Leesburg Essay 13

George’s cousins Christina and Nicole both had baby girls (the third child for each) this summer, Elisabeth and Julia respectively. Nicole and Christina were born the same year in the summertime, so it may be nice for their girls to be so close in age as well. The only hitch is that Nicole’s family is in California and Christina’s is in Vermont. Oh well, I guess that’s what Christmas and airplanes are for.

Fourth of July

The neighborhood upped the ante for the usual Fourth of July celebration; dressing the kids in matching fireworks t-shirts (in the photo, note how many are wearing Crocs shoes). Once again, we managed not to lose any of them in the chaos.

This summer, all of a sudden (I always think there’s going to be a bigger build-up to these things), Nora learned to ride her bike without training wheels, aided by George and a neighbor girl Alex (13), who makes it her business to teach the kids to ditch the training wheels. In addition, although Nora started out the summer loving and at the same time pretty hesitant about the water, she taught herself to swim in my parents’ pool. Very determinedly, she began working her way around the shallow end. By mid-summer she had taught herself enough to skip an entire class in swimming lessons, which is nice for her and ultimately cheaper and less time-consuming, I guess, for us.

Given that summer has already come and gone and the kids spent a good portion of it out of our house and away from our direct supervision, this link is an interesting review of a book on kids and freedom.

Both kids participated in a couple of camps. The favorites were dance camp for Nora and magic camp (weirdly enough through the local art school) for Alexander. Magic camp was a big hit, even though one of the parakeets the magician brought in for demonstration left its mark (from its hindquarters, not its beak) on Alexander’s arm. The camp culminated in a show for the parents, which led to a cascade of mini home-shows by Alexander for a variety of audiences.

Although Alexander has been into Lego for some time, this summer he began exploring the whole range of available Lego products for kids his age, including of course the Star Wars line, plus the Indiana Jones and Secret Agents lines. The item that he and George discovered that sent him into paroxysms of joy was the $400 model of the Death Star complete with 24 of the cute little action figures. See it for yourself. We told him he could save up his allowance from now until the end of eternity or alternatively he could win the lottery.

Nora started kindergarten and I believe that the first day was a relief to everyone because she was filled with anxiety prior to it. We encouraged her to try to learn her lower case letters, as her preschool had suggested would be helpful to her (and we thought it might ease some of the anxiety). This task seemed to push her over the edge; the corners of her mouth tilted downward through the exercise. We joked with her that this expression was apparently necessary in order for her to activate her pencil.

Travel Update

In August we took a trip to New York State to the Finger Lakes, specifically to Seneca Lake and Watkins Glen. When we arrived in Watkins Glen, we went immediately to our hotel, which upon inspection was definitely not what I had in mind when I planned the vacation. With me completely unhappy with the situation (when Mommy’s NOT HAPPY…), we had our first dinner in town and then took a walk on the rock jetty from the Watkins Glen harbor out into Seneca Lake. That first and only night in this hotel, however awful, turned out to be a gift. The room was noisy and cramped and unpleasant, but at least the kids were asleep in their room when the “events” began to occur. At about 5:00 in the morning, the “guest” in the room next door to us began yelling at the woman in the room with him, in extremely pornographic and profane terms. We surmised from his ranting that they were having some sort of affair and that he wasn’t getting out of it what he expected to get out of it. The yelling went on for what must have been at least an hour. It was both outrageously funny and appalling at the same time and I don’t think I’ll ever forget the sound of his voice. We told the management in the morning, had an extremely disappointing breakfast at the hotel, and then took a walk in town.

After our walk I went straight to the big hotel on the harbor—one that was clean and new and featured an indoor pool—and asked for a room. With relief and some regret for the owners of the first hotel, clearly a family business, we moved into town with no charge from the first hotel (we explained that we couldn't take the chance that our kids would have to listen to another night of the neighbor’s dissatisfied ranting) and settled into our lovely new place. Things looked up from there. The next day we took a sailing trip on a schooner; it was a perfect day for sailing, not hot and with a strong breeze, so we got way out into the lake.

The lake reminded me a lot of Washington Lake in New Hampshire, where Aunt Marcia and Jolie had a house in the 80s and 90s. We spent time there during a lot of summers, and some of my fondest memories are of waterskiing behind a boat that Uncle Dwight or my father was driving. I can still remember sitting in the water behind the boat trying to keep the skis from crossing in front of me or flipping underneath me while I waited for the boat to pull me up.

We also managed visits to a couple of the wineries in the region, a hike through the gorges in the park in Watkins Glen (definitely recommended), and a visit to cousins Marilyn and Tim in Syracuse.

On the way home from Syracuse we stopped in State College, Pennsylvania and saw my first cousin Mary (on my mothers’ side) and her kids William and Monica. Mary generously offered Alexander and Nora their pick of a huge selection of exotic stuffed animals that she was trying to get rid of. Below is a photo of the two of them with their new collection. Please note that some of Nora’s tiny purse dogs—and our real dog—are also in the photo. See if you can pick them out.

Yoga Update: But it’s Just a Small Thought

In mid-July I went to “yoga camp” (this is how I described it to the kids) at the Kripalu Institute in Massachusetts to complete my hours for teacher training. I participated in a weekend-long workshop run by Shiva Rea, who is as different from Maria Garre, Shiva’s director of teacher training overall and the head teacher of my program, as could be imagined. Shiva Rea is all California: blond hair, skinny, talks a lot about walking her dogs on the beach. And she truly was named Shiva (a Hindu God) by her father.

Kripalu itself was great, although I didn’t sleep very well as our program would go to 9:30 to 10:00 at night and I couldn’t wind down afterwards (ironically, given this is yoga camp). The food is mostly vegetarian or full vegan, and it was kind of a paradise for me in that sense. The choices in the buffet often had several adjectives describing them: fair trade, organic, sustainable, gluten-free—you get the idea. Breakfast was terrific, and they had great salads and whatnot, but I have to say that I heard a lot about how good the food is before I went, and I didn’t really think the main courses were that much to scream about.

Vegetarian/vegan main courses are often billed as the meatless version of whatever they’re replacing (e.g., “mock” chicken salad with seiten protein). I think it would be better to just avoid mentioning the traditional version and give the dish its own name so that people are not expecting it to taste like the original. Also, it’s ironic that the vegetarian/vegan meals have to sell themselves as meatless versions of meat dishes as the whole idea in many cases is to reject the eating of meat for ethical reasons.

My other favorite thing about Kripalu was the plethora of atypical male hair arrangements—dreadlocks piled on the head, or maybe long, long ponytails extending from nearly shaved heads—with much earnest conversation to go with them. (Contrast this with our experience in Watkins Glen, which was preparing for a big NASCAR race as we were leaving, and where we saw plenty of tiny little square goatees.) One snippet, overheard in the hallway as part of a conversation about some yogi’s flat feet, “…but you know, native people all have flat feet and they have no problems running long distances…”

I’ve heard a number of yoga teachers say that becoming a teacher is the worse thing possible for your own practice. I’m trying to avoid this fate by actually practicing, and upping the ante by learning seriously to meditate. This is difficult at best in a house with two young kids, a husband, and a dog who enjoys twilight barking, but I persist. The meditation teacher at Kripalu described the mind as a fountain continually spouting thoughts into the air and emphasized that the art of meditation is simply bringing your mind back to your object of concentration over and over again. I can sit there for quite a while before I realize that I’m actually thinking rather than concentrating on the breath or whatever, and then I say to myself, “well, but that was just a Small Thought, really, so does it count?” One way to fool yourself into thinking you’ve achieved some sort of cosmic mindlessness.

Media Update

Audiobooks

Our library recently began carrying audiobooks in a format compatible with the iPod, so I have been able to listen to a number of them as I walk the dog, garden, do housework, and cook.

On Chesil Beach, by Ian McEwan. I love Ian McEwan and this book was no exception. He writes so clearly and convincingly his characters seem real to me. The story here concerns the wedding night for a young English couple that goes terribly awry.

The God of Small Things, by Arundhati Roy. My favorite thing about this book was its setting. I didn’t feel particularly sympathetic toward any of the characters and so I didn’t feel drawn into their story. I see why it won the Booker Prize some years ago, as the language is beautiful. The author herself is part of the leftist lunatic fringe, which probably made me somewhat less disposed to the book before I even listened to it.

In Defense of Food, by Michael Pollan. I’ve written before about Michael Pollan in reference to his book The Omnivore’s Dilemma. This book is a fascinating examination of the American diet and its lack of real food (which he would define as something your grandmother would recognize as food). He points out that people who follow “traditional” diets of all types all over the world—consisting sometimes of outrageous amounts of things now taboo for Americans, such as fat; and that are sometimes vegetarian, sometimes mostly meat-based—are much healthier than Americans’ diets. He makes the case that the American obsession with eliminating all fat in the diet as the key to good health has very little basis in medical fact. (One positive side for artificial ingredients, however: researchers have found bizarre healing powers in blue M&Ms, a fact about which I can’t say I’m surprised…apparently the dye in blue M&Ms, called “Brilliant Blue,” has been found to heal spinal cord injuries in rats.)

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, by Stieg Larsson. This is the first book from the Swedish writer who wrote the three mysteries in his “Millenium” series and then died. My roommate at the Kripalu Institute recommended it and since then I’ve discovered that the Millenium series is a bit of a phenomenon. I had a hard time turning off the iPod for this one.

My Antonia, by Willa Cather. I know that this book is a classic, but I always put off reading it because I was turned off by the name, of all things. I admit this is rather juvenile. In the audio version, the girl’s name is pronounced with the emphasis on the third syllable, not on the second as an English speaker would pronounce it. Once that was settled, I sighed with relief and was able to enjoy the book. I liked a lot of the descriptions of the recent European immigrants, especially as my Norwegian ancestors presumably had similar experiences. As I postscript, I looked up the entry on the book in Wikipedia, and it seems to suggest that the accent should be on the first syllable of the girl’s name, further confusing the issue and making me dislike the title once again.

Columbine, by Dave Curren. This is a fascinating and well-written account of the school massacre that addresses a lot of the myths (e.g., the myth of the trench coat mafia, the myth that jocks were targeted). I love columbine flowers, but now I can’t think about the flowers without thinking about the school massacre.


The Best Game Ever: Giants vs. Colts, 1958, and the Birth of the Modern NFL, by Mark Bowden. My favorite thing about this book is what life was like, and how football was viewed, literally and figuratively, by the American people in the 1950s. It’s too bad the Giants lose, though. At least it’s not to the Redskins.

The Reader, by Bernhard Schlink. Reading this book reminded me so much of living in Germany; no wonder it made such an impression on the Germans. George had suggested that I try reading this in the original language, but now that I’ve listened to it I’m glad I didn’t try, as it is peppered with long philosophical passages with no resolution. Some parts of it I liked, and the story itself is different enough to be intriguing, but really, in the end I was left with a feeling of “so what?”

Running with Scissors, by Augusten Burroughs. This memoir describes situations that are appallingly weird and apparently controversial with the actual people featured in the book. The author is my age, though, so a lot of the circumstances and atmospheric details he describes are very clear to me. Growing up the 70s really kind of was like that.

Books with pages to turn

Legacy of the Dead, by Charles Todd. This is the fourth book in the Inspector Rutledge series, and probably my favorite thus far. It’s unusual to get into a series and find that you like some of the later books better; most often it’s the first one or two that have the biggest impact.

Bel Canto, by Ann Patchett. The book contains an unusual setup in which an American opera singer is brought in to sing at the birthday party for a Japanese executive in an unnamed South American country. The entire party is taken hostage by a group of “revolutionaries.” Weird circumstances ensue. Sounds strange, but it’s written beautifully.

I mentioned in my last essay that Nora and I had started reading the “Little House” series. We have finished the first three books, and I find it fascinating to read them as an adult with an adult’s perspective on the events. For example, it seems that the Ingalls family moved out to “Indian Territory” in southeastern Kansas because Pa felt crowded in the “Big Woods” of Wisconsin (near Pepin, apparently). The government had reportedly made a statement committing to defending white settlers moving to Indian lands, but there seemed to be some confusion about this (I am wondering where they got their news—probably from their neighbors at the general store in town miles away). One fine day, after setting up house there for a year, Pa heard word that the government was going to come along and kick them off the land, so he said “we’re leaving tomorrow” and packed up everything, leaving their newly built house and newly planted garden behind them. Poor Caroline (Ma). I can just imagine how well that went over with her. Unfortunately for her, the expectation back then was most likely that women simply obeyed their husbands and went along with such nonsense.

Julia Child and the Death of Gourmet

The movie Julia and Julia made a big splash this fall; the premise involves a young woman who takes it upon herself to cook every recipe from Julia Child’s ‘Mastering the Art of French Cooking.” At one time I owned a copy of this book and over the years I probably cooked just one recipe from it. The recipes are too complicated and I suspect that excellent and updated versions of the classic recipes that she describes are available from sources such as Cook’s Illustrated. I am currently clinging to Cook’s Illustrated as my last remaining regular source of new recipes, as I am literally in mourning over the death of Gourmet magazine, to which I have subscribed since around 1994. Sometimes I cook a big meal and realize afterwards that every single thing I made was from Gourmet. Even Cook’s Illustrated’s editor, Christopher Kimball, feels the loss, as he noted in an op-ed piece in the New York Times.

Movies

Four Stars

Eastern Promises. This very violent film concerns Russian immigrants and mob members in London. Starring Viggo Mortenson and Naomi Watts, it’s really interesting and well-acted in a Sopranos kind of way.

Into the Wild. I am a big fan of writer Jon Krakauer, who is the author of several bestselling books, including one on a doomed climb of Mount Everest and another on fundamentalist Mormons. I have never gotten around to reading his first big book, however, upon which this movie is based. It concerns the life of a post-college guy who drops out of society to escape his ugly family. I now hope to pick up the book as well.

Three Stars

Twilight: The movie made from Stephenie Meyer’s first vampire book is a lot less sappy than it could have been. I had imagined that it would be like the movie version of the Nicholas Sparks’ book “The Notebook”: straightforward and overwrought. As it turns out, the movie of Twilight is quite funky and visually interesting. The actors are generally appealing, although the lead guy who plays the vampire does not strike me as particularly romantic. What disturbed me about the movie is that events were changed from the book, even though it didn’t seem important to the storyline to change them. Why annoy the books’ legions of fans?

The Dark Knight: George liked this latest installment of the Batman series more than I did. He thought it was different enough to be interesting, not settling for the usual type of Superhero story. I thought that Heath Ledger as the Joker was terrific, but half the time I had no idea what was going on and who was after whom. The bat cave was very cool, though, as was Michael Caine as Alfred, the butler.

Death at a Funeral: This is a sometimes outrageously funny British film about the events surrounding one man’s funeral. I give it only three stars because at times it is gratuitously icky.

Two Stars

The Guru: I award two stars to this pleasantly silly movie about an Indian actor in New York posing as a sex guru for unhappy rich women. Some parts are amusing, but it’s like a piece of cotton candy that dissolves quickly and is way too sweet—it sounded like a good idea at the time.

The death of actress Farrah Fawcett reminded me of how much I loved the show Charlie’s Angels as a child. I had all sorts of Charlie’s Angels trading cards, which I believe I posted up on my bedroom door, my favorite Angel being Kate Jackson. The show, alas, was no longer the same after Farrah left and was replaced by Cheryl Ladd—and then others after her. Post-Angels, Kate Jackson has seemed to have had a quiet career in made-for-TV movies and Jaclyn Smith has done pretty well for herself designing a clothing line for Kmart.

Sports Update

“Hide your beagle, Vick’s an Eagle.” And with that it’s football season once again. The Giants are coasting through their season while the Redskins seize up and lose to the hapless Lions. It’s interesting that everyone was up in arms over Obama’s speech to schools, but frankly I’m more concerned about the propaganda from Leesburg’s assistant principal, who declared this the year of Dallas and put up Cowboys paraphernalia to celebrate.


Animal Planet


I don’t necessarily want to be the dog, but in some ways I am the dog. George and I actually argue over which one of us is more like the dog. He claims that it’s him because he could sleep for 20 hours a day. I claim it’s me because I need to be walked—in fact, as George would point out, Baxter does walk me.

Between walks, Baxter has taken up actively hunting the small animals that appear in our backyard. His recent kills include a baby bunny that George watched him catch and a squirrel that we found him eating. In both cases, George whisked the remains away, to Baxter’s consternation. Luckily for all of us, Baxter wasn’t the first one to discover the snake we had in our basement or the mouse tramping through our kitchen. In addition, George finally saw a bat in our backyard, but unfortunately it wasn’t residing in the actual bat house that George hung on the side of our house.

Politics as Usual

I have come to the conclusion that my main fear about Obama prior to the election was correct—being a senator with no executive experience to speak of, the man lacks the ability or interest to make tough decisions. George reminded me of my concern the other day, and it suddenly occurred to me that there’s been a big pattern here since inauguration day: big, inspiring speeches followed by dithering or avoidance of actual action. It’s the reason he decided (well, maybe!) not to put forward his own plan for health care. This strategy could be read as maybe just a way to avoid the fate of Hillarycare: don’t dump a 1300-plus page tome on Congress from on high (I had occasion to pick up a copy of Hillary’s bill and it could have been used at a footrest—and probably was).

Maybe it’s far less complex than Obama trying to avoid that particular failure: maybe he genuinely has no idea what to do. So he gives a nice speech. A commentator named Peter Wehner described the leaderless muddle thus: “As a general rule, it’s hard to succeed as a salesman when you don’t have anything in particular you’re selling.” I love it when a poll purports to show how Americans feel about the Obama health care plan: what plan could they possibly be reacting to?!? The same decision-making deficit also goes for the current mess about Afghanistan. As George points out, in the spring Obama dumped his general I Afghanistan and replaced him with another, in effect making a decision about what strategy he wished to follow. George also points out that the flap about McChrystal’s public lobbying is pretty interesting, given that during the Bush years plenty of Democrats were thrilled that the men in uniform were expressing public doubts about the president’s lack of a strategy.


I find it interesting that Obama did make a decision about the stimulus money and the economic crisis—I wonder what the difference was? Maybe simply that in a choice between spending or not spending money, spending definitely won out. Or maybe all his major advisors were on the same page.


In any case, the chief executive of Whole Foods markets, of all people, got himself into a lot of hot water with lefties for espousing free-market principles for health care reform; here is an editorial about it from The Washington Post.

In the category of more amusing political news, at some point I caught a story about Brad Pitt considering a run for New Orleans mayor. This is sort of laughable on its own, but his agenda was the real scream. I mean really, could pot smoking and gay marriage really under any scenario be the most pressing issues in NEW ORLEANS? I don’t know, maybe the state of the levees, redevelopment, tourism, rebuilding—those are some of the things that occur to me, but who am I really?

Minor rant

Occasionally our neighborhood attracts door-to-door sales persons to whom I try to be friendly yet discouraging. At least one, however, made me really irritated when he tried to sell me on some sort of unwanted product and referred to what my neighbors had bought from him, using their first names (seems to be a common tactic these days). Even I, quite informal most of the time, am offended by sales people referring to what “Bob and Edith” up the street are up to. This particular salesman went even further down this road when I told him I wasn’t interested in his product. He came out with something to the effect of: “Jakki over next door bought some—haven’t you been talking to the girls?” I almost puked. It’s been a long time since I’ve heard anything that offensive said directly to me. Needless to say I didn’t buy anything, even after he assured me that I’d be missing out—and he wouldn’t be back!

Postscript: Berlin and Historical Preservation

In my essays from Germany, I noted that pretty large chunks of Berlin’s pretty large historical footprint had been destroyed and arguments continue to this day about preservation and memorialization. Along those lines, this story from The Washington Post discusses the fate of the Berlin Wall.