invisible foot. Six of these - Butthole, Butthole Junior, Jethro, Clem, Goldilocks and (unnamed) came back to Anson Street with us to die in a block of hardened sand in an Altoids tin.
Tonight I bought a pound of roadside shrimp which we ate with quesadillas.
Tonight I bought a pound of roadside shrimp which we ate with quesadillas.
January 17, 2017
Early Lessons Today - Snow, Isogashii
I'm up this morning at the clomp clomping of boots and the slamming of Evol burrito microwave door. I check the watch; it's 6:30. So I go out into the kitchen in my underwear.
Griffin is up and getting ready to head out to walk to the bus stop. Greg doesn't have a period one class this semester, and so he's not giving Griffin a ride to school. Griffin tells me he stayed up until midnight reading his book (Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson). Pam and I spent years throwing books at Griffin and missing and along comes Ms. Gance, nailing him in one shot. I tell Griffin I'm giving him a ride.
7:05 am: First lesson of the day.
Even if you aren't going anywhere, wipe that pile of snow off of your windshield, because if you don't it will freeze in the sun there, and when it's time to take Griffin to school the following morning, you will be faced with trying to remove and de-ice those shenanigans without the aid of an ice scraper, because you gave that to Rowan.
I start the car and put the defrost on full blast, find an old license plate under my workbench and proceed to scrape the crustified snow off. I come into the kitchen and Griffin is just standing there.
"What are you doing?" I ask him. "You could at least be making your lunch." He points to the teapot.
"I"m making hot water to pour on the windshield." Smart kid. Griffin pours the tea water on the windshield, works like a charm, and we're out.
7:40 am: Second lesson of the day.
People are too busy and in too much of a hurry. As I'm driving back from Griffin's school, this guy pulls around me fast to cut back in right in front of me so that he could turn right in just a few hundred feet. I swear he saved .001 of a second doing that, and I know he felt like an idiot because he kind of waved sheepishly at me after having done it. I avoid my impulse to pull into the King Soopers parking lot after him to inquire as to the nature of his problem, choosing instead to ruminate on it myself.
My favorite thing about studying Japanese were the written characters. It's pretty complex, having three separate character sets - hiragana, katakana, and kanji - but also really cool. The kanji are pictorial characters that came from Chinese, and you can sometimes see in them their etymological origins. The Japanese character (kanji) for "busy" is isogashii. When you look at its component characters, isogashii literally means "to lose one's heart." When I'm busy, I lose my heart. Boom. Right?
So I try to bear that in mind. I make time to take Griffin to school if I can, and when I come home, I take some time to make Rowan and I some eggs and toast. When Berit wakes up late in the morning and I'm here working, I stop for a few to talk or stretch with her. I'm grateful to my company for allowing me to work from home. They've made this possible for me to do my job and still be present for the kids. That's my real work. I also prioritize things like exercise, meditation, and yeah, writing. This is how I'm taking care of myself, and today I'm recommitting to daily writing. We'll see how it goes.
Griffin is up and getting ready to head out to walk to the bus stop. Greg doesn't have a period one class this semester, and so he's not giving Griffin a ride to school. Griffin tells me he stayed up until midnight reading his book (Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson). Pam and I spent years throwing books at Griffin and missing and along comes Ms. Gance, nailing him in one shot. I tell Griffin I'm giving him a ride.
7:05 am: First lesson of the day.
Even if you aren't going anywhere, wipe that pile of snow off of your windshield, because if you don't it will freeze in the sun there, and when it's time to take Griffin to school the following morning, you will be faced with trying to remove and de-ice those shenanigans without the aid of an ice scraper, because you gave that to Rowan.
I start the car and put the defrost on full blast, find an old license plate under my workbench and proceed to scrape the crustified snow off. I come into the kitchen and Griffin is just standing there.
"What are you doing?" I ask him. "You could at least be making your lunch." He points to the teapot.
"I"m making hot water to pour on the windshield." Smart kid. Griffin pours the tea water on the windshield, works like a charm, and we're out.
People are too busy and in too much of a hurry. As I'm driving back from Griffin's school, this guy pulls around me fast to cut back in right in front of me so that he could turn right in just a few hundred feet. I swear he saved .001 of a second doing that, and I know he felt like an idiot because he kind of waved sheepishly at me after having done it. I avoid my impulse to pull into the King Soopers parking lot after him to inquire as to the nature of his problem, choosing instead to ruminate on it myself.
My favorite thing about studying Japanese were the written characters. It's pretty complex, having three separate character sets - hiragana, katakana, and kanji - but also really cool. The kanji are pictorial characters that came from Chinese, and you can sometimes see in them their etymological origins. The Japanese character (kanji) for "busy" is isogashii. When you look at its component characters, isogashii literally means "to lose one's heart." When I'm busy, I lose my heart. Boom. Right?
So I try to bear that in mind. I make time to take Griffin to school if I can, and when I come home, I take some time to make Rowan and I some eggs and toast. When Berit wakes up late in the morning and I'm here working, I stop for a few to talk or stretch with her. I'm grateful to my company for allowing me to work from home. They've made this possible for me to do my job and still be present for the kids. That's my real work. I also prioritize things like exercise, meditation, and yeah, writing. This is how I'm taking care of myself, and today I'm recommitting to daily writing. We'll see how it goes.
July 10, 2015
Hello Copenhagen, Goodbye Copenhagen. Hello London, Goodbye London.
On Thursday, after finishing with the cleaning and packing, we began our long journey home. We met Karsten's brother Lars at the Middelfart bus stop after some anxiety about whether we were in the right place or not. Middelfart is the halfway point for the trip between Aarhus and Copenhagen so there were just enough seats for us, with Griffin riding shotgun, by the bus door and beneath the coffee pot.
I spent the journey talking with a gregarious Dane (an anomaly) named Ida (AY-da) who had spent five years in the States on a soccer scholarship. She struck up a conversation after observing me eating a sandwich and potato chips ("so American"). She and her girlfriend, who were headed from their home in Aarhus for a long weekend in Copenhagen, talked with me at length about Denmark and the Danish people.
In Copenhagen, Pam and Rowan trained to Norrebro for some shopping and coffee shop reading (respectively) while Berit, Griffin and I dabbed to our AirBNB apartment on the canal, another spacious, gorgeous flat.
All that talking on the bus really took it out of me but I mustered the energy to head across to the street to the Fiskatorvet mall with the kids. Berit and Griffin got drinks at the Baresso, but I had to get out of there pretty quickly.
We walked about 30 minutes into the centrum to meet Pam and Rowan at the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek art museum. Griffin's opinion on the matter was that one art museum this trip was enough, but Berit was positive about the venture (generously so).
Man Ray, Egyptian mummies and hieroglyphs, and French masters, all of which we fairly ran through. The kids stayed to play chess at the Man Ray exhibit while We foraged for dinner at Central Station.
Our cabbie back to the flat, Søren, was a friendly, older Dane who we enjoyed talking with and who agreed to pick us up at 5 am Friday morning to take us to the airport. Everybody caught at least a few winks on the two hour flight to London and, after going through passport control and customs, we wended our way (speedily, via the Heathrow Express) to our Marylebone (75 Lisson Grove, Earls Court 16) flat, dumped our belongings and hit the streets.
We nourished ourselves on coffees and pasties (oh ye delicious Cornwall pasties!) before making for Carnaby Street, Picadilly and other Soho destinations. We wound around through London, splitting up again as the girls headed to Cath Kitston and Griffin and I to Picadilly where he was pulled into some improv by a beat-boxing, saxophone-playing busker. Griffin and I wound our way through Charing Cross, through the book shops and down to Trafalger where we met the girls at Nelson's Column.
We cooled off and rested our feet in the Waterstones bookstore there. Pam bought a couple of YA books for her and Rowan. We walked down Whitehall, past the Cavalry where the changing of the guard occurs, past Westminster Abbey and across the Thames at Vauxhall Bridge (I think), turned and promenades along the Thames back up past the London Eye, leaning at the South Bank Centre where we fed ourselves among a throng enjoying various street food and music at the South Bank Love Festival.
After 13 hours on their feet, everyone was pretty over all the walking. We took the Baker Line tube from Waterloo Station back to Marylebone. It's 6:45 a.m. It's Saturday, and we have a flight at 3 p.m. Our idea is to hit the Portabello Market this morning, which was an absolute carnival when we found it here two years ago. We'll have to be back here at noon, collect our things and head off to Paddington Station to catch the Heathrow Express back to the airport for our 3 p.m. flight home What a long, incredible trip it's been.
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