in the garden

 

I have long wanted one of Kate Knapp's garden pix (you can see her blog here). So finally I made up my mind I had to have one.  I decided on the one above, which is really beautiful. 

The next problem was where to put it. Wall space is at a premium everywhere. But I really needed the lift in New York. In the winter. In my garden room (such as it is). Here is my garden room today.

But where to put? I had thought of overlaying it on Hannah's wood blocks, but Katie's painting is too big. It is 30 x 30 and would cover much of the other picture. She suggested I consider moving Hannah's wood blocks out to the side. But they are glue-gunned to the wall, and would rip the wall down to move. Katie suggested I look at some smaller 24 x 24 paintings. So  I did.

This one is awesome and would look great with Hannah's installation, I think. But am I buying decor or art? I love the next one, of wildflowers maybe even the best. 

Help me! I could prop one on the table, covering the unsightly plugs and not much of Hannah's thing. Or maybe I could hang something nearby in the same room? What'll I do.

You guys gotta weigh in.

face time, sort of

Indoor/outdoor games. This is what Isaac likes to do on Facetime: Try on different heads and watch himself. Interaction is marginal. 

However, I did get to see the kids sled down the hill in real time. It ain't being there, but it's better than nothing!

 

revels

 The sun is coming inside at different angles. It makes me think of spring—even though we haven't rightly had winter yet—and revels. And to me, revels always involve other people.

And the other people this weekend were all from my life at LIFE magazine. Which makes me sorry for the journalists toiling away in their living rooms, interviewing by email and not ever getting to know one another. Or indeed any of the other young corporate types who will not be able to work together or have close, long-term work friendships. There's Barbara, who was a researcher and reporter at LIFE and Time. Across from me is Ed, who was a war correspondent at both of those magazines. And there's Ralph, who used to ship us all over the world.

The last meal I had OUT at a restaurant in New York City was in June, also with Ralph and another Time Inc friend. (Ralph knows everybody.) That time we got rained out, and had to gobble our food and run for cover. Restaurants in my neighborhood—those that have survived—have taken giant steps since in en plein air dining. This one had like a lean-to with electric heat lamps, and most distanced tables were filled. Other places have plastic pavilions, trees and tents. They have spread across sidewalks and into streets. It's awesome. If you're rich.

Barb in the lean-to. I had not seen her in the flesh for almost a year. She and I both had mussels, if you care. She told me to buy a down jacket on Amazon, which I did, and it already came. I figured if I'm going to eat OUT more frequently I may be needing it. Down booties too!

And then there are the ongoing indoor festivities at The Apartment of No Regrets. I see the usual suspects: Debby, Toby and Ed. And Donna has been a frequent visitor, coming up from TriBeCa for weekends once in a while to escape her beloved grandson and daughter. I met her at LIFE too. She's still a rabble rouser and a world-class carouser. But she works too.

the bernie memes

I wasn't really surprised that I could be found by the Bernie anywhere website in NYC  (link here)

 

A little more surprised that it could locate my places on BI.

 And flabbergasted by the speed at which it found the road in front of my house in Missouri. Granted, the pic is from a Google maps survey when I first bought the Goose years ago, but still. 

However, at Jan's in Alabama, google was stumped.

 

  For those of you who are not totally bored by Bernie and his mittens memes (as I must confess I am after two days) here is a roundup of some of them.

guess what

 How did you sleep last night? Did you wake up this morning thinking everything might be okay? It's amazing you can even see this picture. I couldn't really. Most everyone I knew watching live was in tears. 

And when the oath was taken, New York City rang in the new. It feels like New Year's.

medical alerts

 

The evening began serenely. Uber-ed up to Da Bronx at golden hour.

Stood on line under a waxing crescent moon and watched the lights of police cars and the elevated. For like an hour plus. Freezing my ass off.

Got my shot, after they figured out the technology.

All fairly calm, right? Meanwhile at Hannah's house, this was going on. Her mother-in-law fell and busted her head open. She crawled to the phone and managed to call for help. Lost a lot of blood. She remained conscious throughout, and they patched her up en route to the ER. They are keeping her for observation, but aside from blood loss, she's more or less ok. She can't walk though. The nurses love her.

And then, in a one-two punch, this  morning Douglas started vomiting and couldn't open his eyes or move. So Hannah called another ambulance and waited with her father and brother until those EMTs showed up. And more cleanup. They said his vitals were good, but he has to have an MRI to see what may be going on. They put him on antinausea medication and valium, and he was comfortable enough to talk to his brother when the ER nurse handed him the phone. Also his birthday is today. Gawd.

Poor Hannah said that I should stay home today

the difference three years makes

 

But of course, neither of these (obviously assigned) essays are really truthful, because the most important person in these kids' lives is their mom, obv.

neighborhood news

 

I mean, who can deal with national news today?

I guess the wigmaker to Broadway is finally moving out of the house that was on the market for $15 million. (Can this be right? That's what it says on zillow.) I have always wanted to go inside, but have never even seen inside the door until now. Movers have been toiling for days. 

In other news, my former upstairs neighbor is upstairs with her baby, visiting her mother. She and family are moving to Germany, where she has a university grant to work on something maybe involving neurotransmitters. She doesn't even bother trying to explain it to us. She says her baby timing was perfect. Arthur was born just before the coronavirus hit California in March, and she got maternity leave and then could work from home, as could her partner.

And speaking of coronavirus, ahem, I have an appointment to get the vaccine on this Monday in the Bronx! Thanks to Ed who walked me through the extremely frustrating on-line process. He scheduled his for Tuesday.

shopping fail

 

I need more ear candles. You know, those woo-woo things that are dangerous and don't work? Except that I am convinced that they do. I think they really help your ears and help you to hear better, though the boxes make no such claims for fear of  lawsuits. But being deaf in one ear, I am sensitive to hearing, pressure, tinnitus and other ear problems. I confessed my use of ear candles to my new otolaryngologist and she said that I had the cleanest mastoid cavity (a hole from surgery) she had ever seen. She suggested I come before and after candling so that she could take a look. Have not done that. Pandemic.

Anyway, I ran out after a candling session with Donna. I went to Amazon to buy some more and searched ear candles. I came up with a screen full of what I assumed were ear candles. I looked through, found a box that looked like the ones I had before that claimed to be beeswax, and pushed go. 

The next time Donna came over I got out the box. They were solid beeswax tapers. NOT ear candles. Donna said she had bought the exact same thing by accident a couple days before. "They tricked us!" She suggested we try searching ear cones, so we did. 

"Look! These are much cheaper and come many to a box," she said. "Organic. Plus they are made by Raw, the rolling paper company."

Cut to the chase. They were rolling papers shaped in cones. Fail 2. Duh. At least I can burn the tapers, whereas I have no use for the papers. But Donna found some real ear candles yesterday at a Woodstock health food store. So we're good.

america

 I'm not surprised. This is, after all, the good old US of A, and a frontier anarchy is in the nation's DNA. Not to mention frontier "justice." I arrived in Guns and God Land in the 1990s, when Ruby Ridge and Waco were battle cries against the republic. The government had tried to take their guns away, and in retribution, Timothy McVeigh detonated a truck full of explosives in front of a federal building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people.

On a Sunday in August 1997, I was sitting in a borrowed skirt in an old clapboard church full of "Christian Patriots" listening to a sermon inveighing against "mud people," i.e. nonwhites. And then the congregation started attacking a local judge and a newspaper editor. Both my friends. Both still my friends. And then I learned that Princess Diana had just been killed by the the evil media. 

And there I was, a card carrying member of the evil media, a woman married to a Jew and, perhaps worst of all, a New Yorker. I felt like I was in an alternate reality.

It was and is an alternate reality, and every so often it erupts into ours. And it's always the same: The government is evil, people of color are the enemy, liberals are trying to install communism and take our guns. And god is on our side. We are going to save the nation from these forces of the devil.

The thing that's different this time is that we had a president and a whole political party playing along, reinforcing such beliefs and whipping up anger. And that does surprise me. Or it did, five years ago when they carried an election. I have watched it building since. And here it is. And here we are.

O Biden, a victory song

truth

 Today this by Bill Dugan makes me think of Stacey Abrams. It looks like she delivered the goods in Georgia, all right. Still in suspense, but feeling hopeful. 

It also could be taken as Donna Ferrato's motto. She is starting to get press on her book, Holy. There is an interview with her in a British photography magazine here along with a gallery of pictures from the book. You can buy the book, prepublication, on her website here. Parental discretion advised.

helluva town

So I'm having this argument with my neighbor. She says NYC is over. Without Broadway and ballet and restaurants, no more New York. Of course, she hasn't been outside in a couple months,
 so she hasn't seen the people sitting outside at restaurants bundled up in their coats, the cafes with their tents and heaters taking up a lane of Amsterdam Avenue, the people on the streets—yes, wearing masks—going briskly about their business. She says people are moving out. I say they are coming back. I told her a year from now the theaters will be back open and, if we're lucky, New York will once again be a place where artists can afford to live and the rich people will follow. Yes, retail is dead, but it was dying before. And midtown is somewhat deserted without the office folk. Those buildings may have to be repurposed. But you can't kill this town. People like to be together with other strivers. When I first moved to the UWS in the 1970s, you had to carry a $20 in your pocket in case you were mugged. Your cars were stolen or had their windows bashed in. There were needles on the sidewalks and bars on the doors.

 When I was out of town, the newspapers made it sound as if it was like that again. It's not. 

meanwhile, on new year's eve

 

I don't ordinarily celebrate New Year's Eve. On my most memorable one 39 years ago I was in labor and at the hospital. They told me I wasn't dilated enough and I could have my choice of spending the eve at home or in the hospital. We went home. So since that time, I have held a New Year's Day birthday party and stayed in on New Years Eve, known to drinkers as Amateur Night.

However, with large gatherings discouraged and a garage for the truck and a destination with parking, I ventured out to TriBeCa. We had a Mexican feast (with designer tequila and authentic tamales), Scrasbble, music and dancing. And I was home before midnight since my garage was closing at 11.

The cat remained under the light source.

new year's baby

 

Happy birthday to my kind, smart, literate, beautiful daughter. And to think, in a year she will be 40!