My Truant Pen

Thirty-four (34)

September is one of my favorite months. I love the crispness of the air, the brightness of the sun, the blueness of the sky and the sense of change and possibility that rides on the adventurous breezes. It is back-to-school, new-pencil time. I often return to Tolkien, the progenitor of so many of my childhood daydreams, in September – fondly remembering that Bilbo, Frodo and I are separated in birthday by a scant day. (There was a time in my life where I attempted to figure out whether if, what with time zones and all, I could in any way be considered to be born on September 22nd. There is not, for the record.)

And here we are, on the first welcome day of autumn after a delicious and delightful summer, looking at my birthday. My thirty-fourth birthday.

My mother in law painted my dining room for my 34th birthday

Is there any birthday less consequential than your 34th? I’m no longer young, but not quite middle aged yet. I feel no biological clock ticking down because I’ve had my children. I still can’t be president. It’s not divisible by any exciting numbers. There are no (known) science fiction or fantasy references that make it significant (like 42). It’s just another birthday.

But this year, I find myself wildly and unreasonably excited by it. Look at that! I’m having a birthday! Isn’t that marvellous?! Maybe we should have cake! Although I still find myself melancholy on reflection of my lost little kitty, and although I have been somewhat tired and worn of late, my birthday is still (unexpectedly) exciting to me.

I reflect on why this might be. I come to the conclusion it’s because, for the first time in many years, there’s something I actually want for my birthday that I do not have and have been waiting to obtain for months. A new guitar. A grownup-size guitar. A guitar that says, “Yes, Brenda is really actually playing the guitar now.” A pretty guitar with a graceful body and mother-of-pearl inlay. (I hesitate to confess how much my heart was set on mother-of-pearl inlay.) A guitar with a darkly beautiful sound and an easy way of laying in my arms. I have sought, daydreamed and wanted, and for my birthday I have obtained my heart’s desire.

There are other things too, of course, that make my birthday delightful. There is the delight of a guilt-free chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and rather fewer than 34 candles. There is the delight of watching my sons learn the joy of giving. The New England Patriots are even obliging by playing an 8 pm game on my birthday (although one ardently hopes that this week’s performance is better than last’s – UGH! Eds note: QUADRUPLE UGH!).

Finally, this day initiates the fall for me – coming as it does so close to the equinox. Bring on the orange and brown palette. Let there be pumpkin stickers. May the fridge hold apple cider and the kitchen be fragrant with boiling apple butter. Let us open the windows during the day and close them during the night. Let me wake to the sound of the furnace turning on to heat the room for morning ablutions. Let there be birthdays and Halloweens and Cthulu games and apple picking and Mocksgiving and Thanksgiving and Advent and Christmas. I am ready.

For lo: I am 34. I am not young. I am not old. I am not even – quite yet – middle aged. I have learned how much there is to love of fall, and stand ready to lay down another layer of memory to build the beautiful patina of age.

Great Justice

Back when dinosaurs roamed the earth and I was a newly-wed, I talked my husband into getting a cat. A friend of ours had a connection to a woman in Connecticut who ran an informal shelter, and we went there to select the animal that would be our companion. It turned out not to be much of a selection process: Justice hopped up on the counter and went to lay down in the cat carrier. The message was clear: stop yapping and take me home with you.

We did.

I am oh so tremendously sorry to tell you that Justice died today, and the universe is a bleaker place for it.

Justice was a remarkable cat. Many of you knew him well. He was rescued and neutered a little late in life, so he had quite a bit of the rakish Tom left in him. He was without exception the most gregarious cat I’ve ever met. During parties with 30 or more people, while his sister was hiding under the bed, he would be in the middle of the crowd, hamming it up and demanding scritches from whomever in the room had the worst allergies. He was impossible to ignore, and would drape himself over you, your keyboard, your book or whatever triviality you were attempting.

Justice was a very adventurous soul. When we originally got him, he started going crazy in the confines of our apartment. We got Magic to help burn off some of his kittish energy. It didn’t work. He was very unhappy as an indoor cat – always trying to escape and looking longingly out windows. When we finally accepted that our grief tonight was a price we would be willing to pay for him to have the life he wanted to live and let him outdoors, he was much, much happier. He followed us on walks around the neighborhood. People would stop us and ask if we had him on a leash – but we didn’t. He just followed us non-chalantly, as though we happened to be going the direction he was headed anyway.

Justice excelled in all catlike arts. He was an excellent hunter – often expecting us to be impressed by the rabbits and squirrels he offered to us. He spent many an hour napping in a finely cat-like way. But oh, he was so gentle and patient with people. He excellence with children was unsurpassed. He never offered violence at any but the most outrageous treatment. He liked to sniff the heads of babies to see if they were tasty. He was incredibly patient with kids, and their attempts to play with him.

Justice welcomes an infant Grey home from the hospital

Justice had his trials of course. There was the long bout with urine crystals that ended up with a full abdominal surgery and ignominious shaving. There was the broken leg. The tattered ear predated our acquaintance, but bespoke a more than passing familiarity with pugilism. He bore them all with great dignity and pride: charming the staff of the veterinary clinic, and making friends wherever he went.

He was well loved throughout the neighborhood. When we left our last place, the neighbors brought over the toys they’d kept for him, and the treats. He invited himself into many a home, assumed his place on the guest list at many a gathering and was a well known local figure.

Last night he slept at my feet – crowding me so that I had to contort myself in bed. The night before, I’d cuddled him as I put him on the porch so he wouldn’t follow me on a longer walk that would take him outside his territory. Tonight, he has left us and is gone. I confess myself completely bereft.

Last night, I went to Grey’s back to school night. In one drawing hung on the wall, Grey drew four things: one thing he liked to do (read), one thing he liked to eat, I forget the third. But the fourth was one thing he loved. And he drew a picture of his beloved cat Justice. When I sat the brothers on the couch and told them their cat was dead, Thane did not really understand. But Grey did, and he burst into tears. “He was my best friend,” he said. “I loved him so much.”

I know child. I did too.

May you never be forgotten, beloved friend

A year of zombie life

September 16th is one of the dates I remember. On September 16th, a year ago, I became a zombie.

The story is this: 14 year ago, I went skiing for the first time and snapped my ACL. Being young and dumb, I figured six months of limping was normal for a sprain. Then 18 months ago I jumped off a wall and tore my meniscii – both of them – badly. A summer of physical therapy, then I re-injured it and the MRI showed that I had massive damage to my knee. I was scheduled for an ACL replacement surgery and repair of both my meniscus.

I think that exactly this time last year I was fading in and out of consciousness, in and out of pain. I don’t remember that day too well. The rest of the week I spent ensconced on this very couch, an awesome ice pack circulating cold water over my bruised and violated knee. It was a long, slow, obnoxious journey back to (mostly) full mobility from there. I hated the crutches stage. I limped for months and months. Even now, I can feel that my knee is different than it’s partner on the right.

There are a few things I bring out of this experience.

First is gratitude. My new knee with its excellent function is a gift. There was a person who chose to be an organ donor. There was a family who affirmed that donation – in grief – after they lost that loved one. We all think about donating hearts and lungs and livers: the life-saving organs. But there is so much more than just that. There are tendons, eyes, skin – things that make life better. I carry a bit of my donor with me – and it carries me. There is a person who lives on, in some small way, in me. And I am grateful.

Second is also gratitude. It turns out that chronic pain and difficulty moving are mentally, emotionally and physically debilitating. Last year was one of the hardest – the worst – years of my life. This year has, so far, been one of the best. There is more to it than just pain and disability vs. no pain and ability… but that is a huge amount. It is salutary for the young and able bodied to see the world through other’s eyes. I’ve been fearful walking across slick ground in a way I never was before. That gives me sympathy and care for the octogenarians who always walk with such caution. I also being to understand the toll chronic pain takes on its sufferers.

Finally, there is the moving on. This appendage has taken up a tremendous amount of space in my psyche in the last year: with the pain, the fear, the disability, the limitations. But that’s pretty much over with. Now I have all this lovely extra space in my thoughts for new things, like guitar!

So that’s a wrap. One year later, I am signed up for the next Red Cross blood drive and saying, “Sayonara knee preoccupation!”

Glittering Images

Glittering Images by Susan Howatch
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This was a tremendously satisfying book. It started light and Wodehousy, but quickly got deep and complex. There were a few moments of delighted realization as I, the reader, got to know what was going on. The book spoke to the kind of reality I live in, or wish I did.

I think my very favorite part of this book was its treatment of Christianity, Christians and the church. It is rare to find fiction that has a nuanced, compassionate view of any of these. But I found the book to be theologically compelling without being the slightest bit prudish or preachy. There were real Christians, driven by real faith and supported by a church that had some Really Good Ideas. I’m not sure I’ve ever encountered that done as well anywhere else.

I am a gulper of books. I can’t help myself most of the time. But this is a sipping book – like a fine glass of wine.

Read if: you enjoy post-war-period English novels, you like a complex narrator, you would enjoy a nuanced view of Christianity, you like good books.

Avoid if: you cannot handle any sex scenes in your literature, you find books about the journey of the mind/spirit/soul boring and want more explosions, you are overly triggered by child loss.

View all my reviews

There and back again

I’ve had a very long day today. I rose at 4:30 am to make a 7 am flight out of Boston. The TSA lines were very, very short. The folks manning them cheerful, efficient and thorough. There did not seem to be any pall cast over Logan as we flew out, the pinking sky in the east making silhouettes of clouds. I flew to Atlanta, the time collapsing in the liberty of the constraint of an airline seat.

I’d thought that I had about an hour before my colleague arrived at the airport, and I was just lowering myself into a massaging chair for a manicure (I know! Such luxury! But I’d meant to get a manicure before I went client-facing and it seemed like too good an opportunity to pass up!). My phone rang. He’d gotten there early! Rats! I decided to get the manicure anyway, and my Northern impatient self attempted futily to relax at the Southern, relaxed rate of the service. However, if you believe I did not smudge Regina’s meticulous work, you do not know me well.

We had cajun, lemonade and planning for lunch, and then launched into a three hour meeting fueled by software architecture and coffee. I had fun. I know you’re not supposed to have fun at three hour business meetings, so I apologize but… well. I had fun anyway.

Then back to the airport, stumble through security (again: short lines, nice folks), exchange heels for socks, walk the entire length of the Altlanta airport, dinner, check my email on my phone (46 new message!) and find my seat. Now I’m enjoying in-air wifi (oh! What a marvel technology is!) and feeling satisfactorily tired and accomplished and urbane. We’re probably somewhere around Pennsylvania right now – give or take.

Tonight I’ll rescue my car from the parking lot (only one day!), drive darkly over the Zakim to the steepled towns of the North and kiss my sleeping children before I lay myself down next to my drowsy husband.

My first grader

My eldest son is going to his first day of first grade today.

The traditional first day of school picture

The other night I had the mother of a kindergartener at my son’s school over for dinner. She was asking me how it all worked. “Did you pack a drink?” “Do they have microwaves?” “Do you walk the kids into the school?” “Have they ever forgotten to pick your kids up from afterschool?” For many of the questions I know the answers “No, they’ve never once forgotten my kids” but for others… “Grey!” I called. “What do you drink during snack time?” With the cool confidence of one who sees Kindergarten in the rear-view-mirror, he gave us the lowdown on how things were supposed to work, how things actually worked and how to optimize the Kindergarten snack-drink experience.

Grey's new "Back to school" wardrobe, which he picked himself — Grey’s new “Back to school” wardrobe, which he picked himself

I suppose I should have few qualms sending him to first grade He’s academically prepared (hey, we even know where the over-the-summer homework is and it’s even done and it wasn’t all done this week! WIN!). He’s socially prepared, although he’s bummed that many of his friends are in the other first grade class. He’s confident. He’s looking forward to returning to school.

And oh, my friends, he is so very big and grown.

Those of you who have been reading for a long time remember me talking about being pregnant with little Alpha. You remember the “holy cow are they really letting me go home with this baby?!”. The toddler phase. The barfing phase. The preschool phase. Becoming a big brother. Reading. Becoming a fully fleshed person. Now I find myself gobsmacked by my son’s capability and confidence. When and how did he learn to do all these marvelous things he does?

For example, Grey earned $32 this summer feeding neighbors’ cats, watering plants, weeding gardens and bringing in the mail. I will confess that I still had a role to play (what can I say… he is too short to reach one mail box and one key is too hard for him to turn). But I sat on the porch and let him do his work for the most part. He and I had long conversations about this money he earned. I played payday lender and threatened to charge him a 10% daily interest rate if he really wanted to spend the money before he’d gotten it. He opted not to. We talked about giving a portion to the church. He owed his brother a portion for helping with the weeding. And finally, I took him down this week to create his very own savings account at the bank.*

We went camping this weekend, and Grey was a marvellous help. He helped his brother play Legos. He swam (head underwater and everything!) in the lake. He was reliable and dependable. He (GASP!) went to the bathroom all by himself. In possibly the most astonishing evolution of all, he also announced every night that he was tired and was heading to bed now, thankyouverymuch. And then… he did!

Grey still has his faults, for sure. There are still many things we have to teach him, beyond a doubt. But I am so proud of the person he is and the person he is becoming.

*As an aside, I am offended on his behalf about the kind of account we set up. Perhaps I should have done more investigation. He isn’t allowed to withdraw money from his own account until he is 21. What’s up with that? He could be drafted by the army to be sent to war when he’s 18. He can vote for our leaders. He would be convicted as an adult of any crime. But he can’t touch the money that he himself earned? That’s… shameful. I wanted to go to the bank we walk past all the time to give him a concrete connection to his money, but I dislike the account we set up immensely. I was also disappointed that they didn’t have any children’s financial literacy documents or anything.

Red Sox: In good times and in bad

Red Sox fan - Fenway 2009 — Red Sox fan – Fenway 2009

I don’t think I’ve ever experienced a baseball season that made me so passionately excited about football as this 2012 Red Sox season. I’ve been a baseball fan since 1995 – a respectable time now. I started as a Mariners fan and – without dropping my hope for the Ms to do well while bowing to the realities of being 3 time zones away – I’ve become an ardent Red Sox fan.

I’m definitely not alone in having come to Red Sox fandom in the last decade. I attended my first game at Fenway in 2000. 2001, for reasons that will be instantly understandable to those of you who live in the Northwest of follow baseball closely, I lived tied to the MLB broadcasts on my computer – up until late at night. After that, though, I started following the Sox. I lived through the devastating heartache of 2003 (there is a great group of guys with whom I can never watch another game after Pedro got lifted…). I actually missed the first three games of the ALCS in 2004 (I was in Vienna and thinking, as I caught the box scores, “Well, at least I’m not missing a *good* post-season.”), but lived through the incredibly late nights and unbelievable comebacks of Game 4 and beyond. I rode the wave of seeming-inevitable excellence through 2007. And like so much of Red Sox nation, I find myself facing down a September where we are – to put it plainly – totally out of it.

Dire days like these, my friends, are when I need to draw on my Mariners roots. There are 29 teams in baseball. This year roughly a third of them will make it to post-season play. Only two of them will stand on the frost-hard field in the chilly air of late October. But all of these teams have fans – not just that ultimate pair or penultimate quad.

Your team does not have to be winning – or even good – to have fun being a fan.

As the 2012 season turned from bad to worse, I opined to a friend that it was years like this that allowed purer motivations to shine. Everyone wants to be part of a winning effort, but disdain and disinterest have followed the Red Sox this year as they have struggled to win as many games as they’ve lost. As fast as people jumped on that bandwagon, so fast are they saying that the Red Sox do not deserve their fandom. Well, I’m not jumping.

There are great compensations in losing, my friends. For example, the next time the Red Sox are great (which with Cherington’s moves may be as early as 2014), we will get to be the “We were there when” folks with the 13 year old lucky shirt. Sox fans can actually see the games now. This isn’t a problem in most towns, but there have been years where it was impossible to procure even bad tickets to exciting games in Boston. They still cost an arm and a leg, but at least now if you WANT to get to Fenway, you can go. We are getting to watch some young players come up who will be next year’s super-stars. I remember listening to Kevin Youklis’ very first major league at bat. Some of the kids we’ll see next year will be the next Youklis… and some will be the next Jose Cruz Jr. (My Mariners peeps remember how big he was billed!). We may have the chance to watch a team win against the odds, instead of having the “Best Team Ever” collapse into ignominy. In small market towns, some of the compensation is watching your gifted young players “Make it big” in the big towns. In a town like Boston, it’s getting to poach those self-same players. Regardless, the Red Sox are almost guaranteed to have a shot at the playoffs within a decade.

That isn’t true everywhere. Take, oh, Seattle for instance. There was much ado about the 84 years since the last time the Sox brought home the championship. But Seattle’s team, founded in the 1977 expansion has not only NEVER won a World Series… it’s never BEEN to a World Series. The furthest we’ve ever gotten is the ALCS in 1995. That record-breaking 2001 season ended up flaring out in October. And although the Mariners keep valiantly trying, there is no sense of entitlement in the Emerald City that we’ll ever win it. But still, the fans flock to Safeco and turn on KOMO.

Why?

Because it’s fun to watch and listen to baseball. That’s the point. Your team may lose four games out of five, but man that fifth game King Felix is pitching. Or you have an outfielder like Jay Buhner who just loves to play, and it shows. Or you have an Edgar Martinez, who would still be DH-ing if they’d let him run the bases for his doubles using a wheelchair. Or, in a particular appalling year, you still cheer for your team to win (against all odds), but the fun of watching is seeing all the stars of the game come to your home town to trounce your teams… a little like having the Harlem Globetrotters come. Just because your team is under .500 doesn’t mean it isn’t fun.

So, bring on September. Would I rather we were in the thick of the chase? Of course. Am I looking very much forward to the Pats kickoff in just over a week? HECK YES. But until then, I’ll listen to Joe and Dave, follow the kids called up in September, hear the amazing feats of the opposition and hope that we at least play well in tonight’s loss.

Dear Trumpet

Trumpet and I getting together for Easter

My Dearest Trumpet,

You were absolutely my first love. Obviously, you weren’t the first instrument I dated. Piano and I went out for a few years before we met, and I had a crush on voice when I was a little girl. But I fell head over heels for you. I remember the time we played Cappriccio Italien together. There were all the good times at the Evergreen Music Festival or with the Tacoma Youth Symphony. We had fun in pep band (well, even though we rolled our eyes. I still have the third trumpet part – the best part – to “Sweet Child of Mine” memorized). I used to drag you everywhere. Do you remember that 15 days driving trip across the US when I practiced with you at rest stops and behind hotels?

I don’t think I’ve ever been more in love with you than I was in high school. You made me feel like I was flying on a dragon when we played Gabrieli together. You were with me in one of the best moments of my youth, when Dr. Cobbs winked and told us – for an encore – that we were going to “crash the ship again” in Scheherazade.

I cannot imagine how my life would have been without you, and I wouldn’t trade our time together for anything.

In the normal course of events, though, I went to college. And although I formed a brass quintet (I cannot BELIEVE that site is still up!) and tried playing in the college symphony, it just wasn’t the same. I don’t want to say we’d grown apart, but we both moved on to other things.

After that, it was like we were Facebook friends. Oh, we’d get together a few times a year at Easter or Christmas or for special occasions. But even though I tried to rekindle the spark by looking for a nice symphony orchestra – or even a brass ensemble – where we could be happy together… it just didn’t work out. I spent a long time pining for you. Over a decade, I remained true. Ok, so there was that one fling with the cornetto, but it that was over quickly.

Finally I had to admit, though, that it was over between us. Things would never be the way they were. I guess that’s the way it goes, isn’t it? You can’t go back to the way things were when you were 17. And I moved on.

You know that I’ve been seeing a new instrument – guitar. And it’s been good to me. I mean, the guitar is patient and kind. It gets along a lot better with my friends than you ever did. I could see guitar and I building something beautiful together – not like what you and I had. Nothing could ever reach that. But, you know, a comfortable life together. We were just starting to get serious, you know. Talk about some investments together. Sign some papers. That kind of thing.

Then all of a sudden, you want back in? Really? That wind ensemble that reached out to me; with the amazing looking repertoire, and the schedule I could actually do… but that is on the same night as guitar lessons… let me get this straight. You want me to break up with guitar, and come back to you? And you’re saying that it won’t be just like it was, but it will be great again between us.

The question is, my dear Anduril¹, do you mean it, or are you just playing with my heart again? I don’t want to break up with this good and loving instrument just to have my heart broken again. But I can’t really pass up the change to be with you again, either.

I’ve asked to audition in December – gives me some time to see how guitar and I are working out. But… don’t break my heart, trumpet.

-Me

¹ Yes, that really is the name of my trumpet. What can I say, I named it when I was like 14 and the two things I loved best in life were trumpet and Tolkien. DO YOU HAVE A PROBLEM WITH THAT?

Pictures!

So I got way behind on pictures for the summer. In one marathon session, watching the Olympics, I have brought them into LINE! Muahah! So here you go:

Pictures from York Beach in Maine, with babysitter, as referenced in the last post.

Pictures of a trip to see the Rampage, which I thought I’d posted but Picasa says I never did.

Father’s day, with kites.

Second camera pics from May, including camping and summiting Black Cap Peak.

Now my memory card and my conscience are both clear. Enjoy!

Rampage Nation

WBUR had a prime drive time story today covering the Rampage! It was a great story – I do wish it had come out in time for people to catch a game of the 2012 season though. Anyway, it’s pretty awesome to hear!