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“From a commercial point of view, if Christmas did not exist it would be necessary to invent it.”

July 29, 2010

The humidity has returned with a vengeance. I loved the last few days when a dry breeze swept across the deck and kept me nice and cool. Today, the mere effort of walking produces sweat. This morning I had to do some of the chores I’ve been putting off the last few days so to enjoy the weather. The bed got changed, the dishwasher run and clothes are in the washer. I’m soaked from the effort. My glasses even fogged when I was walking up and down the stairs. Thundershowers are predicted for tonight and tomorrow.

The intrusion of one season into another never happened when I was a kid. The dreaded back-to-school shopping was a late August event. My mother would drag us all uptown for new school shoes and new uniforms if we had grown out of last year’s. That pretty much signaled the end of summer for us, but by then we had already become bored anyway so the idea of school, a new teacher and seeing friends again didn’t seem all that bad.

September was a settling in month. It was back to the routine of getting up early, walking to school, coming home, changing into play clothes, going outside then coming back inside to eat supper and do homework. It was the same every weekday. It was a kid’s rut.

Halloween didn’t start showing up until October, and it was usually only a week or two away before the excitement started to build. What would we be? How big a haul would we get? We laughed and chatted and planned.

Thanksgiving was no big deal for kids. It was just a big dinner when you had to dress nice. The best part was time out of school. No TV ads pushed Christmas and none of us made lists. It was just too early.

It was a week or even two weeks into December before Christmas excitement began to build. We had the Sears catalog so we started circling our favorites. Houses were lit up with lights, and uptown was decorated. A couple of weeks before Christmas we got our tree, and about a week before the big day, Santa was on TV in the afternoon. Every day was one less day to wait, and we were filled with excitement.

Now, Halloween ads starts in early September and Christmas ads come right after. They get to be routine, even a bit monotonous. I miss all that excitement and the counting down of days.

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“I am big! It’s the pictures that got small.”

July 27, 2010

Today is another gift, cool, sunny and dry. When I stepped out to the deck, I could smell the salt water. Though the ocean isn’t close, the breeze was just right and brought it my way. I sat down and said good morning to my backyard friends. The crow was especially vocal. I looked for the squirrel, but he’s not around, maybe the nest is finished. Today is a perfect deck day.

Last night’s movie was the original War of the Worlds. We ate popcorn, sno-caps and Raisinettes, all perfect movie fare. We look forward to these movie nights, our sitting outside in the cool of the evening and chatting if we want or pausing if we need a break. The projector has a coffee cup button for those necessary pauses and the cup appears on the screen. Trying to find a movie last night, I realized my collection does need expanding so my sister is already talking Christmas and movies and my stocking.

In Ghana, in my day, all the movies were shown outside. You paid in the lobby, bought some munchies and walked from there into a wide courtyard. At my favorite theater in Accra, the chairs were in no special order and could be moved, and there was a balcony. The screen was huge. Overhangs were on three sides of the courtyard so if it rained you just hauled your chair under an overhang and kept watching. The movies weren’t new, but we didn’t care. It was just fun to see a movie.

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“We’re eyeball to eyeball, and I think the other fellow just blinked.”

July 26, 2010

The morning is a delight. The humidity is gone, and the breeze, if you’re sitting in the shade, is a bit chilly. I lingered on the deck a long while this morning, and it was a spawn of Satan who had my full attention. He was building a nest. I watched him chew off small oak branches and jump from limb to limb. All the while he was trying to keep the oak branch steady in his mouth until he reached a topmost cluster of two pine branches where he disappeared. I got my telephoto lens and was able to watch him hustle about arranging the leaves. He did this several times and I never tired of watching him. I actually looked up squirrels to find out it is the male who constructs and the female who feeds. Come to find out squirrels are polygamists, and males will take care of several females.

Tonight will be in the low 60’s. It’s movie night because of the rain yesterday. I’m thinking a sweatshirt and my chiminea lit to ward off the chill. Nothing sweetens the air like the smell of pinon wood burning.

Despite duck and cover, I was never afraid as a little kid. The idea of a devastating bomb didn’t make a big impression. It was even fun to have those drills. We used to look at each other from under our desks and try to smile and wave without getting caught. It was the Cuban missile crisis which scared me. By then I was old enough to understand. I remember watching President Kennedy on a flickering black and white TV screen as he explained the quarantine, the naval blockade, and the ultimatums he was giving Russia. We all held our breaths for those thirteen days knowing that a nuclear war was a possibility. Nobody practiced duck and cover. We knew better.

When I went to Russia in the 1970’s, one of the places we visited was the graveyard where Nikita Khrushchev was buried. It was part of the tour, and in those days you couldn’t travel in Russia unless you were on a tour. In that graveyard, each of the tombstones had a picture of the deceased attached. Nikita’s picture was black and white, and he was wearing a suit. He had a huge grin.

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“I’m not sure what makes pepperoni so good – if it’s the pepper or the oni.”

July 25, 2010

Yes, it remains hot and humid, but the deck has a breeze so I’ll go back when I finish here. While I was reading the papers outside, I stopped a few times, as I usually do, to watch the birds. This morning it was an amazing variety. A hummingbird dropped by and took nectar from the zinnias, but he was too far away for a good picture. This was his third visit so I’m now counting the hummingbird as a regular. The male oriole was back for some grape jelly, and I was able to catch a picture of him on a nearby branch. A fledgling made all sorts of noises from a branch by the feeders. He was a young titmouse still sporting fluffy feathers. My regulars too were there in big numbers, and they ignore me so I get a close-up view. I noticed one of the feeders needs to be filled, an afternoon chore.

When I was a kid, we used mustard or mayonnaise on sandwiches. Ketchup was for hamburgers and French fries. Piccalilli was for hot dogs. The bread we used was always white and mostly soft. It beaded when you took a small piece and rolled it. For sandwiches I ate bologna. My mother always bought a roll of it, and I’d cut it for my sandwich. Most times the piece was thick on one side and thin on the other. I wasn’t the best slicer. A friend of mine’s father introduced me to hot peppers, and they became a sandwich regular, even with the bologna. I still get hot pepper in my subs. My mother bought liverwurst for my father. He’d spread it on bread and add some onion. It looked awful so I never tried it. Much later in my life, I tried and love pâté so I gave liverwurst another chance figuring the two were distant cousins. I liked it.

When I was a freshman in college, a good friend was from an Italian family, and I used to go home with her for weekends. For spaghetti, her mother made gravy instead of sauce, and her meatballs were the stuff of dreams. My friend’s father was a butcher, and he brought home sandwich meats I’d never heard of before. They were all foreign and exotic. I ate mortadella, capicola, both regular and hot, soppressata, proscuitto and finocchiona. Even the cheese was exotic, the provolone and the mozzarella. The bread came in loaves which had to be cut. For dessert we had Italian cookies and pastries. I felt like an exchange student.

My friend left school, and the family also moved so I lost track. I wish I could thank them. They made me a fearless eater of the unknown.

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“When I was a boy, just about every summer we’d take a vacation. And you know, in 18 years, we never had fun.”

July 24, 2010

Lots of rain last night, and it’s still a damp day with a sky full of clouds, but it seems to be getting lighter so I think the sun will be making an appearance shortly. The weatherman says thundershowers tonight and maybe tomorrow. For the first time in a long while, I stayed inside to read the papers. Everything outside was still too wet. I missed the companionship of my birds, the sound of the fountain and the rustle of the leaves.

I got a chuckle from the paper this morning, a few chuckles actually, but a picture’s caption gave me the biggest laugh. The picture showed a street in downtown Pittsfield with two bicyclists riding on the sidewalk. The caption said, “Pedestrians biked down the revitalized North Street.”

My dance card is empty this weekend except for tonight’s deck movie so I’m hoping those showers will come late. On cloudy days like today I stay home and let the tourists have the roads. This is changeover week in the cottages so the mid-cape will be busy, coming and going.

When I was a kid, I don’t ever remember going to the cape for vacation. If we went away, we went north, usually to Maine where the water was far too cold to enjoy. My father’s friend had a cottage in Ogunquit, and that’s where we generally went. As I got older, into my teens, the last place I wanted to be was on a family vacation. I begged and pleaded to stay with friends at home, but I never won that argument; instead, I was crammed in a car filled with six people, bags of food and a few pieces of luggage which didn’t fit into the trunk. The car was stifling, and I sometimes got car sick. Add my annoyance to all that, and you can imagine how pleasant I was.

The last trip we made as a whole family was to Niagara Falls. It was my favorite of all the trips we ever made. It was during the summer I turned fifteen. We left for the falls after a weekend in Ogunquit. We saw so much on that trip even I wasn’t bored. I remember staying in a motel for the first time, skipping stones on Lake Ontario, the wonder of  the Eisenhower Locks, crossing into another country, the falls under the lights at night and my father talking to the wax cashier at Madame Tussauds. One of my memory drawers keeps that trip close, and I get to go back every now and then.

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“Be grateful for luck. Pay the thunder no mind – listen to the birds. And don’t hate nobody.”

July 23, 2010

Yesterday was a wonderful day, sunny, dry and breezy. Today is back to that ugly humidity, but the paper claims we’ll be dry by Monday. A cold front is on the way. Thunder showers are a possibility tonight and tomorrow. I hope so.

The addition to my deck is finished. Without furniture, it looks like a bit like a dance floor. I’m going out today for a few planters and to start checking out furniture. That end of the deck will the living room.

This morning has been a delight. I got up early, grabbed the papers, made coffee and sat outside. In between the papers, I filled my new hummingbird feeders. I have this one hummingbird that drops by periodically and tries to get nectar from my tulip solar light. I felt bad for the bird so I bought a small feeder for the planter where the light is and a larger feeder for the trees. I also filled the oriole feeder with grape jelly. Finally, I cleaned and filled the bird bath. I then had another cup of coffee, read the Cape Times, did all the puzzles and sat for a bit watching the birds. The crow was here as it is every day. It always sits on a huge branch not so far from me. I like to watch it even though it does nothing. It is a beautiful bird. Finally, I took my outside shower then came inside to the computer.

The best of all days doesn’t need to be much. I think it just needs to leave me contented, happy with my world. I seem to have a lot of those days. I think myself quite lucky.

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“To me, travel is a triple delight: anticipation, performance and recollection.”

July 22, 2010

It seemed odd yesterday to be out and about by ten as that’s when I usually start to sit and ponder; instead, I was shopping for ingredients for the appetizers I was bringing to dinner. I made muhammara which I hadn’t made all summer. It’s a crowd favorite. I also made a spinach dip and carved a sandal out of bread to hold it. My sandal was a bit off center but still impressive.

Did I mention my guilt?

Today is perfectly lovely. The humidity is on hiatus, and the weather report says 60’s for tonight. I need to do a few errands then I’m going on the deck with a drink, my book and the phone. I always carry the phone with me now since I got locked out.

Last night was my Wednesday play, and I didn’t get home until close to 11:30. There was e-mail to check and a book to finish so I was up until nearly 2. Good thing as it started to rain around 12:30, and I would have missed it.

When I traveled during my twenties, I backpacked. Europe was filled with backpackers just like me. We all carried pages from Let’s Go Europe, and we stayed at the same cheap places, mostly hostels, but sometimes we slept on night trains, boats or buses. We carried cheese, bread, jam and peanut butter for those meals on the go. If we ate in a restaurant, it offered cheap and plentiful food. Wherever we stayed, we traded books we’d finished and got information about the next legs of our journeys. Because we were sharing an adventure, an expedition, it was like we had been friends for years rather than having just met over breakfast that morning in the common room. I wore clothes far too long between washings, but I didn’t really care. My money had to last the five or six weeks I was on the road, and it was better spent getting from here to there.

In my thirties, I gave up my backpack. I stayed in hotels instead of hostels. My traveling time was limited to a week or two at most so I always chose one country or one city for the entire trip. Most times I rented a car though there were a few boat and ride rides, in the daytime. I still brought pages from Let’s Go, but I added Frommer and a few others to the options. I stopped having to share a shower room, and my clothes were mostly clean. I never had to wash a single pair of underwear again.

My traveling has been about the same since then. I spend a couple of weeks in a single country and do all sorts of research before I go. I love the internet. I never stay anywhere grand, but I do treat myself well.

The flight to Ghana will take forever so I am thinking of flying first class, might as well be comfortable. I have come a long way from my backpacking days.

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“Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in.”

July 20, 2010

Yesterday, in the early afternoon, thunder and lightning arrived with great fanfare and brought along a tremendous storm. Huge drops came first followed by steadily falling smaller drops which stayed around all afternoon. I took a nap on the couch and fell asleep to the sound of the rain. Today is sunny and still humid. It’s sweat weather.

Whether we like it or not, the clock rules our lives. We go to work, get up, eat and sleep around the same times every day. Buses go and the train starts down the track. Only planes are iffy when it comes to schedules. At school, the bells ring and everyone moves. I, however, don’t wear a watch, haven’t for a long time. If I have to be somewhere, I leave in time to get there, and I’m always punctual. I think tardy people are boorish. I’m not talking the once in a while you couldn’t help it late but lateness as a personality trait. When I ran meetings, I started on time regardless of how many people were missing. The punctual should never be punished for the impolite. I had a friend who was never on time. She drove me crazy. I learned to start without her. She usually missed the appetizers. I won’t get started on doctors and dentists. I think most of them should be publicly flogged.

In Ghana there was Ghanaian time and European time, and it didn’t take long to figure out the difference. Ghanaian time was whenever. Lorries left when they were filled. Waiting a few hours for one to fill was common so I learned patience. A party started two hours or more later than the invitation. To come on time was to arrive far too early. Classes did start on time, and bells still ruled because there was no way around it, but school was about the only place driven by time. I had most of my clothes made by a local seamstress. She was as consistent as a Chinese restaurant where every take out order is ready in twenty minutes. She always said two days. I usually went back day three and she’d still say tomorrow.

I learned to live by Ghanaian time, even came to like it. There was never much hurry. Things got done when they got done, and that was enough. Lately I’ve found myself moving more and more toward Ghanaian time. I do what I want when I want. Things’ll get done sometime, and that’s beginning to be enough for me.

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“No, now go away or I shall taunt you a second time.”

July 19, 2010

The weather is going to be the same all week, the same as it was last week. The paper did say chance of thundershowers this afternoon and evening, and I’m hoping it happens. My world is brown from lack of rain, and I love a thunderstorm. Last night I showered about eight then went right to my air-conditioned bedroom to read. I was reminded of Ghana. I’d take my cold shower, jump into my robe to walk across the back courtyard to my house then go right to bed, still wet from the shower. The air drying would keep me cool enough to fall asleep.

I have such an itch to go somewhere. The other day I went to a few sites and plugged in destinations hoping to find an inexpensive airfare. All the places I investigated were new to me, that was the only rule. I’m still on the hunt. Ghana will be some time next year, but I don’t know when yet. I’m waiting to hear if there will be festivities celebrating 50 years of Peace Corps in Ghana. I’m going regardless, but I’d like my trip to coincide if there are any planned.

When we were kids, we laughed at the grossest stuff and told horrid jokes. If someone got sick, it was fodder for endless jibes. I remember there was a  Helen Keller joke phase and the punch lines would send us into peals of laughter. We weren’t cruel. We were just kids.

Telling someone they had cooties was about the worst. None of us knew exactly what a cootie was, but we knew we never wanted any. I remember making a cootie catcher and holding it near kids and saying, “I got one; I got one.” That always got me chased.

We never swore at each other back then, but we named called. I remember the universal answer was always, “Sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me.” They actually did, but in no way would we let that one out. The last thing any kid wanted to be was a target, even for a little while.

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“When ambition ends, happiness begins.”

July 18, 2010

The weather is the same. The deck has a breeze, but it’s still hot. I want to drink icy cold liquids and stand in front of the air conditioner. Winter is never when you want it.

Movie night was great. We saw part 1 of Gene Autry in The Phantom Empire, and it really was a cliffhanger. Our heroes were plunging off the side of a cliff after the rope to which they clung had split in half. I hope they’ll survive. The main feature was Casablanca. I hadn’t seen it in a while, and I loved watching it again. It’s on of my favorite movies.

Today is a retro Sunday, like the leisurely Sundays I remember as a kid. We sometimes went to the beach all day and other times we did absolutely nothing. The big family dinner was never a summer event so we were free in the afternoon, not expected at the table. When I was really young, I just hung around. Nothing was open on a Sunday, and I used to moan because there was nothing to do. When I got older, my friends and I would take off for the day. Usually we had no destination in mind. It was the driving around which was the attraction. Funny, but I still do that only I’m not checking out the boys in the next car or the ones hanging around Carroll’s, the local hamburger joint. I’m just riding for the fun of the ride.

I took my time reading the papers this morning, watched the crow for a while, the one that comes every day, then sat on the deck looking around and doing nothing. Later I’m going to sit in front of the fan while watching the Red Sox. I have no ambition at all, and I don’t think it’s a bad thing.

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