a brief history

We're climbing into the wayback machine. Well, we're not going that far back—only three weeks or so. But I'm hoping my faithful readers will forgive my spotty posting when they see how much has been shoehorned into the recent past. So here are three days.
 

The Annual Santana Season's Over celebration coincided with a birthday. Happy birthday, Hector!

There were a couple of non-Santanas. Yes, that's Lina, now back in Brazil.

The next day Jose Santana helped me move all the outdoor furniture inside, and I closed up Hannah's house and packed up my stuff at Claudia's

The next morning I got on the ferry. As always, it was a relief to blow that ice pop stand.

That night was Simon's 15th birthday. Here he is held by his "big" sister. Lynn and Douglas have moved off island to Providence so that Simon can go to high school there.

Happy birthday, Simon!

 

view of vines

View from my window

Despite my absence, the karela vine was able to thrive. It likely doesn't have long to live (and will never produce bitter melons) as it is a warm weather annual. But it has been fun to watch it crawl up the side of the building, worth digging it up and transporting it from Missouri to Alabama to New York.
  

The sword bean, too, has thrived. It has made it all the way up and into Toby's window, one floor up. Probably about 14 feet. We'll see how long they last in a New York winter. So far no freezes.

View from Toby's window

grandpa elliott

So I'm escaping from Bourbon Street on Halloween (more about that later), and I recognize this dude. No big surprise: The video above of street musicians around the world playing Stand By Me  has been seen more than 120 million times, several by me. It took me a while to realize I should video him doing the song myself, but I finally did.

substandard posting

I have so many great pix and stories that I haven't posted due to houseguests and travels, but I am getting back with the program and will be dribbling them out. After I return to "normal" life in New York City.

still making mischief

Three cases of trouble, then and now. My cousin Richard, me and my brother Chris. My guess is the old picture was taken in about 1957 at Seminole Village in Florida. The new one was last week in New Orleans, where we all got together for some cousin love at cousin Silas's wedding. And now we have whole passel of new DuPont cousins. The Family That Ate The World!
   Picture credits: my sister Erin, for saving the old print. My brother Ben for reenacting the shot.
PS is the new pic better in color or black and white?

pity the poor postal workers

Back in the city where bombs are mailed in daily and a storm is imminent. Just as well, perhaps, to be out of the journalism  biz and going out of town. This pipe bomber can't be very technologically adept or he (yes, I'm making assumptions) would have better info and execution and addresses. Fortunately, my peeps don't scare easily.

a long story

I always swore after Hannah's wedding on Block Island that I would never hold another wedding there or even encourage wedding guests. However, these were special circumstances.
  Hmm. So nigh on 40 years ago, I bought this property with my former husband and brother-in-law. Douglas and I had Hannah, who grew up summering on Block Island, and sadly, in the summer after high school, she fell in love with S. Now S already had a child with J, and when Hannah fled the East Coast for S in Oregon, she wound up with part time care of J and S's daughter, N.
   Time passed, as did the relationship with S, but Hannah stayed in touch with J and N, especially when N wound up at RISD in Providence. Not long ago, J asked Hannah if she could rent Hannah's house on Block Island for her wedding. I said okay. I did not know they were planning to get married on our property, but when I saw them trying to get out of the wind and cold, I offered them a little archway of bayberry behind my house. The officiant was s's father, Just as J began her march from Hannah's to Claudia's, the sun came through.
  The next day when the bridal party was packing up to leave, Douglas was sitting at my kitchen table. I tried to explain who they were, and Douglas said, "I don't know any of these people." I said, "You do too! M is a friend of yours!" He said, "M?" and ran precipitately out the door to find him.

   

closing time

 Two views of the porch. All that remains is to haul in the beach chairs and porch furniture, hide the candles and soap from the mice, decommission the refrigerators, toss the flowers, put all detergents and any liquids in pails (so that if they freeze they don't go anywhere), clear access to all pipes for the plumbers, unplug appliances, dispose of food, clean and turn off the gas. In two houses. (And not a moment too soon. It was 38 degrees last night. Inside.) Wake up in  the night thinking I forgot something.

Jamie McGlone DuPont's photo of the not yet put-away porch.

seasons go round and round

The apple tree is blooming again, and the sparrows are nesting in the corner of the porch. But then last night, it was bitter cold for this time of year—lower 40s. I feel sorry for the newlyweds inhabiting my other house. And for me, with my untoward utility bills.
   This should be, and is, the season of asters.

outside my window

And yes, I should be outside, but I am not. I am inside, writing, for the next couple of days. Donna wants her intro written on a real typewriter. Does anyone still have on that is operational? I have two, but have no ribbons and have pretty much forgotten how to put them in. Duh!
Signed, All digital all the time.

yeah, i know

I've been a bad blogger. But that's because I'm booking for next season. That, and I better write Donna Ferrato's intro pretty darn quick. Meanwhile, it's cold, so I'm booking from bed.
  And speaking of booking. My friend Peter Meyer has finally opened up his Air bnb in Hudson NY. I gave it a trial run last fall (already!), and it's great. Couldn't be better situated from the main street. Here is the link.

we were ever bookish

 And now, more than 50 years later, we are two PhDs (Elizabethan Theater and Linguistics) and a writer. And all wearing glasses. More on the 50th reunion later.

the crew

Pete, the gas guy, goes off island to pick up his gas truck and get more gas.

John, the heroic roofer, is kept busy by the family.

 It takes a while to gather a group of people to take care of things you cannot. And once you finally have, they start getting older (just like me) and you have to switch them out to keep going. Some, like Peter, the gas guy, are training up the next generation. But will they know how to light the pilots on a Chambers stove? Or how to wiggle the switch on the propane fireplace? Will they want to put on foul weather gear to climb around steep roofs? Or know how to shingle? Where's the tricksy outdoor shower or the shutoff valve in the ground? But the real issue is trust. These people have access to my life in the most basic way, and I to theirs. That trust takes years in the building.

John Henry, with his sister (left),  is incapacitated due to ALS. He can't lift his arms.

off island

 Made it onto the 8:15 boat yesterday, standby. I was the last vehicle on. I had caught my breath by the time I reached New York, but then I had plenty of time to, well, not relax, but sit. It took me an hour to find a parking space. I got lucky.

Leaving Block Island in the wake.

changeable

 And so a string of two perfect days ended this morning in clouds. Stay tuned for more Block Island weather. But tomorrow I head for New York and my 50th (!)  high school reunion. That should give me something to write about!

don't have to be a weatherman

Are you sick of me talking about the weather yet?  The rain this morning is torrential. Seems like a safer subject than talking about the anniversary of my mother's death right before what would have been her 92nd birthday. Or friends' blown deadlines or financial problems. Or the damn Supreme Court. Or that time I was raped. Or the frat parties I've been to. Or what it means to know that almost any man is stronger than you are. So, about that weather. Supposed to be windy and nice tomorrow.

like it never happened

Today the sets are lining up nicely. It is hot and humid, like yesterday never happened. There was tropical rain this morning—maybe an inch and a half—and then the sun came out. Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes. Going out to sit in the sun!

fierce nature

The wind is coming due east at about 20 mph. That is straight onshore, where I live, with the full-moon tides at their highest. The waves are crashing on the rocks put in to hold back the sea after Sandy, and sand is drifting across the road in places. The afternoon ferries are "questionable" I rather like this weather as long as the storm doors are closed and the propane fireplace is on. And as long as it doesn't go on too long.

the amazing skies

Find the bird.

Striped sunset for the record books

Town of New Shoreham under harvest moon last night. Tonight is full.

It was the hippiest dippiest holiday I had ever celebrated. Taiwan, 1971, the Mid-Autumn Moon Festival. As it grew dark, Ping and her family took me to a temple high above Taipei. We spread out blankets and a feast and listened to other citydwellers doing the same in the nightwoods. Playing music. The guzheng, the pipa, flutes. Laughing, drinking, eating and bathing in the  bright moonlight. I think of it every year at this time. I don't have any mooncakes here in Block Island, but if the moon is out, I will be too.

outside/in stormy

This is what it looks like in front of the house today.

This is what it looks like from inside at daybreak.

son and father

 Simon likes his new room on the mainland. Finally, after growing up on Block Island, he has fast Internet. He saved up his own money to buy a gaming chair with back support, swivel arms and other features he's happy to demo. For the first time, he is going to school with more than a handful of students in a class. For the first time he has homework. His parents too have uprooted to Providence, though his mom comes to the island for work, and his dad for such things as yesterday's anticipated flooding rain. Didn't really happen.

the birthday party

Still playing catchup from the weekend.
   The Pokemon cake Hannah made from scratch was a triumph. Camilla, now eight, blew out the candles on the first try. For the first time in my life I heard kids refuse cake because they said they'd had too much sugar already. They preferred eating candy from the Pokemon pinata. Crazed, they wrapped Hannah's cousin in crepe paper until she was mummified and ran around the house playing war. Camilla said the war was her favorite part. There were many relatives including Hannah's brother Simon, now taller than she, and newly moved to Providence for school. It was a tough day for dogs and little brothers.

Ruca is terrified of balloons, making birthdays a nightmare for her. After being released from the bedroom, she tore around the yard for a while and sank, exhausted into bed.

Isaac was a pretty good sport, but it was tough having his sister be the center of attention. And  his own birthday two weeks before seems to have given him a taste for opening presents. The day after the party, everyone was exhausted and coming down with colds.

ping at home

Ping came home from her road trip to Graceland to find a fully-stocked refrigerator, thanks to her boys. She also found that a downstairs neighbor's smoke had permeated her apartment to the degree that she has not been sleeping there very often. I arrived to deliver an iron frying pan she craved, a plastic box for lures from Walmart that she had wished for to store her earrings, and a pound of Zabar's espresso. I got to Belmont, Mass.,  at 3 pm and left at 9 am for Providence and my granddaughter's eighth birthday. In that period of time, she served me three multicourse meals comprised of foods she knows I particularly like and a case of Stella Artois. I could not eat or drink it all, but I assume the boys will help.

A light snack: Dragon eyes (like lychees), blueberries, clementines, plums, apple, boiled peanuts, soybeans.

Dinner: Dry tofu, shin of beef, beef tendon, pickled vegetables, French beans on a bed of blue corn chips, more peanuts and soybeans.

Breakfast: Congee (my fave!) with pickled vegetables, some weird powdered fish and seaweed stuff that I don't know what it's called but I like it, green beans, wild-caught salmon, tofu with anise and soybeans.

Ping walks it off at the rate of at least 6,000 steps a day. Me, not so much.

backyard birthday

Camilla at eight.

downtown with donna

Spent a couple days smashing the patriarchy. Sadly, we haven't finished yet. But I'm off to Providence.

9/11 again

I don't have any more to say than that. Going down to the World Trade with my partner in news and mischief then and now, Donna Ferrato. Pix TK.