A view of a vineyard just before the spring cycle of the growing season kicks in with budbreak. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Where are you? It’s been much too long since we last saw each other.
I’m hoping you’re about to show up for a leisurely visit. Though I can’t decide if it will be a surprise or not. You’re overdue, but Winter has been here for so long I suspect he will never leave. I tried getting a restraining order, but I’ve yet to find a judge willing to sign it. This rat bastard has his icy fists punching through every pothole, frozen toes doing the tango up and down my spine, and a steel wool beard that has turned my skin into stucco. And that’s just the physical.
The constant sub freezing temps have done a number on my psyche. I’ve even gone back to my yoga routine, in an effort to get myself to feel better. No, of course I’m not contorting myself into a mangled pretzel just to catch Summer’s eye. Maybe it is true that part of me is concerned I won’t fit in my overpriced bathing suit that’s only two years old, but honestly, that’s just a byproduct. I’m doing it for me, because Winter has sucked the soul out of me. Not only that, he’s been playing footsies with the 1 train. At least 50% of the rides I’ve taken since November that train has been a mess of frozen tracks. Late to arrive, slow to move, stopping between stations, evicting passengers for no apparent reason, and sometimes not showing up at all.
I’d rather be with you, Spring. Truly. At least until beach season.
here. No, this isn’t another weather complaint. Ok, maybe it’s a little bit of a weather complaint, but it’s actually a nice day in NY–for February. Sunny and forty five degrees. But really, I think it’s about the life I wish I were living.
It’s funny, because the life I am living is one many others want. Parts of it. New York City. Manhattan. Rent controlled apartment in a high rise building. Proximity to theater, music, art. And when I imagine life in Hawaii, I can see a lot of overlap. Multicultural living. Waking up to sights others dream of. Crazy high cost of living. Crowds. Tourists. Public transportation and walking making more sense than a car for daily life. Roaches big enough to put a leash on.
New York is like a mirage for so many. Generations keep coming. But for every 3 who come, 2 leave. It isn’t what they thought it would be. The competition is too steep, too massive, the snow is too black, the apartment is too cramped, the rent is too damned high. I imagine the same is true in Hawaii. Well, not the black snow, but the fantasy of what life will be like compared to the reality of bills and laundry and dirty dishes.
But in Hawaii you have this.
Big Island, Punaluu Beach Park (Photo credit: Wikipedia
What will it take for me to make peace with where I am? I don’t know. What would it take for me to get there? More money than I’m ever likely to have. Husband willing to go. Nerd Child and Man Child willing to trade their home base. More money.
For years I kept a reef tank, my beach house of dreams in a glass box. Recently I broke it down, the cost of upkeep too much right now. Much as I loved my tank and critters, and I expect I will set it up again eventually, it isn’t much of a substitute for this.
A Needlefish is being cleaned by Rainbow cleaner wrasse, Labroides phthirophagus. on a reef in Hawaii at cleaning station (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
There isn’t a whole lot of me in Christina, my main character of Astonishing. Except towards the end, when she’s dreaming of black sand beaches. Yet I didn’t send her there. Why? I don’t know. It would have been a different story, she would have been a different character.
Are you where you thought you’d be, Fringelings? Where you want to be?
**I don’t know why the spacing is so funky today. My mind must be somewhere else. On a beach. Or underwater with a school of yellow tang.
This morning I gave up. When I woke, it was 42* outside, windchill of 37*, probably 33* when factoring in the wind tunnel of my terrace. That’s right, I cried uncle and put socks on.
Sock Prayer Flags. (Photo credit: knitting iris)
I have a love/hate relationship with socks. Mostly hate. I prefer barefoot or flip-flops. I always make sure I have at least one pair of shoes that are fuzzy inside so I can delay the dreaded opening of the sock drawer as long as possible. But then…there are so many cool socks out there. Patterns, colors, silky, cozy, cushy, and itchy. Can’t forget itchy. They can be a boost on a cold morning, getting your toes warm and bright yarn to pierce a gray sky.
I always preferred barefoot. When I was a kid and running down the outside stairs without shoes on, my grandmother would yell behind me, “Fringie, the dogs make sissy out there! There’s glass!” Both true. Remember, I didn’t grow up in the country, these were the streets of South Brooklyn, no garbage cans on every corner, cracked cement, before NY was cleaned up for tourists, before the young and hip discovered the outer boroughs, before pooper scooper laws.
Here in Manhattan I don’t often see anyone barefoot outside. Once in a while, though, usually a young woman late at night or early in the morning carrying stilettos. Even I want to yell at her, “The dogs make sissy out here!”
As a teen, I would go to the beach and walk the boardwalk barefoot. The boardwalk used to be wood, no practical composite materials. Old weathered boards. At night, I could be found in my room with a pair of tweezers, picking the splinters out of the soles of my feet. By then, my feet were so calloused I didn’t feel the splinters going in or out. What did I do with my shoes while I was on the boardwalk or the beach? I can’t remember.
Coney Island, New York boardwalk on a foggy night. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Now, I’ve got the feet of an old peasant. Makes sense, I am an old peasant. Doesn’t matter if I spend 99 cents or $8.00 on a pair of socks, the average lifespan is a season. Or it would be, if I threw them out once they had holes. I don’t. Not until the holes can no longer be twisted and arranged so my toe doesn’t poke through inside my shoe while I’m walking. That’s uncomfortable. I’m sorry Man Child, you got my feet.
Husband has the feet of royalty. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him wear through a pair of socks. And he wears them :shudder: all year long.
English: Feral Goat on Island Davaar. At the time he was stood stock still and blended into the background very well. I almost walked straight past within a few feet and not notice him. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I can do a lot of dreaming looking at this photo, how about you? ~Mrs F
Late August. Time for the annual panic, “oh no, the school year’s about to start.” I’ve been walking around saying this summer has felt particularly odd because of the cool weather. Lies.
Summer is just never long enough for me. If it isn’t cool temps, it’s temps that are too hot, or too rainy, or too many obligations or too many deaths. Just not enough, which is an old and familiar song for me. The theme of much of my writing, the guilty chorus that whispers about my parenting, the peek at my word count at the end of each day’s writing session, the ever ready want of more.
The other day I went with Nerd Child and Flower Child to my godson’s Eagle Scout ceremony. Induction? I don’t know, scouts aren’t a big thing here in Manhattan. My suburban friends reassure me that scouting exists here in the city, but I’ve never met any beyond a small, half hearted cub scout group when Man Child was in 1st grade, disbanded by Christmas.
Brooklyn and Manhattan Bridges (Photo credit: honus)
It was very sweet–though I know better than to use the word sweet in relation to an almost seventeen year old boy– and made me feel old and nostalgic. We took the train to Brooklyn and the Scout’s grandmother, where I sat with my kids on her couch in the living room I spent hours in as a teenager. Not too many people from my past have stayed in Brooklyn, let alone the same house, so it was very alternate reality feeling. We met up with a friend and traveled the rest of the way to Long Island. There I saw more friends, and watched my kids goof around with theirs, and felt the absence of a good friend’s son who passed away last summer.
Obviously more goes into the Eagle Scout thing than I understand, Godson and parents were very, very proud. Local politicians and reps attended and gave brief speeches and congratulations. A snapshot of a lovely moment.
I also missed Man Child. Between boarding school and college he’s been away a lot, and I did get to see him this summer, but he’s already back in the dorm. This is the first time he hasn’t come home to be “home” over a break, and it’s damned weird.
Kind of maudlin today, aren’t I? Did get to the beach with Flower Child yesterday, which felt good, but didn’t quite recharge me in the way I had hoped. A family of three, two parents and a little girl of about 4 years old settled next to us. I couldn’t believe the amount of shit they had with them for two hours at the beach. Six towels, two large shade umbrellas, three huge bags of toys, sunscreen, and snacks: three people. The little girl was covered neck to calves in one of those bathing suit/lycra sun coverall things. I swear Flower Child and I saw bathing suits that looked just like it in the museum last year, what women wore at the turn of the twentieth century. This was not a fair skinned family, but you would think they were albino (am I politically incorrect, is there a more current term?) with the amount of sunscreen they slathered on. I’m not going to mention their little disagreement with the lifeguards about the safety of their sweet pea, and the rule against life jackets/swimmies in the ocean. I know it seems counterintuitive to the Backyard Pool crowd, but really. Big waves, riptides, small children, you don’t want them at all out of reach and where they can’t safely stand.
I know we’re all so much safer than previous generations, fewer kids will find themselves in the dermatologist’s office with a skin cancer diagnosis, but widespread Vitamin D deficiencies weren’t a thing when I was using baby oil and iodine instead of SPF 8000, either.
Listened to Creedance Clearwater Revival on the way home, remembered when that was my favorite beach music. When I had to turn the tape over it was time to flip and freckle my other side. I used to work odd hours, at the time I lived in South Brooklyn and worked in either Manhattan or downtown Brooklyn. In the summer, if I was working overnights I’d leave work and head straight for the beach, get a few hours of sleep and sun before heading home to eat, nap, and go back to work. Swing shifts, I’d get up early, get on the train and go back to sleep on the beach, leaving just enough time to shower before work. Thinking a lot about those days as I work on Astonishing, tapping into those old work experiences and certainties that I would, when I was ready, be a published author.
It’s ok, you can laugh, there was no internet then to tell me that isn’t how it works.
We did get to the beach the other day for a couple of hours. My peace, my soul, my bliss. I will be happy at any beach. Obviously, the ones with clean sand and water are better, but I’m not all that picky. The Brooklyn beaches with their layer of scum and floating you-don’t-want-to-know-what works for me too.
The above photo is of Sandy Hook, NJ. My favorite “local” beach. It hurt my heart to go there, seeing the damage still in evidence from Hurricane Sandy. I’m impressed and amazed at how much it’s been fixed up over the last months, and the road on the Hook is now smoothly paved. But you still see many businesses closed or closing on the highway leading to it, and the bathrooms are still out of commission. No thanks, Johnny on the Spot. I’ll skip the porta-potty and just clench those kegels until I get back home.
I’m sure I rambled about this last year, but I’m going to do so again. Mrs Fringe ❤ Beach. I don’t know the word for it, but there’s a feeling I get when on a beach that I just don’t/can’t get anywhere else. Stress levels drop, anxiety lessens, I feel…calm. I feel well. For me, it’s like being halfway through a perfectly mixed gin and lemonade. You know that point? Just enough so the gin is the most delicious substance to hit your tastebuds, smiling, relaxed, that neutral strip between this-mind-numbing-daily-grind-is-crushing-me and foolishly-relaxed-and-happy-I-CAN.
Alas, poor Yorick, we loved him well
Flower Child also loves the beach. Part of it is not mysterious, it’s a purely physical comfort. She doesn’t sweat, and playing in the water with the constant breeze off the ocean lets her enjoy a summer day. But part of it is that same mystery gene I’ve got, from before there were any known medical issues, when she was a baby, and the beach was just plain joy at first experience.
I wonder, if I lived on the beach, would my writing flow more easily? Or would I feel too good, and lose the drive to write? I wonder why I’ve never set a story on the beach, or in a beach town. Maybe it’s too hard to tap into enough conflict imagining such a life.
In my next life, I want a beach house.
But for this life, I take those days when I can, how I can. Revel in the contrast of my toes in cold waves and shoulders baking under the sun, while the scent of the saltwater wakes me from the inertia of the day to day, and the spray of the water is a protective coating.
If I hadn’t remembered this (ha!) I would know by the fact that Flower Child woke up and got out of bed on her own this morning.
Summer to me means extra time with my kiddos, stepping off of the rush rush rush, beach bliss, and all the deliciousness of summer fruits.
Dark cherries, white cherries, fuzzy peaches, ripe mangoes, nectarines, watermelon! And papaya. Dear Husband, I don’t like papaya. I don’t care how ripe it is or isn’t, what how nicely you cut it, how perfect your batida came out. Papaya tastes like farts. Sorry.
The feel of the sun on my skin. The scent of cocoa butter. (Hey, I have dry skin, ok?) Flower Child’s glee on the beach, wind blowing, waves breaking, entrepreneurs with carts and Hefty bags plodding through the sand with an ocean wet towel draped over their head, “Cold Water HE-ah! ColdWater, ColdSoda, Cold Beeeer! If you don’t drink beer, you’re gonna die!”
thinking about next week (Photo credit: Makz)
Ok, there’s only one guy who says the last one, but it leaves a lasting impression, and you look for him if you haven’t packed enough drinks to last for the afternoon. Also true, I can’t remember the last time I drank a beer on the beach, probably before I had children. But still, it’s part of what comes to mind when I think summer beach day.
The city does tend to smell a whole lot worse in the heat. The temperature bakes into the concrete, mixes with old dog piss and rises up in waves that try to suck you down like a rip tide. Most buildings try to minimize this by hosing down the sidewalks at least once a day. If it weren’t for the filth factor, you could probably bake a brick oven pizza directly on the subway platform by the time we get to August. And while most of me loves the heat, in the past few years my nerves–literally–don’t. If I’m out walking when it’s hot I get this weird painful zinging buzzing down my arms and spine.
The best part of summer in the city is my neighborhood. Quiet. Half of it empties out, people take off for their country houses/beach houses. Sometimes my suburban friends will even come to visit me, there are parking spots to be found. Certainly quieter than my bedroom at this time of year. Our air conditioner doesn’t work well, and it isn’t properly set into the sleeve, so it sounds and feels like I’m trying to sleep on an airport tarmac.
Have to bring the girl to school. We should be on time, the day is only two and a half hours long for this last one. What does summer mean to you?
Cooling off nyc style (Photo credit: *Bitch Cakes*)
A pair of well-used flip-flops. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
This is what I should be wearing. Instead, I’m wearing a turtleneck and winter coat. For the love of God, I’ve got socks on! Socks!
I hate socks. Don’t put them on until the last possible day in the fall, and put them all away the moment my toes don’t actually get stiff in the spring. Yes, I’m whining. And yes, I know it isn’t just NY, it seems like much of the country is experiencing unusually cold temperatures right now.
Last year Flower Child and I spent one of the days of Memorial Day weekend on the beach. I’m sure, over the course of the weekend, I cooked things that were seasonal. Tofu dogs, cole slaw, burgers, whatever.
At least it’s still a three day weekend. And today Husband was going to work later, which meant I could sleep in. (I try to walk the dogs at least once while he’s home so Flower Child doesn’t have to get dressed and come out with me in the mornings of her days off.) Except I didn’t get to sleep in. Something went wrong with the plumbing yesterday; dirty, disgusting water backed up into our tub. So instead of snoring, I was downstairs harassing the handyman at eight AM, to make sure he didn’t “forget” to come up and fix it. Again. In my coat, because it was 44 degrees this morning.
I’m making soup for dinner today. Kale and cannellini bean soup. So wrong for the calendar, I didn’t have soup stuff in the cabinet, and had to go food shopping first thing this morning.
1) Saute your base in olive oil. I used garlic, red onion, carrots, celery, fresh ground salt and pepper, thyme and oregano.
2)Add canned peeled tomatoes, smush them in pot, cook about 20 minutes.
3)Add water and or broth (I used about half and half), kale, beans, and a hunk of Parmesan rind. Bring to boil, then lower down and cook about half an hour. *I prefer escarole, but the store didn’t have it today and I didn’t want to go to another store.
4) Immersion blender into pot, blend part (but not all, and don’t blend the Parm rind) of soup, I did a rough, quick few runs with it, leaving it mostly chunky, just adding texture.
5) Add torn stale Italian bread. Or baguette, whatever you’ve got, cook at least another 40 minutes over low heat.
I am ready to be smack in the middle of this photo. My mind is, anyway. The calendar says not yet. Come to think of it, my abs aren’t so sure either, I haven’t worked out in way too long. It can’t be bothering me that much, or I’d get my butt onto the yoga mat and start crunching.
Instead, I’m still working on the damned synopsis. I have a completed draft. It needs a gastric bypass, and then some serious CPR.
Little Incredibly Dumb Dog decided she’d help me out by eating my flash drive. This way there’s no evidence of those wasted hours when I hit the delete button, and I burned a few calories chasing her to get it out of her tiny, vise-like jaws.
Don’t let the bad haircut fool you, she isn’t innocent.
Maybe if I put the printed synopsis between my teeth as I hold the chair pose, both flabby abs and prose will tighten up.
For someone who isn’t going anywhere, I spend a lot of time thinking about where I’d like to be.
Hawaii (Photo credit: jmauerer)
I’ve never been to Hawaii, so it’s pure fantasy to say I’d like to live there. But I know I love warm weather, and sun, and the beach. I’d have to give up my mixed reef tank, it’s illegal to buy most corals there, but I could have an excellent softie tank, with some beautiful fish. Besides, I’d be able to see the corals in the ocean. Wouldn’t that be something? Unfortunately, I’d also love to live somewhere I could afford a little house and groceries, with a good school system for Flower Child, so Hawaii isn’t a likely scenario.
So many beautiful places to fantasize about, even limiting my game of “let’s pretend” to America. Sometimes I think about going north, have you been to Vermont? Awesome sharp cheddar, real maple syrup, elderberry wine! It’s stunning; peaceful, sunny, and many parts are affordable.
Vermont (Photo credit: Dougtone)
I love to read the descriptions and study the photographs posted by my online friends who live in various parts of the country. I envy their gardens, their scenery, their reasonable cost of living, and their space. Then I keep reading. And hear about raccoons and deer and bear, and beavers and possums and snakes. *** I had to pause here, because my shudders made it impossible to work the keyboard.
Yes, it’s true, Mrs Fringe is a weenie. I’m willing to brave underwater creepy crawlies, willing to brave the subways, I’ll even, on occasion if need be, brave the tourists in Times Square. But rabies and lyme disease and giardia? Oh my!
When I was a kid, I thought I was an animal lover. I loved dogs, I even the loved the gazillion stray cats that lived in the neighborhood. My parents told me I was an animal lover. There were plenty of breadcrumbs, if I had thought to follow the trail. I hated the chickens at the live poultry place on McDonald Ave. But they were there to be killed, plucked, and taken home for Sunday dinner, the F train roaring and clanking above, so I didn’t think of them as nature. I also didn’t think of them as dinner, I think I stopped eating chicken by the time I was eight. I hated the zoo. But this was before the days when zoos became humane, who could love the scrawny, flea bitten lion tearing into a hunk of bloody raw meat in his cage? I loved the track. I loved Black Beauty. Very exciting. Beautiful animals, those thoroughbred horses. From a distance. Up close, they’re really, really big. Scary. I was an adult before I found myself next to a cow. They’re huge! And they stink. I know how to hold my breath on a steamy day in August when walking down the subway steps, so the waves of funk and urine don’t penetrate. But farm animals? There is no holding your breath for that stench. Pfft, clean smell of manure…I don’t think so.
Thinking back, again, they weren’t so much breadcrumbs on a trail as bright yellow strips of divider on an interstate highway.
Are you living where you want? If you could move, where would you go?
For all my fantasy time, I’m not sure where I want to end up. But I don’t want to be here.
mrsfringe 