Gracie's Birthday Banquet

"Feasts must be solemn and rare, or else they cease to be feasts." -Aldous Huxley 

^ From the top, clockwise: 

kibble and sardines, 

fresh blueberries, 

fresh bell pepper, 

roasted chicken, 

frozen blackberries, 

and in the middle, Gracie's favorite, hard boiled eggs. 

A cozy bed. 

A squeaky toy.

Maybe a sweater. Or a raincoat.

It's hard to land on a great birthday present for a dog. 

Especially when your dog does not care one whit for such treasures.

Gracie cares for one thing and one thing alone. (Well. Besides me.)

Gracie cares about food.

So this week, as her birthday approached, I racked my brain, trying to think of a new way to give her all the delicious food we're already giving her, in some way that would feel novel and maybe even special. At least to us. And one of my daughters hit the nail on the head.

A scavenger hunt.

After ruling out several undesirable scenarios:

1) In which we hide food around the house, which would result in unsightly puddles of Gracie's drool left behind in every place where she found her treats, 

2) In which we hide food outdoors along the route of her walk, which would only encourage her to eat (more) garbage, a horrible habit of which I'm continually trying to break her,

we hit upon a winning idea. 

Once home from her walk, we'd serve Gracie up her usual dinner of kibble and sardines. As she was chomping that down, I would slip out from the house a series of other dog bowls, each full of some Gracie-approved tidbit which, considering she loves all food except raw mushrooms, would not be difficult to accomplish, and tuck said bowls here and there around the front patio where she would already be dining. Then, we imagined, our birthday girl would nose around the patio, finding one delicious treat after another, and snarfing them all down to her heart's content. 

And you know what? It worked perfectly. 

^ Kibble and sardines, down the hatch.

Interestingly, Gracie did not tear through her various dinner courses at quite the breakneck speed I'd imagined. She worked carefully, diligently, licking every trace of food out of each bowl before moving on to the next. Other than the hard boiled eggs, which she wolfed, she ate with much more careful deliberation than usual. It was a delight to see her move through her progressive supper with more curiosity and self-control than her usual chomp fest. 

In fact, the only downside of the entire feast was the disappointment she surely felt on the day after her birthday when we returned from her walk and she excitedly scanned the patio for more of the extra treats.

Sorry, Gracie. Those goodies are for celebration purposes only.

But don't worry. You'll get another birthday banquet in just 364 more days. 

* * * * *

Do you remember the crazy story in which Gracie came to be mine? Read this for the details.

Surprise!

Hello And Goodbye

"Saying goodbye doesn't mean anything. It's the time we spent together that matters, not how we left it." -Trey Parker

"I don't know why you say goodbye, I say hello." -The Beatles

For the past five Saturdays, I've made a trip to the airport.

Five weeks.

In a row.

I've driven there and back.

Now it's a 74 mile round-trip journey. Forty-five minutes each way if the traffic is good. Goodness only knows what if it's not.

And - full disclosure - I have not been behind the wheel every inch of those trips. I've shared driving duties with my fourth born and my husband. But I've been there in the car, clocking the travel time, brainstorming alternative routes, and otherwise cheering on the entire enterprise. 

Some trips have been in daylight, others in the wee hours of night. 

But all of these trips - each and every one - have trafficked in the deep emotion that always surfaces during our hellos and goodbyes. 

Now, I am an experienced mom of adult children. I truly respect that they have built lives of their own that involve these comings and goings. Shoot, I moved away from my family of origin so I know from experience that there's nothing personal to these distances. Sometimes, life just beckons us to follow where it leads. I get that. And I'm good with that.

But there is a visceral pain that comes from squaring your shoulders, buttoning up your tears, and sending your daughter (or niece) off on a plane to live her own life. 

Yes, she's allowed. 

Yes, she's entirely capable. 

Yes, she'll be back.

Still, it's hard. 

So it gives me 

a certain solace, 

a comfort in numbers, 

a sense of feeling seen, 

when I visit the airport to watch the other families saying hello and goodbye, to know that we all carry a certain pain in our hearts, to accept that this process is very much a part of the human condition.

At least the postmodern human condition.

So here is my gift to you. When you find yourself in the process of saying goodbye - or hello! - to your adult children, I am with you. I will meet you at the airport and join you in all the emotions of these tender moments of hello and goodbye.

Owl Friend

Photo credit to one of my neighbors who snapped a pic of this owl and shared it in a neighborhood group. It looks exactly like the owl in the story I'm about to tell.

I had a feeling I'd see you today. As I strolled along the first bit of my walk, letting whatever thoughts might fly into my head build a nest there, I thought about you. I've seen you swooping through the woods along my path several times in the past few days, always at that same spot on the footbridge behind the high school. Powerful and silent, you glide through the trees and disappear into their branches. Just thinking about you triggered an echo of the shivers I always feel when I see you; you're majestic and mysterious and just a little bit creepy. You fascinate me and freak me out.

So as I come upon that little footbridge, I am looking for you. I call out to my dog in several unnecessary ways, just to give you a lil heads up that we are approaching your domain. I come upon your Doug fir growing in the little grove on the edge of the forest, sandwiched between the walkway and the parking lot, and look up.

There you are.

You're backlit by a tall light behind you, sitting on a branch maybe ten feet up. In a flash, I make out the unmistakable silhouette of your owl noggin. Deep in the shadows though you are, I catch a glimpse of the white and brown ruffled feathers that can only mean owl, and I feel the familiar tingles begin. 

I know it's you.

But just to be sure, I take a few more steps, so that I can look back up into the tree from the other side, with the angle of the street light shining fully upon you.

I see your face.

Your eyes, shining deep and alert, are staring into mine.

And hypnotized, for a full second, maybe two, I stare into yours. 

Now the goose bumps begin to zoom across every inch of my body, head to toe and back again, round and round. Dumbstruck by your imposing magnificence, I also somehow feel as if I'm invading your sacred owl privacy, trespassing into your secret owl life, crossing a line between our two separate lives that I should not be crossing.

I quickly turn, cast my eyes downward, and walk on. 

But you better believe that not a minute has passed since then that I have not relived our encounter. I see 

your dignified profile, 

your snowy feathers, 

your glossy black eyes, 

and I overflow with the magic of our encounter.

And you better believe that tomorrow, my dear little owl friend, I will be looking for you again. 

Watching | Postmodern Christmas Movies

Haul Out The Holly | Directed by Mclain Nelson

Meet Me Next Christmas | Directed by Rusty Cundieff

My Dad's Christmas Date | Directed by Mick Davis

All streaming on Netflix

Welcome to the world of holiday Hallmark movies. Somewhere around twenty years ago, in the early naughties, the greeting card powerhouse invented a trope of movies driven by predictable plots almost always involving high-powered yet brokenhearted women, small town settings, cozy Christmas vibes, and hot, very hot men. While this is not a genre that typically catches my fancy, here are three recent offerings that I've enjoyed. 

Mild spoilers ensue. 

^ Haul Out The Holly

Newly single Emily heads to her parents' snowy suburban home, hoping to cocoon through a cozy Christmas, only to discover that her parents are leaving for Florida and she's in charge of decorating the house up to colossal community expectations. Lo and behold, the neighbor and HOA president in charge of holding her to standards is her long lost childhood soul mate, he of steel blue eyes and the perfect sprinkle of freckles. Hilarity ensues as Emily resists and eventually celebrates their wacky cul de sac traditions, and maybe even falls in love. 

What makes this film stand out is that it carefully steps around the usual machinations of gooey romance and fills in all the resulting gaps with bits of quirky off-beat humor. References to Nickelback, Star Wars, It's a Wonderful Life, and Fresh Price of Bel Air pepper the plot which left this viewer snorting with laughter instead of rolling my eyes. 

^ Meet Me Next Christmas

Last Christmas Eve, Layla met her Prince Charming at snowed-in O'Hare, and this Christmas she's desperately seeking a ticket to a concert where he's promised to meet her. She hires a concierge to help her turn up just one highly coveted seat, and the two of them race around holiday-bedecked New York City in hot pursuit of various leads. In the end, Layla finds her ticket but learns that maybe her Prince is not who she thought.  

This movie is smarter than most. Yes, it stereotypically features a bestie who gives our female lead dubious relationship advice during cozy chats in their jammies, and a grandma-aged lady who offers plates of tasty holiday goodies and wraps everyone up in warm Christmas hugs. But the story takes place in a recognizable and romantic big city, rather than yet another Stars Hollow clone, and features a wee bit of a twist ending that we didn't see coming in, oh, let's say the first fifty seconds of the plot. 

Also, and maybe most importantly, this movie is cast with people of color. What a refreshing change. 

^ My Dad's Christmas Date

The title and the generic synopses of this film suggest it's about a teenage girl who tries to set her widowed dad up with a new lady, a la Billboard Dad.

But that's not it at all.

You see, Jules has a broken heart. So does David, her dad. They lost their beloved mom/wife in a car crash two years earlier, and both of them are still floundering in their grief, mostly by taking out their understandable pain and anger on one another. Jules' plan to land David a girlfriend is nothing more or less than her desperate attempt to help them both break this awful cycle and move on. But what we, her voyeuristic viewers understand, is that neither dad nor daughter can move on until they heal their relationship with each other.

This is not a sugary sweet, sexy, sappy Christmas movie. It's real and painful and though the ending is gently positive, the mood of the story is bittersweet at best. 

And that is exactly what makes it so very beautiful.

* * * * *

Christmas Schmistmas.

My mother loved Christmas. But - although she couldn't articulate this is so many words - she felt let down by the holiday. Reality always fell short of her expectations for the love and warmth and genuine contentment she hoped to find on that special day, which led her to fall back on her short-hand expression of frustration: 

Christmas Schmistmas. 

And while my younger self didn't quite know how to respond to her pain and oft-repeated refrain, I get it now. 

As humans, as women, and especially as mothers, we deeply crave the connection that Christmas teases us to believe is possible. We yearn for it with all our being: 

Watching our young ones' faces open with delight over Christmas surprises.

Gathering all our grown babies back together so they can reconnect over their childhood joys.

Seeking to find not what divides us but bonding over the love we share.

Serving our family and friends food that feeds their stomachs and their souls. 

Feeling peace on earth, right at our very fingertips.

This is all a lovely dream. And I believe that one day, we will find all this and more in eternity.

In fact, I think it's the eternal nature of our souls that makes us crave this perfection while we are living our entirely imperfect lives here on earth.

And that's the rub. We ache for that cozy glow of contentment, that blazing fire of love that we believe is possible at Christmastime most of all.

But Christmas Schmistmas. Life just doesn't usually work out that way.

So enter the postmodern Christmas movies. They help us fill up this space between our dreams and reality. They build in us with the hope that somewhere, somehow, Christmas dreams really do come true and all is calm, all is bright. And you know, for many of us, it works. Reality is suspended for somewhere around 90 minutes, and we can live in the cozy glow of a beautiful, perfect, snow globe of a Christmas dream.

Which is lovely.

As long as we remind ourselves that perfection only happens in heaven and holiday rom coms, and take it all in stride when the kids cry, the adults bicker over politics, the dog licks the plum pudding, and we're tempted to lock ourselves in the bathroom and cry. 

Christmas Schmistmas

Life is a crazy dance.

All we can do is celebrate together and hope for the best. 

* * * * *

What I'm watching lately. 

Postmodern Christmas Movies

Formula 1: Drive To Survive

Masters Of The Air

Downton Abbey

Sirius' World

 

Sirus, back when he used to sleep on couches. 

I'm leaning at the kitchen sink and listening to a silent house. Gracie sleeps at my feet. My husband is tat-tap-tapping on his Excel spreadsheets behind a closed door. Upstairs, my fourth-born makes nary a peep.

When suddenly there erupts a symphony of crackling papers. 

Rustling.

Ripping.

Crumpling. 

I'm stunned for a single beat, but then I remember. And I smile.

* * * * *

A couple weeks ago, in pursuit of some free plastic bubble wrap, I hauled in my stash of recently received shipping boxes from the garage and set up shop in the dining room. As I sorted through the boxes, I extracted the bubble wrap and stacked it neatly on top of the table, and tossed the less desirable (for my current purposes anyway) paper wrappings under the table. Various weights of tissue paper and that weirdly sliced expandable paper - honeycomb packing paper, I've since learned it's called - were discarded in devil may care fashion onto the floor where I promptly forgot all about them.

Until an hour or two later, when I tracked back into the dining room to pick up my mess and found, lo and behold, my good cat, Sirius, sound asleep on top of the paper wrappings. 

Oh. So cute. I left the pile and the sleeping cat be, and figured I'd let him have his nap and gather up the mess later. 

Well.

One nap turned into another; days passed and still Sirius slept on the paper heap. 

Now Sirius has always been one to move around the house quite a bit during the day, choosing a couch here, a chair there, a sunny spot on the floor, and of course, free range on the beds upstairs. He's always been one to mix up his choice of sleeping spots every hour or so.

But I noticed that Sirius was spending an inordinate amount of time in the nest, as I came to call it. 

Oh, and he fights with it too.

At first I thought my kitten was simply rearranging the papers as I heard him thrashing around in his nest. But no, a few discreet peeps revealed that he was wrestling armloads of the papers; kicking and biting them in a full-on grudge match. Then, exhausted, he'd simply close his eyes in the spot where he lay, and drift off into another long, lovely nap.

* * * * *

By now, Sirius's nest has become a charming part of our household routine. I find him there many times each day. Every now and then, I zhuzh the papers back up into a pile for him, but I'm not sure he really cares. 

Is it:

the texture of the papers, 

the warmth of his body heat captured in the layers, 

or the satisfying crinkling that so satisfies his little kitty soul?

I don't know.

All I know for sure is that rustling noises from my dining room are a new normal for me. They tell me that my little Sirius is curled up in his nest, and all is well in his world. 

P.S. Sirius' brother, Luna, has discovered the nest and fallen in love with its magical soothing powers as well. I'm happy to report that they take turns nicely.

Friends In The World

So there we were, my dog and I, trucking around the back side of the local high school, as we do every single gosh darn day, when what to my wondering eyes should appear but a man on a trajectory to intercept our path.

Just kidding. We see men and other humans around and about on our walks all the time. Nothing unusual about that.

However, this gentleman, by the logos and insignia on his jacket and cap, identified as a coach on the high school football team. And because the football practice field is tucked into the back corner of the school property, we don't often cross paths with the coaching staff. In fact, I've never noticed this particular coach before.

But I noticed him on this day.

Now, my dog and I have a deal. While we are walking along the streets where actual cars drive, she stays on her fifty-foot leash (who am I kidding; it's a rope with a clip knotted at one end and a loop at the other) and marches strictly on the sidewalk. But when we are walking within the school property along various lanes, paths, and footbridges, she is allowed off leash to run her little heart out as well as search out cast-off paper trays of Asian noodles and discarded chicken patties in the bushes. 

So it was during this off-leash portion of our adventure that the man approached us. 

Actually, as he intersected our path, he was much closer to my dog than to me. 

And as he crossed directly behind my dog, his head swiveled in her direction with nary a glance toward me, and he spoke.

"Hi, Gracie! How's your walk going today?"

Wait, what? How does this man know my dog? How does he know her name? Her habits? What is the root of this breezy familiarity he offers up to her?

I paused, hesitantly smiling, waiting for his attention to shift to me, for him to explain just how it is that he has some sort of standing relationship with my dog that I know nothing about.

But this is what happens.

He gazes at my dog for a beat longer, puts his hands in his pockets, and continues on his way with an absent-minded whistle. He doesn't so much as glance in my direction.

And I realize that my dog has more friends in the world than I will ever know.

Reading | Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs | Walter Isaacson

Edwin Land, Polaroid inventor

Bob Dylan, songwriter

Walt Disney, storyteller

George Orwell, author

Timothy Leary, advocate of psychedelic drugs

No list of 20th century geniuses is complete without the incomparable Steve Jobs. From his early days growing up under the watchful eyes of his doting parents, his barefoot and body-odor years working in an apple orchard and studying Buddhism, building the first Apple computers in his parents' garage (yes, he really did) to his roller-coaster ride in building and sustaining his place at the center of tech revolution, Jobs' life is documented honestly, compassionately, exhaustively in this biography. Isaacson thoughtfully spins out the dualism of Jobs' both tender-hearted and ruthlessly critical personality. The author also informs readers that Jobs loved to have critical conversations while walking around his Cupertino neighborhood, ate at cheap vegetarian restaurants, and obsessed over mind-blowingly minute details in every product he ever launched. 

What Steve Jobs wanted, far more than money or fame, was to create a gloriously elegant product. His designs were intuitive, minimalist, serene. In order to maximize customer experience, he insisted upon end-to-end control over his devices; every moment from opening the box to adding apps to transferring data between devices flowed as effortlessly and pleasingly as possible. And please, no on or off switches; Jobs' devices simply fell asleep and woke back up at the user's touch. 

Sadly, Steve Jobs' life was cut down by pancreatic cancer but not before his name was added to any worthwhile list of 20th century geniuses. 

Steve Jobs, social revolutionary

(Now go read the book, and find out how Land, Dylan, Disney, Orwell, and Leary all played significant roles as heroes in Jobs' life.) 

* * * * * 

One way to remember who you are is to remember who your heroes are.

What a joy it was to have been alive as Steve Jobs was building Apple. I remember every product launch, each surge and countersurge in the technological throw down with arch nemesis Microsoft, every refinement of Jobs' ever-evolving hair styles. His light shown bright during my young adulthood, and I saw him as a rough and ready tech cowboy who was always up to something exciting and new. 

The way we're running the company, the product design, the advertising, it all comes down to this. Let's make it simple. Really simple. 

But there was always a hint of tarnish on Jobs' shiny Silicon Valley sheriff's badge. Reports out of Cupertino were that Jobs had a mean streak, a red hot temper, a sharp tongue. Prone to tantrums. Outrageously demanding. And nowhere near deserving of the pedestal upon which I had placed him. 

Several years after his death, I still carried ambiguous thoughts about the man. Hero or villain? I could never be sure.

But then, one day, a friend of mine told me this story.

Otherwise, as Dylan says, if you're not busy being born, you're busy dying.

She was visiting her parents who lived in the Bay area, and her infant was struggling to nap. So mom settled the poor fussy lamb into a stroller, and headed out the door, hoping that the fresh air, California sunshine, and rhythm of the rolling wheels would settle them both. 

As she walked along the neighborhood streets, she saw up ahead on the sidewalk, heading her way, a dad and his four- or five-year-old daughter, who was clearly learning to ride, in wobbly fashion, her two-wheel bicycle. My friend realized that one party would have to yield the sidewalk to the other, and with a frustrated sigh, recognized that the simplest solution would be for her to tilt the stroller down to the curb and pray that her baby would not be rattled awake. 

But before my friend could angle the stroller off the sidewalk, the man also sized up the situation and quickly, calmly, helped his budding cyclist ease down the curb into the street. In no time at all, they zipped past my friend and her still-sleeping babe. As they passed, the father looked at my friend, met her eyes, and smiled, wordlessly acknowledging that he understood all about crying babies who need to be walked with as little jostling as possible. And then, in a flash, he was gone. 

Only much later did my friend recognize this father. It was Steve Jobs. 

And ever since the day I heard that story, I have forgiven him his faults.