Effortless

The sky overhead is grey and glowering, locked with low-hanging clouds that make the earth feel squeezed. The air is cool, breezy, hovering between autumn and winter. I walk with my hands in my pockets, my wool coat held closed with the only button that will still reach over my pregnant belly. I am never sure whether I like these long solitary walks or not. I love the nip of the air, the feel of the wind on my face, the wild scent of raindrops as the light drizzle hits the pavement below me. I love the time alone with my thoughts, the feeling of escape, the openness of the world around me. Still, there is something monotonous about the churning of my legs, one step after another, the same motion repeated again and again. They don’t feel tired today, my legs. After my first block, I decide to keep walking, turning away from my house and widening my path.

The wind picks up as I walk up a leaf-carpeted sidewalk; it snatches the leaves into the air and for several long seconds, I am carried along in a rush of dry leaves, swirling around my feet and legs with a sound like water. It is a magical moment, a good-to-be-alive moment, and I find myself rejoicing in the day—in the wind, in the leaves, in the strength of my own body.

When I get home and plot my meandering route into the computer, I am shocked to find that I walked two miles easily. Effortlessly, I think, remembering the way my legs kept going, the way my breathing was steady. I am overwhelmed by some emotion I cannot name. At the beginning of this year, I couldn’t walk one mile without it feeling like a monumental effort, without coming home afterward and collapsing onto the couch.

This is my year of miracles, my year to make medical history. Eight months ago I started a brand-new medication for cystic fibrosis, groundbreaking in its abilities, but still only available to handful of CF patients with a relatively rare mutation—a mutation I happen to have. In these eight months, I have watched my life slowly change in ways more dramatic than any I could have imagined. I have walked further. I have felt better. I have seen my lung function go up instead of down, and gone for two-thirds of a year without ever feeling the need for a hospital admission. After a year and a half of infertility, I find myself pregnant with a miracle baby and breezing through the pregnancy without any serious health concerns.

These are the kinds of things that you never expect, with a terminal illness. You don’t expect to get the chance to travel back in time, to reach a place of better health and more stability. You don’t expect to spend eight months watching as, one by one, so many of your longest-held dreams come true.

A few weeks ago, I sat in a hard plastic chair, beaming, as a stream of medical professionals came in and out of my room. Each one exclaimed over my lung function test results, my burgeoning belly, my newfound stamina, my health in general. In the lulls between visits I could hear the patient next to me—young; nearly all CF patients are young—talking with his nurse as she replaced his oxygen canister. They wondered aloud if he was up to the walk down to the cafeteria, or if his mother should take him in a wheelchair.

The cafeteria is almost directly below the pulmonary clinic, perhaps five hundred steps.

That afternoon lingered with me for days, and I found a familiar question returning again and again to my heart. Why me? I wondered. Only this time I was on the other side of the fence: I was not asking Why me? Why is my situation so much harder?

Instead, I was asking Why me? Why am I so blessed?

These eight months have brought with them a wealth of complicated emotions. I feel consumed with joy each day, overwhelmed by my own fortune. Every day I walk further. Every day I feel my tiny daughter move inside me, a sensation so magical it brings tears to my eyes, remembering all of the days I thought I would never feel this.

Every day, I am grateful.

But there is frustration, too, and guilt. While I have been experiencing a year of miracles, it seems like nearly all of my friends with cystic fibrosis have been locked in a year of trials. Today, when I get home from my two-mile walk, I learn that one of my very oldest and dearest friends has spent the week in critical condition, unable to breathe on her own.

Like that afternoon in the doctor’s office, it is a stark contrast.

I know that all of my friends are thrilled for me in my good fortune, and I am certainly grateful for it, incredibly so. I wouldn’t trade this year for anything; not only has it changed my day-to-day standard of living, but it has flung open so many doors to the future, exploded all of the barriers that used to exist. In a community of disease where the average life expectancy has yet to hit forty, suddenly old age doesn’t seem like such an impossible achievement. But still, I wish that I could share it, could watch all of the people I love experience similar miracles.

I cannot, of course—not yet, at least, not until science has come a little further and there are miracle medications for more common CF mutations. All I can do, for now, is to make sure that I never take this new life for granted.

And so, now, I pull back on my shoes and re-button that single button on my coat, and go outside again. I am not ready to be done walking yet, not ready to be done relishing the feel of the wind on my face and the strength in my body.

Wanting to hold on, for just a little longer, to that feeling of effortlessness.

A World of One

My bed is in front of a window. I should move it, really. Old apartments get drafty. But I like the sound of the cars on the interstate because their wooshing wakes me up. It’s a gentle way to begin the day. Nobody honks in rural New England. When I rolled over this morning, the other side of the street was barely visible. It was the densest fog I’d ever seen and the sight filled me with a sense of urgency. Marine layers burn off quickly when the sun comes out, or at least they do at home. So, I threw my coat on over my pajamas, tucking my plaid pant legs into the top of my Hunters. I grabbed my camera and walked outside.

The neighborhood was absolutely silent. In the center of the park, I looked at the tree line. Closest to me, the trees were made of deliberate lines. But, the middle-distance figures turned into figments. Farther on they were just vague silhouettes, more indefinite until they stopped existing all together. It was like rubbing away a smudge.

When I walked back into the house, I stood in the doorway of my bedroom. I stared out the window and then down at my bed. Half of the covers were rumpled and slept in. The other half were still perfectly straight. I crossed the wood floor to fold over the sheets and pulled up the corner of my comforter.

All this time, I thought it was habit. Or, I thought maybe it was loneliness. Some nights it felt like a symbolic act---half filled heart, half filled bed, defined by absence. But I felt full standing out in the fog, clutching my camera and completely alone. There was a surrounding presence in the dampening air. A weight, like the undisturbed covers.

I wake up to the same span of sheets that I always have. My hands rest on the edge of the mattress. All that exists is the world within reach. The rest simply fades into white.

Coming and going

Last Thursday, I landed in Chicago and hit the ground running. I had just a couple of hours to catch a glimpse of the city before my work there began in earnest. And although I knew I’d be exhausted by the end of the trip, I wanted more than just bland seminar rooms and conference center halls to make up my first impressions of the city. It was the first time in a long time that I’ve simply showed up someplace new and set out to wander. As I hopped out of the cab on Michigan Avenue, I felt myself slow from my usual hurried pace to a leisurely stroll. I had no particular destination in mind, and in fact, had little sense of where I was to begin with.

It felt strange at first, to plop down in the middle of a purposeful crowd without much direction of my own, and then, all of a sudden, it felt so good. I wandered in and out of shops, just to browse, in a way I wouldn’t in my own city. I ran my fingertips over silky dresses and sequined tops. I stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and snapped photos. I smiled at strangers and held the door behind me.

Over the course of the next five days, I worked long hours and ate enough deep dish pizza to last me a decade. I took in all the twinkling lights and laughed at how Christmas seems to have blossomed rather early in Chicago. It’s funny how some places seem imbued with such magic when you meet them for the first time.

It felt just as delightful to go as it did to come back home to Atlanta, just as luxurious to sleep in a new bed as it did to return to my own. Our little place felt even more cozy than when I’d left, and I couldn’t help wondering at how sometimes slipping away and returning again is the perfect reminder of delight in newness and comfort in familiar.

The 90/10 Ratio

I read a great article recently about parenting where they mentioned that it was 90% work and 10% meaningful fun. I suppose that’s one of the biggest surprises about parenting is how much work it truly is. I spend more hours of my day cleaning, cooking, doing the laundry and dishes, than I do interacting with Charley. He watches way too much TV since I’m exhausted and pregnant, and in those tiring afternoon hours when he’s not napping I think I’ve failed at it all. (Although he is learning quite a lot about trucks.) But then we have these small moments that are worth everything. The other evening after a tumultuous afternoon nap where he woke up crabby and I did too, we turned off the TV and went to the playroom. Before kids I wanted to be one of those cool stay at home moms that came up with fun crafts and cooked with her kids all the time. The reality is that I am so exhausted I occasionally let him help bake something, but usually I just make peanut butter and jelly. And crafts, forget it. The second I think about attempting one of those quaint glitter-covered paper pumpkins on Pinterest, all I can picture is the massive amount of clean-up that will be involved. But the other night I set it all aside, grabbed some craft paper and traced Charley’s hand to make little turkeys. I didn’t use glitter or glue, just crayons and paper, and the whole thing lasted about ten minutes before he was bored. But in those ten minutes when the Christmas music was playing and the windows were open with a cool breeze (we live in Florida, this is our best time) I was happy.

Even yesterday, I had this funny déjà vu moment of remembering my childhood. We were out on the porch, eating cut sandwiches of ham and cheese and pretzels in little snack baggies. Charley was in his bright red and yellow Fisher Price car, the same one my parents have photos of me in when I was a child, and I thought about being a little kid on the beach, eating sandwiches and Cheetos that my dad packed me for lunch. The moment was sad and happy at the same time. It was the realization that I was no longer in that place, but I was slowly finding that place for myself.

I often fall into the trap of feeling like I could be doing more. More of anything; more cooking, more teaching, more sex. That I could be less tired all the time, and try harder. It’s tough to feel like you are constantly not living up to your parenting expectations. But then I think back to all my favorite memories, and I’m sure those were the rare 10%. So perhaps that’s all they really remember anyway. I hope.

XIII. Provence

I am walking along the Mediterranean coast with the groupe des randonneurs that I joined as my required extracurricular activity from ACCP. What I had expected to be rigorous hiking turns out to be a group of mostly retired people who amble through woods every Tuesday afternoon. I convinced Leah and Bridget to join as well, and we’re laughing at how ridiculously slowly we are moving. We hadn’t fully comprehended the meaning of the verb randonner when we signed up for this. We thought it was hiking. This is ambling, maybe. Strolling.

We are the only ones wearing shorts and are obviously American, and so the other walkers are delighted to meet us. At the break halfway through the walk, we are plied with treats and spécialités personelles of every sort from our fellow randonneurs — homemade cake, figs stuffed with almonds, provençal cookies. I finally have to say no to coffee. Leah, Bridget and I tried so hard to be friendly and gracious that after the break we feel a bit nauseated.

Wild rosemary grows everywhere in this dry climate. As I walk along the cliffside road back toward the bus, the clouds rolling in over the sea, I pick some and crush it between my fingers to release the sharp, woodsy fragrance.

“Try eating it,” says one of the smiling women walking near me. “It’s good for the digestion.”

Knitting for Writers

No, this is not the name of a ridiculous fundraiser. And it’s not a title for one of those “How to . . . for Dummies” books either. I took up knitting during my last year of graduate school. I had received a starter knitting kit, complete with gigantic needles, two balls of very chunky yarn, and instructions for basic projects, during the previous year. After a couple of false starts, I left it propped against the wall in the corner for many months. Since I couldn’t knit my first row perfectly, I was determined to give up altogether.

But as I launched into my last year of studies, I felt smothered by the weight of so many books that needed to be read and so many papers that needed to be written. I felt like I was climbing a mountain whose summit I couldn’t see. As part of me began to hunker down and plow through the work, another part of me came up for air, grasping for something tactile to hold onto.

I was searching desperately for something that was not a four-syllable word or an idea about a theory about a concept. I wanted a real thing, with measurable weight and texture and vivid color. Hence, the knitting.

I remember the false starts, when I tossed the needles aside in frustration, but I don’t remember beginning in earnest. Before long, I had transformed a ball of thick, scratchy yarn into a very ugly, very square-shaped hat, which I gifted to my sister, who wore it with pride on both sides of the Atlantic.

After the hat, I gave up on interesting shapes and focused simply on flat rectangles—potholders, scarves, and lately, a blanket. I realized that my delight had nothing to do with the complexity or practicality of the project, but simply with the joy of transforming one thing into another.

For a while, I had a thing for fancy yarns and would scour the aisles of yarn shops for the softest possible yarns (alpaca, cashmere) and the warmest colors I could find (brick red, mustard yellow). Eventually, though, I settled on an armful of the simplest undyed yarn I could find, along with a pair of circular needles. I wasn’t sure what I would make, exactly. I only knew that it would be very big and very flat. I just wanted to knit and knit and keep on knitting without stopping for a very long time.

In the midst of all of that knitting, I wrote my papers. I wrote them without all of the hair pulling and teeth grinding I had done in my first year of the program. I wrote them without that terrible sense of sprinting and crashing I’d had before, and without the all-nighters. I chugged along steadily, picking up with each new paper just as soon as I’d tied off the ends of the one before. I knitted, I wrote, and at long last, I graduated.

Of course, this is not to say that it was only knitting that saved me, or that it wasn’t still a very hard year. It’s just to say that sometimes it helps to come at a thing indirectly, that sometimes it takes a bit of creativity to generate momentum, and that discipline grows with steady practice over time.

One Bad Mother

I have the video monitor on with the sound turned way up. I listen with one ear perked to her noisy, clogged breathing---such an adorable, pathetic, concerning sound emanating from our miniature person with a cold.  I glance periodically at the screen, whose camera looks like it is hunting for paranormal activity.  I flash on all the tasks that should consume the rest of my evening---the tasks left hanging from a never-ending work day.  It is 8:38 PM and I wonder how much steam I've got left before that heavy molasses feeling envelops my brain.  I am distracted momentarily by her flipping over, sighing a little and registering a tiny complaint.  My resolve begins to waver and now I'm considering the consequences of simply climbing into bed at this point with the monitor and a magazine.  Or better yet, scooping her up out of the crib and bringing her into bed with me.  In weeks like this one, there are days when I spend more time watching her on the monitor than I do holding her in my arms. Even a generation ago, I am not sure women allowed themselves the luxury to think about work-life balance in the way that we do now.  Today, as I was frantically rushing home to catch 20 minutes with the baby before bedtime, I thought about how lucky I am to even consider such a notion.  How fortunate that I have the education, training, and capacity to work outside the home in the first place, let alone be daunted by how to thrive in two environments.  My work is meaningful to me, it is in a chosen field, and I have a large measure of control over my schedule.  I am not limited to an exclusive childcare role nor am I forced to work a job that is dangerous, unsatisfying or menial.  When I zoom out on my scenario, I realize how refined and esoteric my dilemma might seem to some.  In fact, in an ideal world, more women would face this kind of dilemma---one in which they are choosing among many good options for childcare and have the privilege of participating an elevating career.

It would appear that whether or not women (and many men) have had the consciousness or the language to describe it, this struggle is ages old.  I try to recall how my own mother dealt with managing work and home life.  I don't ever remember noticing her being particularly tired, lacking the energy to make things happen at home or even seeming anxious about her responsibilities.  She consistently helped with homework, threw some hot meal on the table (albeit rarely cooked by her) and made it to all our games/performances.  Although she worked full-time, I always had access to her on the phone.  She arranged for school pickups and shuttling to activities with others if she was unable to coordinate her schedule.  We definitely reconvened each night as a family and this seemed to re-set the connectedness.  I do remember a general sense of wishing I could spend more time with my mother and vaguely complaining about this in moments.  But weekends were exclusively devoted to us and our needs and whatever else was happening during my parents' busy lives, it was clear we were the priority.  Of course she had help, as I do, with housework and childcare.  Oh and did I mention she had five kids?

When I ask my mother these days about what it was like for her raising a brood and working full time, she admits to feelings of guilt, mostly about not being enough or doing enough at home.  She was always highly competent and effective at work---in her mind, it was home that suffered.  Although it was not our experience that she dropped any particular ball, I have more insight now into how she must have lived with powerful ambivalence.  It is also worth noting that my parents literally never took a single vacation on their own or did any individualized, enriching, adult activities.  This is the one area where I picture doing things a little differently.  As much as I can't begin to process the demands on their time for all those years, I hope/plan to delineate more regular space for my marriage and more escape for myself.

Sometimes my mother says to me, "Oh, well, you know it was easier back then."  I have some sense that she is right about that but neither of us can put our finger on exactly why this is true.  I think for one, it required less money and less time at work to be a solidly middle class family and achieve financial flexibility.  I also think there was more neighborly and community support built in to people's lives.  Perhaps the expectations on adults and children were also more reasonable---not everybody was supposed to a "Super" anything?  The fact remains that we had soccer, art class, piano lessons et al and my parents were pulled in a zillion directions.  Still, I can't access a single episode of a legitimate melt down---the machinery always moved fairly seamlessly forward.

The guilt I feel about missing time with our baby casts long shadows and tugs at me throughout the day.  I genuinely imagine that she might develop a greater attachment to the baby sitter during weeks when their time together is more enduring.  When I come home and she instantly lurches forward from the babysitter's arms for me to hold her and proceeds to cling to me like a chimp for the remainder of the evening, it brings some secret satisfaction.  The selfish side of me is relieved when she demonstrates a touch of separation anxiety, howling when I leave the room.  I want her to be securely attached, but I also want to know she prefers me to anyone and won't forget that during the many hours I am away.

I am proud of my work and know it is critical to my identity to have a holistic sense of self.  I recognize it is good for my daughter to establish her independence and be cared for by many different loving adults.  I reaffirm that I want to be her primary and central model of a woman with a career.  This doesn't mean I don't cry at my desk mulling the fact that she might take her first steps today and I could miss it.  This is the fulsome experience of the modern woman/parent.

In my view, it is not so much about figuring out how to have it all as it is being happily immersed in what you are doing at any given moment.  I think anyone who presents as having each domain of life under control is hiding something or is teetering on the brink.  I respect and appreciate the women in my life who admit to questioning their many roles and evaluating their health and sanity with respect to each of them.

By 10:17 PM I had done nothing but write this piece and pump 5 ounces of breast milk before I packed it in for the night.  Then again, I guess that is something.

Photo of Sarah: Buck Ennis for Crain's New York Business.

A Responsibility to Love

Last week Roxanne wrote a post titled The Responsibility to Love. I encourage you to follow the link and read it if you haven’t already, Roxanne’s writing is always timely, poignant, and thoughtful.  You should also read her post, because I’m not going to recap her words here, only the title. For a week I’ve had those four words running through my head: A Responsibility To Love.  The sheer power of that phrase has reverberated deep in my soul and subconscious.  What does it mean? What does it mean for me? A Responsibility To Love.

Love is one of those words that fits multiple parts of speech.  It can be a thing, a metaphorical place, an emotion, an adverb, and of course, a verb.  To Love. I love many people; I love my best friends, my family, my husband.  I often have very strong feelings for my first cup of coffee in the morning too, but let’s forget about loving things for now.  Love can be stagnant; I will always love my parents. But as with anything, surely it’s better with a little effort. I love my parents much more because I know them as people and individuals; I know them because I talk with them often and communicate.  So I don’t just love them as my parents, but as individuals whom I know and respect.  But perhaps that is degrees of love, and not responsibility.

What does it mean to have a Responsibility To Love?  I think first, it means letting someone know that they are loved.  If you love someone, truly deeply love them, and you don’t express that, it’s a little like the tree falling in the forest.  Love isn’t something that is meant to be hidden or silenced; it should be shouted from the rooftops. If you love someone, I think you have a responsibility to let them know: initially, often, and frequently.

I also think with Love comes the responsibility of caring for someone.  Whether it is taking care of a spouse when they are ill, helping a friend through a breakup, or offering support whenever able, if you love someone you should be, to some extent, responsible for their wellbeing.  In a similar vein, I think it is important and necessary to care for the relationship.  I have a black thumb myself, but I’ll use the analogy anyway: just as a plant requires water and sunlight to bloom, a relationship requires care and contact to thrive and survive. (Luckily I am a much better friend than I am a gardener).

Finally, on a grander scale, I think A Responsibility To Love means that I have a responsibility to act with love.  Not only towards the select group of individuals that I love, but in everything I do.  Everyone loves Someone, and in the nature of 6 degrees, if you follow the connections long enough, eventually the someone that a stranger loves will come in contact with someone that I love.  Just as I want that person to be treated with kindness, I should treat the strangers I meet with the same. There is nothing wrong and everything right with spreading a little more love in the world.  From now on, I’m looking it as my responsibility; a responsibility to love.

Envy and Gratitude

For as long as I remember, I—like many girls—have loved the Anne of Green Gables series. Some of my earliest memories involve falling asleep at night to the sound of Meagan Follows reading Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Avonlea; to this day, there are whole passages of those particular books embedded in my subconscious, in Follows’ melodious voice. I have always found much to identify with in Anne Shirley; like Anne, I was an impetuous, talkative, dreamy child who used big words and was once paid money to keep quiet for ten minutes. (I succeeded, by the way.) Like Anne, as an adult I struggle with keeping my temper and tending to take life through a rather melodramatic lens. Even as a child, one of my favorite books in the series was also one of the less well-known: Anne’s House of Dreams, the fifth Anne book, which covers Anne’s first years of marriage to the swoon-worthy Gilbert Blythe. I’m not sure why, as a preteen, I found myself drawn to a book about new marriage—especially one that includes a heartbreaking subplot that still makes me cry every time I read it—but the love has persisted. Once I became a newlywed myself, and experienced, like Anne, the pangs of disappointed longing for motherhood, the book earned an even more special place in my heart.

One of the most interesting characters in Anne’s House of Dreams is Leslie Moore, the victim of a loveless marriage who is now left caring for her incapacitated husband in the wake of a traumatic brain injury. Leslie is complex and confusing, by turns sweet and sour; she becomes good friends with  Anne, but has a difficult time not being jealous of Anne’s newlywed bliss. Halfway through the book, after Anne suffers a tragedy herself, Leslie opens up about her conflicted feelings. Describing the first time she saw Anne driving into town with her new husband, Leslie says:

“I hated you in that very moment, Anne . . . it was because you looked so happy. Oh, you’ll agree with me now that I am a hateful beast—to hate another woman just because she was happy,—and when her happiness didn’t take anything from me!”

I must admit: every time I read about Leslie’s passionate jealousy, I feel something of a kinship. Envy has always been my besetting sin. I can vividly remember being fifteen years old, lying on my bed, my soul harrowed up with frustration over some now-forgotten inequality. I’ve always been prone to jealousy, coveting my friends’ lives, their children, the apparent ease that is always the illusion of a life seen from the outside. Like Leslie, I’ve been guilty of feeling anger at someone else for a happiness I couldn’t share, even when that happiness took nothing from me.

Earlier this year, I had had enough. I resolved that 2012 would be the year that I learn to overcome that natural jealousy, that I learn how to be truly content with my life exactly where it is, without feeling the need to look over my neighbor’s fence. And as I pondered, and journaled, and read, and soul-searched about the issue, I came up with a deceptively simple answer:

Live in gratitude. That was it. Could it really be that simple, I wondered? Could a life lived in gratitude have the power to overcome the vice I’d struggled with for twenty-four years?

I set about testing the principle out. I promised myself that the next time I caught myself looking with envy at somebody else’s life, I’d think instead, What they have is wonderful. But what I have is wonderful, too.

And, to my surprise, it worked. I felt myself becoming more and more aware of all of the things I loved about my life. I found that suddenly, even the things that hadn’t turned out in the way I wanted them to had become sources of blessings; I began to rejoice over all the unexpected twists and turns I’d encountered in my life and the exciting and unanticipated places they had taken me. I discovered, to my delight, that scenes and situations that had once filled me with jealousy and bitterness no longer disturbed my equanimity—unless I let them.

I was the “master of my fate,” I realized; it was up to me to decide what the condition of my heart would be on any given day. Simply the act of acknowledging my own power, and making a conscious choice to live in gratitude and let go of my envy, was bringing more change into my life than I ever could have imagined.

It hasn’t been a perfect, or a permanent, change, of course. Since that May day when I made my decision, I’ve experienced plenty of periods where I’ve let go, let frustration and ingratitude creep back into my life. Like anyone, I’ve had down days—but they have come less frequently than they did before.

As I write this, I find myself marveling over the difference that such a simple choice has made in my life. It seems silly, elementary, hardly worth discussing. But I can’t shake the idea that, this year, I have come upon the secret of happiness:

And its name is gratitude.

Beginning to End

I left Portland thinking that I was on the verge of becoming the person I wanted to be. My big dream had become a reality: I’d been accepted to graduate school. I was about to become scholar, a creative, a put-together person who listens to their voicemail. But now, here I was, putting on mascara at three o’clock in the afternoon. My first (and only) social interaction of the day would be with the clerk at the corner market. I’ve gotten to know the houses that sit between mine and the market. I walk there almost everyday for something, maybe green beans or licorice. Mostly I just need the air. The gardens have changed gradually since I moved in, but on this day the change was emphatic. The first frost had come the night before. And everywhere everything was dying. In front of the church, the snapdragons had been pulled out by their roots. The grass was wilted over and clinging limply to the curb.

Inside the store, Paul Simon’s Slip Sliding Away was on the radio. It was a song I'd heard a thousand times, but for the first time the words really shook me. Autumn---the celebrated season of New England---was giving way to the season I’d been warned about. All of it had gradually slipped away. Not just the season, even, but parts of myself, too. I hadn’t touched my camera in months. Somewhere I'd stopped being the girl chasing her dreams and had become the girl crying in a grocery store aisle while staring at a bottle of cabernet.

I needed to see something or someone flourishing, so, I set out to visit a friend who had also started a new life here recently. Nichole is an apprentice in the flower and herb gardens at Stone Barns, a non-profit farm and education center just outside of New York City.

In the hoop-houses it was every season. Microgreens pushed up through the soil in rows. Sungold tomatoes were ripe on the vine. But outside, it was just like what I'd seen in New England. The peonies were crumpled like burned paper. Even the globe amaranth---defiant in fuchsia and Shiap pink---were being cut that day.

“How do you do it?” I asked her. I knew that Nichole helped to plant the terraces last spring. She’d put her knees on the ground and drawn her finger across the earth, placing a row of seeds in the part she made before folding the dirt back over again. With her care, the seeds had sprouted and become something beautiful. And now all of that was dying.

She replied with graceful acceptance. “It’s hard. But I like seeing something come full circle”.  I knew she was right---I’ve seen the Lion King. But, I kept thinking about the churchyard snapdragons, disappearing in a compost pile somewhere. Sure, they were returning to the earth from where the came, but they had once been exuberant. The change felt harsh and unfair.

Then Nichole took me to the drying room.  Rows of soybeans were hung up in bunches. Statice and cockscomb were pinned to the rafters and the globe amaranth was being tied for drying. There were wooden bins full of gourds and screen drawers filled with herbs. Most of them would become something else, used in teas or tinctures. Some would be saved for seeds.  Nichole picked up a clipping of rosemary and ran her fingers along the stem. With one quick pull the leaves were stripped. “Full circle.” She said.  And I finally knew what she meant.

She had followed these flowers from start to finish---and here we were at the start again. I guess circles are comforting that way. The further you are from where you began, the closer you are to the next beginning.

So long, Vogue

By Rhea St. Julien After several years of an admittedly tumultuous relationship, I am breaking up with Vogue.  My subscription is up, and I am finally pulling the trigger and not renewing.  If this blog were a movie, I’d segue here into a montage of me + Vogue in better times, reading sandy articles on the beach, discovering Claire Dederer and Cheryl Strayed, ripping out amazingly curated spreads by Grace Coddington and Irving Penn to create collage art.

But our relationship has not all been Happy Days with scissors.  Like everyone else on the planet, I was appalled by Dara-Lynn Weiss’s article about shaming her child into losing weight.  I have grown increasingly tired of the pieces on Connecticut garden homes refurbished by gazillionaires, and the lack of diversity reflected on the pages.  However, I was willing to overlook all of this, because Vogue isn’t pretending to be anything else than it is.  The magazine is sold as the flight of fantasy of a particular Manhattan woman, and if I don’t like their point of view, I can just skip those articles or join the conversation surrounding them to shift the culture.  Somehow, what pushed me over the edge from giving them a pass to writing CANCEL on my invoice was a subtle message in an otherwise innocuous, seemingly empowering article.

I was drawn in by their profile of fascinating congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a woman who manages to balance motherhood, congressional leadership, and extracurriculars such as softball teams and fundraising for cancer awareness.  The tale of her own breast cancer battle was riveting, but then they slipped in this absolutely ridiculous paragraph:

“By 2011, the only lingering effect of her treatment was weight gain brought on by the drug tamoxifen.  Having ‘never gained an ounce in my life,’ she found herself 23 pounds heavier.  ‘Like every woman who goes through weight gain, you’re just not happy,’ she says.  ‘You’re not comfortable in your clothes, you’re mad when you walk in your closet, you hate going shopping.  I didn’t feel good about myself.’  After a press event in her district promoting a small business called the Fresh Diet, she decided to sign up.  Seven months later, she had lost the 23 pounds and dropped from a size 8 back to a size 2.”

First of all, I’m sorry, the only lingering effect of surviving cancer was weight gain?  What about the scars from surgery, the months lost to recovery, the strain on your family, the emotional damage from confronting mortality in such a raw way?  If you fight cancer and win, and you’re worried about your dress size, CANCER WINS.  You learned nothing from your brush with death, and I just can’t believe that a woman so intelligent and powerful really feels that way.  I suspect they took her comments about her body image struggles out of context in their attempt to trivialize and glamorize the congresswoman.

Also, what’s so terrible about being a size 8 (ahem, ahem)?  The fact that they even put the sizes in there shows that it was a nod to diet culture rather than a well-rounded portrait of a woman’s experience with cancer.  I realized I needed to stop giving money to a publication that was insulting me.

It really bothered me that this blatant body-shaming message was slipped in to a profile of a political leader, a piece that was well-written and interesting.  The subtlety of it was what shook me, left me thinking about the lasting effects of such a paragraph, like when, in the 90′s, they found all those messages about sex in Disney movies.

Recently, my review of Peggy Orenstein’s Cinderella Ate My Daughter: Dispatches From The Front Lines of the New Girlie-Girl Culture was published on the Equals Record, and in my piece, I say that I’m going to try to keep my daughter away from the princess craze as long as I can, and to expose her to different forms of what it means to be a woman than the overwhelmingly narrow cultural ideal.

Well, if I’m going to do that for my daughter, I need to stop “playing princess” myself, and reading Vogue is a way that I, monthly, escape to a world where women are saved from the effects of aging (The Wicked Witch of Wrinkles) by state-of-the-art surgeries and creams (Prince Botox), I dream of having a Fairy Godmother that will bring me a $3,450 biker jacket for the ball, and my confidence is boosted by how modern day royalty (celebs) are really down-to-earth, just like me.

It’s time to put down the princess wand.

I am searching for a new way to be feminine.  Am I a woman because I paint my lips red, wear a dress on the daily, shave my legs and flat iron my bangs?  Of course not.  These are the ways I am fashioning my body right now, and I have chosen other forms for it throughout my life---letting my prodigious body hair grow in college (my husband and I got together, actually, when my leg hair was so long I could French braid it), wearing the same pair of dusty Carhartts for months, forgoing make-up even in the face of period zits.

Right now, my look is very traditionally femme, but, my love for fashion will not die with my Vogue subscription, and I could see myself dressing like one of my icons, Patti Smith, or Georgia O’Keefe, my hair a wild mass of black and gray, my pants pegged and baggy, my white shirt crisp enough to cut a fingernail on.

There is so much power in womanhood---this is one of the major reasons I chose to have my baby as naturally as I could---I wanted to experience that feminine power running through my body in the most primal way possible, to let it change me in the process.  And it did.  But now, despite Operation Rad Bod, I feel crappy about that amazing body that brought me a baby, about two weeks out of every month (if you guessed that those are the week before and the week of my period, then ladies, you are correct).

Vogue is absolutely not going to help me with my quest for a learned experience of the deeper meaning of femininity, beyond waist size and wardrobe.  So, I’m taking this whole experiment to the next level, and trying to limit my own exposure to damaging cultural messages about women, especially since I’m going to limit my daughter’s.  I can’t be wresting the Bratz doll out of her hands while I’m filling my own with pictures of Kate Moss’s wedding.

Perhaps, I’ll spend all the time once consumed with Vogue reading things like this, an excerpt from Dear Sugar’s column entitled Tiny Revolutions:

“You don’t have to be young. You don’t have to be thin. You don’t have to be ‘hot’ in a way that some dumbfuckedly narrow mindset has construed that word. You don’t have to have taut flesh or a tight ass or an eternally upright set of tits.

You have to find a way to inhabit your body while enacting your deepest desires. You have to be brave enough to build the intimacy you deserve. You have to take off all of your clothes and say, I’m right here.

There are so many tiny revolutions in a life, a million ways we have to circle around ourselves to grow and change and be okay. And perhaps the body is our final frontier. It’s the one place we can’t leave. We’re there till it goes. Most women and some men spend their lives trying to alter it, hide it, prettify it, make it what it isn’t, or conceal it for what it is. But what if we didn’t do that?”

So long, Vogue.  It has been fun.  But it has not been real.

Republished with the author's permission from Thirty Threadbare Mercies, Photo:  Some rights reserved by JeepersMedia

Bluff View Art District

I've become quite obsessed with the historic Bluff View Art District.  Any time there is mention of a weekend walk, my first request is to venture over to this magical place.  It may only be a sliver, not even two city blocks to be exact, of the Chattanooga pie but it packs huge flavor.  The neighborhood is filled with restaurants, one of the best coffee houses in town, an art gallery, beautiful gardens, and plenty of quirky sculptures to ponder.  The art district will have your senses yearning for another visit.

For sight starters, this secret garden sits on top of a cliff giving it the most dramatic downtown and Tennessee River views. From the highest point of the bluff, it would seem the river flows to the end of the earth.  The mortar-speckled dwellings are covered with dark green ivy and provide an enchanting setting for alley strolls.  At night, the city sparkles with lights as if it were decorated for the holidays year round.

The smells that permeate the Bluff View Art District will leave one full before ever sitting down for a morning pastry or a savory meal.  Rembrandt's Coffee House is a European-style cafe nestled behind grand foliage on the main street. They provide an abundant selection of fresh coffee beans, rich chocolates, sweet danishes, hot pressed paninis and cold salads for the lunch crowd.  Right around the corner located in a Victorian mansion is a casual but superb Italian eatery known as Tony's Pasta Shop and Trattoria.  The aroma of warm pastas and homemade sauces tossed together with fresh herbs and meatballs would have anyone drooling.  Just a short walk down the block and you'll stumble upon the Back Inn Cafe's menu of upscale dishes and a wine list that will make the head spin in delight.  Between the quaint library, the bright sun room, and the outdoor terrace, this restaurant allows you to pick your own setting while enjoying dinner with friends and family.  I'm a real sucker for fresh-baked bread so naturally my favorite stop is into the Bluff View Bakery.  This artisan bakery specializes in rustic breads and infuses only the best ingredients into their hand-molded loaves.  If my husband and I get into a disagreement, I always tell him to forego the bouquet of "I'm sorry" flowers and instead bring home a roasted garlic ciabatta or rosemary focaccia loaf as a peace offering.  It works like a charm every time.  Whether it be a create your own pasta dish or an after dinner dessert, the taste of the Bluff View Art District will leave your buds completely satisfied.

For such a tiny area, the sounds of the art district come in a variety pack. While lounging on one of the benches in the garden, the natural flow of the river combined with the chirping baby birds provide a calming and rejuvenating sound for the ears.  The background noise is a mixture of friends sharing laughs while catching up over a steamy cup of joe, servers politely asking their guests if another bottle of wine should be opened, and flattering oohs and awes of tourists.  This district area has a unique bustle all of its own.

As for the sense of touch, the "do not" signs discourage it but with all the beautiful flowers and artsy pieces, how could you not?  If you find yourself in Chattanooga for any reason, it's definitely worth a visit and I'll be more than happy to meet up for dinner with a view.

The Effects of a Storm, an Ocean Away

My landlord woke me up with a phone call on Monday morning. “Are your friends and family okay?” he asked. “I heard about everything on the news, and I was so worried.” It’s the first question off any of my new London friends’ tongues when they see me, and the first question of any stranger when I first tell them where I’m from. Is everyone okay? Is my old apartment okay? Is New York okay?

My answers are, in order, yes, yes and I don’t know. The first two are easy: almost everyone I know in New York lived mostly out of harm's way. A few of my friends have had to walk or bike to work; some have had to go without showers or use candles to light their way. My old apartment, nestled safely in Midtown, never even lost power or water. The last question is the worst and the hardest for me to answer, both because I have no information and because I hate that I have no information. I don’t know how New York is, because, while I identify as a New Yorker to everyone I meet in Europe, while I compare everything I encounter here ceaselessly to the world I knew and loved back there, while many of my friends and family are still in the place I consider home, I am not. I am in London.

I’m not jealous of those in New York, and it should be said plainly and clearly that I absolutely wish Sandy hadn’t hit the East Coast and Caribbean. I wish it was a repeat of last year in New York City, where we ventured out into Times Square in the middle of Hurricane Irene and took pictures in the typically overrun with tourists hub that was now deserted (I, of course, also wish Irene had never negatively impacted the areas outside of New York that bore the brunt of the storm). But there’s something to be said for the ache you feel when something happens to your home and you can’t be there. You want to stand up for it. You want to experience things with it, so it doesn’t have to go it alone. I don’t fool myself to think I know what New Yorkers are going through right now, but there’s a part of me that wishes I was there for it. New Yorkers, I believe, are at their best in the face of adversity, and I feel a pang in my chest when I read Facebook updates about candlelit sleepovers or charging parties or the Exodus like group walking over the Brooklyn Bridge together. I want to change things there---I want to help, desperately, beyond the Red Cross donations and options from afar---but that’s not the whole story. I want to be there because I feel it---the city, the people in it---would change me.

And while my heart goes out to everyone affected by the storm, New York will be okay, with or without me. And I will be okay, with or without it. But it’s moments like these you realize that it doesn’t take a hurricane to create ripples strong enough to be felt even across an ocean.

XI. Provence

My classmates and I pile onto a bus and drive for over an hour, winding up and over and around the steadily climbing hills of the Luberon valley and eating tasteless crackers to keep from getting sick. Then we step out and this golden-orange view, peppered through with greenest evergreen trees, is what awaits us. We are in Roussillon, a town whose rusty clay cliffs have been mined for ochre for the past century or so.

Tipsy on the fresh air, we rush to climb and play in the silty dust like children, and the ochre cliffs---run through with brilliant smudges of pinks and oranges and crimsons, even---rub off on our clothes. The earth feels like soft charcoal on our fingers. Soon we are covered with it, and traces of color will make their way back on the bus to Aix-en-Provence with us, only to be found hours or even days later by scolding host mothers, impatient with hanging the laundry outside to dry only to find it still dirty and streaked through with red silt.

Why they insist on cleaning our clothes is beyond us---the teachers at the ACPP center tell us it is a différence culturelle which translates most directly as don't question it.

The Faithful

"“Do I love you this much?" she’d ask us, holding her hands six inches apart. “No,” we’d say, with sly smiles. “Do I love you this much?” she’d ask again, and on and on and on, each time moving her hands farther apart. But she would never get there, no matter how wide she stretched her arms. The amount that she loved us was beyond her reach. It could not be quantified or contained. It was the ten thousand named things in the Tao Te Ching’s universe and then ten thousand more. Her love was full-throated and all-encompassing and unadorned. Every day she blew through her entire reserve." -          Cheryl Strayed, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail

My latest pick for book club was a wholly personal one. My friend Dorothy gave me a copy of the book right after my mom died, but it was almost seven months before I was ready to pick it up. For anyone unfamiliar with the story, Strayed writes about hiking the Pacific Crest Trail by herself, after her mom's death. What stuck with me most about the book weren’t the months she spent alone while hiking, or the blisters on her feet that she writes about in detail, or the weather or wildlife-related obstacles she encountered on the trail. For me, it was reading about how her life spiraled out of control after her mother's death.

I thought about this last weekend, while I was in California with some of my oldest and closest friends. We had gathered for Brooke's wedding, a friend since we rode our big wheels to nursery school together. We then spent years in Brownies, with my mom as our fearless troop leader. Last summer, Brooke showed up in New York for my bachelorette party, Brownie sash on. She said those are some of her best childhood memories, in large part because of my mom. Katie flew in from Australia for the wedding. Just a hop, skip, and a 14 hour flight for her. The line between friend and family is blurry with Katie and I; that's how long we've been friends. Katie is the kind of friend who flies halfway around the world when your mom is in the hospital, the kind who sits with you and makes you laugh when you think there is nothing left to laugh about, the kind who can be trusted with the most unpopular of errands (buying boxers for your dad, for instance). Andrea came from Chicago, leaving her baby boy at home with her husband.  Andrea has a laugh bigger than any room and a heart to match. She’s loyal and never forgets---not the bigger things like birthdays or even the little ones, like the color dress you wore to prom. Sara, my daily lifeline and keeper of secrets, was the only one missing---and miss her we did.

The wedding ceremony was a traditional Catholic mass, held at a beautiful old church in Santa Barbara---my first time in church since my mom's funeral. We sat together, observing the same rituals we’ve known since we were kids. The only off-script moment came during the Prayers of the Faithful, the part of mass when the congregation prays for those in need. The groom's cousin---leading the prayers---giggled his way through, while the rest of us looked on in confusion. Later, Brooke confessed that the prayers she and her husband had prepared weren’t waiting on the altar, and so their cousin was forced to improvise. More importantly, she wanted me to know what wasn’t said: a prayer for my mom they had intended to include in the ceremony. It was an acknowledgment that took my breath away, and I heard my mom so clearly in that moment, reminding me what good friends I have.

Back in Brooklyn, it was my turn to host book club. Just like every other one over the last six years, there was a heated debate about the merits of the book, but more importantly, there was plenty of wine and laughs. Overwhelmed with gratitude, I looked around at these girls who have become my friends later in life, who have held me up and righted my footing repeatedly throughout the last year. Rather dramatically, I announced that it was because of them---because of all of my friends---that I was not off hiking by myself somewhere, a la Cheryl Strayed.

My mom gave me the best and the worst of herself: her eyes, but also her hips and thighs; her brains, but also her impatience; her candidness, but also, at times, her candidness. There is no doubt, however, that she also gave me the gift of friendships, to which there is no downside. For that, I will thank her now and forever.

Lessons from a workshop...

Dear Clara,

Since we’ve been back in the US this past year, I have tried to remain mindful to use the time we have here for things that we wouldn’t be able to do abroad.  Part of that time has been allocated to friends and family, taking advantage of their proximity.  Part of the time has been dedicated to seeing the great United States – you’re still too young to remember your adventures here but I’ve taken lots of pictures and amassed all kinds of stories.  But part of the time I’ve stashed away for myself to get out of my shell and learn some of the things that inspire me, but that I haven’t been brave enough to learn more about in previous years.   And so, this past year has become the “year of the workshop”.

One of the things I’ve made peace with – at least for now – is that sometimes our professional lives can be rewarding in their own way.  We like well enough what we do, we have good colleagues, and it helps us to put our portion of dinner on the table.  It gives us a lifestyle, and it gives us worth in our day.  But what it might not give us is something more passionate.  And what our passions and interests give us, might not exactly fill those other qualities that our jobs provide.  So I’ve used this workshop time to help round out those creative interests that aren’t necessarily related to my professional life, but they are to my inspired life.  I’m nervous at these workshops, which are mainly related to photography or the creative aspects of my blog.  Before each one, I contemplate dropping out, and after each one, I’m always so glad I stuck it out, usually at your father’s insistence.  So after all of these workshops this year, here are a few of the lessons I’ve learned:

• The first step is signing up: This is the most intimidating part – signing up and sending the money.  Choose wisely, after all, resources will be limited by either time, money or both, but choose bravely.  One of my managers told me once that any job should make you sweat outside your comfort zone just a little bit, and I’ve applied the same principle to choosing learning outside of the job.  Push yourself a bit and you’ll be surprised how much you can learn.
• Be flexible: Chances are, the workshop won’t run exactly the way you expect it too.  Maybe it’s in a location you’re not used to, maybe they’re flexible on timing…just come with an open mind.  The whole point of doing something different is to do something different, right?
• Attend all the events: Sometimes workshops have a dinner, or a get together, or some other event associated with it.  If you’re going to know a new group of people for just a short amount of time, get the most you can out of it.  Do the events and don’t be shy.  Introduce yourself and get out there.
• Give yourself time to absorb: The great thing about workshops is that they usually fill you with lots of new and grand and big ideas.  Make sure to give yourself a little clean time after the workshop to let it all sink in.  You’re going to want to go in 34 directions all at once – don’t compromise the value of everything you learned by overloading social commitments or other things that start the minute the workshop is over.  Give yourself space to absorb the learning and plot out exactly what you’re going to do with it.  A few notes to yourself now will pay out great dividends later.
• Translate into your own voice: Sometimes when we see something by someone we admire at a workshop, we’re tempted to go home and recreate the exact same thing.  Re-creation is great for practice.  But the workshop’s intent was to teach you a series of tools so that you can create what you want out of it.   It’s still going to be up to you to apply them in your own voice and vision.  Don’t hesitate to stretch what you’ve learned into the direction that you need it to go to work for you.

All my love,

Mom

On The Way To Palmyra

Palmyra greeted me wrapped in a mist of a spring late afternoon, years ago.  The Syrian desert surprised me as quite different from other desert landscapes I had seen before. It’s a dry barren wilderness, suddenly covered in green patches that gather in small oasis, where for no apparent reason water breaks through the ground surface. What I am sharing here is a memory of the country of Syria as I remember it, and I wish that soon it will be possible for me to visit those amazing places again. Most importantly, I wish people peace and happiness. I wish children to grow in harmony and equanimity.

***

April 2001.

The trip from Damascus is hard---cloudy sky, stubborn winds, and oppressive heat.

Mamma, papà, brother. All of us accompanying my grandfather in a business trip throughout Syria, and occasionally taking time to explore.

We are only forty miles from Palmyra, but a sudden Jeep breakdown risks to jeopardize our family adventure. Two hours stop in the middle of the unmerciful desert, without food, only cans of delicious mango juice for lunch.

We sit by the roadside, on our right and left only an endless road, starting in the capital and ending in one of the most ancient cities in the center of the country. Our driver, Amin, blue eyes, brown skin and four children at home, lies under the car, occasionally breaking the silence by muttering words whose meaning is easy to guess.

The emptiness of my stomach matches the emptiness of my cultural background---I don’t know much about Palmyra, I only imagine the ruins from the Roman Empire, surrounded by desert. I know of an oasis. And I have seen pictures of a big castle on a hill, which dominates the valley like a severe guardian.

Finally Amin the hero fixes the Jeep, we feel relieved and begin to drive the road towards our destination.

As we reach Palmyra with great expectations, we can’t see a thing. The wind is blowing hard and the landscape appears like a pink thick cloud. We opt for a half an hour break at the hotel. And while we rest, a heavy rain starts.

When we step out of the hotel, a miracle has just happened.

The sky is ocean blue, and the wind has calmed down, becoming a pleasant warm breeze.

The desert in front of us is rich, full of past, enlightened by the sun.

There it is the old Roman ruins from long ago---right next to the road. No fence, no guards, and not many tourists around. Only a couple of local Bedouins at the beginning of the column road, waiting to give foreigners a ride on their camels.

We stood there for a long while. The light and the colors of the columns were amazing---the sun still strong in the sky produced an amazing spectacle in different shades of yellow and pink. And that is when we know that the trip was worth the effort.

 

by Sir Edwin Arnold (1832–1904)

A weary waste of blank and barren land,

A lonely, lonely sea of shifting sand,

A golden furnace gleaming overhead,

Scorching the blue sky into bloody red;

And not a breath to cool, and not a breeze

To stir one feather of the drooping trees;

Only the desert wind with the hungry moan,

Seeking for life to slay, and finding none;

Only the hot Sirocco’s burning breath,

Spangled with sulphur-flame, and winged with death;

No sound, no step, no voice, no echo heard,

No cry of beast, no whirring wing of bird;

The silver-crested snake hath crept away

From the fell fury of that Eastern day;

The famished vultures by the failing spring

Droop the foul beak and fold the ragged wing;

And lordly lions, ere the chase be done,

Leave the black desert to the desert-sun. 

Greetings from Grrls Meat Camp

The morning is chilly and bright. A sheen of frost covers the picnic tables and the wooden deck, the nearby pond is shimmering in the morning light, and the towering evergreens sway in the breeze. This idyllic setting belongs to the YMCA’s Camp Duncan, located just outside of Chicago. Inside the cozy cabin kitchen there are biscuits in the oven and sausage gravy simmering on the stove. After breakfast there will be an entire 250 pound hog delivered to the back porch, followed by lessons in whole animal butchery, pate and sausage making, and grilling and smoking. This is Grrls Meat Camp.

I first learned of Meat Camp via Kate Hill's Kitchen at Camont blog and through last year's Washington Post coverage of the inaugural event.  It's a gathering of chefs, butchers, bakers and enthusiastic home cooks. It's a weekend of food, fun, and ultimately of camaraderie and encouragement.

The group's Facebook mission statement reads: "To inspire, educate and foster sisterhood through a cooperative collaboration of women . . ." with an aim of "giving voice to those working with animals and meat on farms, butcher shops, restaurants and home."

It was an inspiring weekend, and not just because of all the delicious food.

It was a salon, of sorts, with conversation focused on sustainability, ethical farming, and our shifting food systems.

Even more moving, perhaps, were the personal stories shared of learning a craft that didn't typically welcome gender diversity. At Grrls Meat Camp, though, we were all in the front row. We all had access to new knowledge and experience, and were encouraged to participate.

At one point over the weekend I over heard a conversation between two of the butchers who were discussing the most physically difficult parts of their job. "If you have the right tools, you can do anything. Anything is possible if you've got the right tools." It's true of butchery, sure, but it struck me as some advice for life's work in general. "The right tools" could mean sharp knives and saws, but also the strength an individual receives from a supportive community. Many women I met this weekend were self-educated and self-motivated, their successful careers the products of their own initiative. Even the professional food photographer who was busily shooting stills of the beautiful dishes coming out of the kitchen agreed: No one taught her to be a photographer, she taught herself. So, even if you have no desire to butcher a hog or some beef hip, these lessons from Meat Camp resonate with those of us finding our way---in the kitchen, and beyond.

Kitchen Meditation

The potatoes are cold in my hands, imbued with the chill of the refigerator. My husband will only peel potatoes after they’ve been sitting in a bowl of warm water for a few minutes, but I prefer to do it quickly and go on to other things. Dusty brown peelings curl off into the trash can, the little pile growing fast as the white flesh of the tuber is revealed. When the potatoes are chopped and placed in boiling water, I raid the crisper for other vegetables: Carrots, onions, fresh garlic (a staple in my kitchen), celery, corn. I have a method for chopping each different vegetable—the carrots are sliced in half long-wise and then diced into half-moons; the onions are gently scored in both directions across the top, so that when I cut off an inch from the onion’s face, I’m rewarded with a shower of evenly-chopped pieces falling to my cutting board.

I vividly remember a conversation I had shortly after getting married, when I was still part-time in college and struggling to get the degree I knew was out of my reach for the time being. “I want to like cooking,” I had said into the phone. “I feel like it’s the kind of thing that I should enjoy, that I could enjoy. I feel like it’s something that could bring me a huge amount of satisfaction. But I’m always just too tired.”

And I was. Even with a light class load, by the time I got home from my one or two classes in a day and finished my homework, I’d exhausted my slim supply of energy for that day. I made dinner each nigth with my husband because I believed in good, home-cooked food, and I loved eating the fruits of our labors—but I rarely enjoyed the experience. Always, I felt that frustrating sense that the true joy of cooking was just out of my reach, the kind of thing I ought to feel, but didn’t.

I baked bread, and ended up so tired I could hardly enjoy the finished product. I made muffins, and thought that cleaning the muffin tin might be the death of me. I cooked soups and puddings and even, on occasion, things like pasta from scratch, reveling in the knowledge that I could identify every ingredient that went into our meals—but ultimately, feeling utterly spent by the task.

Two years later, when I began the true transition from part-time studenthood to full-time homemaking, I was surprised to discover that suddenly, I was beginning to love cooking. All at once, as I began to spend less time in the classroom and have more time for the kitchen, I was feeling all those things I had thought I should feel before. Baking became a celebration. Chopping vegetables became a game. Doing the dishes afterward became a meditation.

Now, as I sweep a neat pile of onions and carrots from my cutting board into a pan for sautéeing, I think about that time of transition. Cooking still tires me, of course; it’s a physical task, one that requires time spent standing up, and often one that demands strength in the kneading or rolling out of dough. But in my life as it stands now, that’s all right. I may be tired afterwards, but I have the liberty to spare a few minutes for rest and recovery.

It is, I think, a perfect example of the unexpected joy the last few years have brought me—my adult life in a microcosm. For such a long time, I was frightened of my plans being changed, terrified of being forced to find something new to define myself. And yet, when that change did come, it wasn’t meaninglessness that lay on the other side—it was just a different kind of purpose, a different shape to my days.

A different shape, but a good one.

I pour extra-virgin olive oil over my pan of vegetables, letting the rich, fruity scent of the oil assail my senses, hearing the crackle and pop as it hits the bottom of the hot skillet.

And in this quiet kitchen moment, I know what it is to feel peace.

The Art of a List

By Marni Zarr Each morning when I wake, I make a list. First is dinner. What’s for dinner??? The question looms like a tiny splinter lodged under my skin, unnoticeable unless touched and then the annoyance lingers past the pain. You know, that miniscule one you can’t remove but it’s undeniably there so you either get frustrated attempting to ignore it, or accept it, and eventually it works it’s way out.

Next up, “trash out,” “kids to school,” “walk the dog,” “check mailbox,” “buy lunch bags and milk,” “get gas” . . . succinct chores neatly stacked like building blocks, always topped off with a load of laundry. “A load a day keeps the pile away” . . . I make up silly sayings, mostly to amuse my simply-amused self. Bashful to share half of what my mind writes while it’s busily lost in thought, I’ve finally come to appreciate the vastly under appreciated and valuable by-product of everyday chores, realizing that inspiration comes most easily when my hands and task-oriented mind are in motion.

Some of my best bursts of writing creativity occur when I am driving and listening to a song. It's usually a catchy tune with swinging lyrics that confide flirtation and first glances---the anticipation of discovering all those small things about a person that seem to spark your interest the moment you meet them. Some people are interesting, and then there are those whose unique mannerisms stick to your mind like a fly to a frog’s tongue. I don’t completely understand the science of it but I’ve felt the tension pulling taut like a slingshot ready to fire. Something in the back of my mind functions of it’s own accord sending sparks of Morse code to my sub-conscious to be stored and decoded later. Sometimes it takes hours and many times it’s not until days later that the replay becomes obsessive, starting and stopping as I try to pinpoint the moment the tiny spark flew. A game of catch from one to the other or both firing at the same time, laser beams pinpointed for collision and meeting at the height of their arc, then a little explosion sending back a blinking mission complete to some part of the brain. Is it the frontal lobe?

I jot that down on my list to look up later.

[image:  some rights reserved by puuikibeach on Flickr]