Posted tagged ‘cape cod’

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“If it could only be like this always – always summer, always alone, the fruit always ripe…”

June 30, 2012

Today will be warm, 85˚ warm. Right now, though, the house is still morning cool, especially this room. The dog is sleeping in her crate. I can hear her snoring. She and I both slept in this morning. Last night I was up until after 2am watching the Red Sox playing Seattle first then some really bad movies. My taste definitely changes when the choices are so few. I’ll tolerate almost anything to pass the time until the Sandman comes.

My acorn squash has flowers, and I have already eaten some of my tomatoes. I figure my first year with a vegetable garden is a success. Not only that, it’s been fun watching everything grow. Today I’ll have my cherry tomatoes in a small salad. The first tomato got popped right into my mouth. It was wonderful!

Today is quiet. Usually on a Saturday I can hear people’s voices and lawnmowers and the occasional car going down the road. I don’t know where everybody is, but I’ll take the quiet. I have  new book called The Leftovers which is calling for me. I figure a cold ice tea, the book and some cheese and crackers will be terrific on the deck later.

Fall is my favorite season here on the cape, but summer is a close second. It is when spend my days outside, even to taking an outdoor shower. I grill my dinner. We have movies on the deck. Some afternoons I fight Gracie for the lounge and I take a nap. The nights are filled with the wonder of fireflies flitting around the trees and the mornings are bird songs. Even the sounds of lawnmowers are welcome.

Sometimes I look at the cape as if I were on vacation. I drive on all the scenic roads and along the shore. I visit shops instead of stores. Sometimes I stop for lunch and have clams or shrimp and French fries as take-out. Every now and then I eat at A&W Root Beer and always have hot dogs. A sunny day is the best time for meandering. Everyone else is at the beach. The roads are mine. The last time I roamed I went all the way to Wellfleet. I took Route 28 down and Route 6A back. Before I went home, I stopped for an ice cream cone. It was a perfect day.

Categories: Musings
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Comments: 18 Comments

“Books are a uniquely portable magic.”

June 14, 2012

Yesterday it rained all day, and the rain left today cloudy, damp and generally miserable. It’s chilly at 60° and the dampness makes it feel even colder.  I’m wearing a sweatshirt and just closed the window I had opened earlier. No more flip-flops around the house-today it’s slippers.

The bear is gone. He was seen running around P-Town parking lots, and people were out trying to find him to take pictures so wildlife officials let it be known that they had chosen to relocate the bear so he could find himself a mate, and they wanted updates as to where he was. The bear was found, successfully tranquilized, tagged and taken to the western part of the state where we can all hope he is wooing some fair female black bear. Now we have another creature to watch. A Beluga whale, usually found in Arctic waters, has been spotted off Cape Cod. It is white which makes it an adult. The whale has been seen twice. P-Town is the summer vacation spot for right whales so maybe the Beluga read a brochure and decided to give the cape a try.

Rainy days make me want to be cozy reading a good book under an afghan. That started when I was a kid. I’d have to walk home from school in the rain, whether it was misty or torrential. I’d get soaked. My shoes got so wet that sometimes the water bubbled out the sides and my socks got so drenched I’d make footprints across the floor. My mother would grab my uniform skirt and hang it up to dry as I only had the one. That ugly western type tie we had to wear she wrapped in a towel to dry. The blouse went in the laundry. Even though it was afternoon, I’d put on my pajamas, the coziest clothes I had, as I knew I wouldn’t be going out to play and then I’d read away the afternoon. I think those were my favorite days. The darkness of my room lit only by the bed-lamp made me feel safe somehow, wrapped by my house as if it had arms. I’d be drawn into my book by familiar characters I had come to love like Nancy Drew or Trixie Belden. I never heard anyone in the rest of the house. It always seemed as if I were alone, never scared, just content.

I have one quick errand today then I’m going to change into cozy clothes, lie on the couch under an afghan and read. I can hardly wait!

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“Strange to see how a good dinner and feasting reconciles everybody.”

June 3, 2012

Yesterday it rained. Last night it poured and left today cloudy and damp. The weatherman says it will get sunny, but I am skeptical. Right now I’m watching and have been watching the flotilla down the Thames. It is is the largest flotilla since 1662 and the reign of King Charles II and is spectacular! The Royal Barge looks gorgeous with its gold front and red on the rest of the barge, flags waving all along the front and sides, green fir garlands filled with red flowers draped along the sides and flowers in the middle just back of where the Queen is standing. The Havengore with Prince Andrew just floated by the BBC camera. It is cold and rainy in London, much like the weather here. The Queen has been plucky  standing the whole time giving the Queenly wave.

My friends arrived yesterday and I took them on some of my favorite rides, ones Maggie and I used to take. We went all the way down to Chatham light then back partly on Route 28 and partly on back roads. Last night we had dinner at the Brewster Fish House, and it was fantastic. Both John and Michelle loved the small restaurant and their dinners. This morning we went to my usual spot for breakfast, and it reminded them of their Saturday breakfast spot. They’ll be back later to help with preparing dinner. Birgit asked for the curry recipe so I posted it in comments under yesterday’s blog if you’d like it.

I used to invite friends over for dinner more often than I do now. Usually I’d cook something I’d never made before or a favorite like the curry. It is always fun making and trying new dishes, and I’ve been lucky that most have been a success. All but one of my friends are willing dinner companions who will try everything. They may not like everything, but they dismiss nothing without a taste. I appreciate their daring especially after I’ve cooked all day.

Sorry to cut this short today, but I’m going to watch the pageantry for a bit then I have to make the appetizers and start dinner. Have a wonderful Sunday!

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“I confess freely to you, I could never look long upon a monkey, without very mortifying reflections”

May 31, 2012

Today is a lovely day with sun, a breeze and blue skies. Gracie is out on the lounge having her morning nap in the shade of the oak tree. Dogs do know how best to enjoy themselves.

Today I have a few errands then I can sit back down and read. My newest read is Defending Jacob.

On the bear front: he is now in Dennis. The black bear was sighted near the Dennis golf course yesterday and according to all reports is still on the move. The sightings are very early morning and at night. Fish and Wildlife as well as the local police have the bear’s best interests at heart and are hoping to keep him safe. If there are problems, he will be moved but only as a last resort. The bear has a twitter account if you want to keep tabs: The Cape Cod Bear or @bearswimmer.

When I was a kid, I never saw much wildlife in the local woods. Maybe a skunk or two came our way but that was about it. Here on the Cape, besides the common skunks, opossums and raccoons, I’ve seen foxes and coyotes, and wild turkeys are now pretty common. One night a deer ran across the street in front of my car a couple of blocks from here and another hit the car while we were driving on the highway. White-tailed rabbits sit in my front yard and drive Gracie crazy. They just stare and she tries to jump the fence.

I remember seeing my first elephant at Benson’s Wild Animal Farm in New Hampshire. We even got to ride on it. I know I told these Benson stories a long time back, but I enjoy them so much they’re worth a second time. My parents told me that on one visit the crowd was around the baboon cage, and they were roaring with laughter when they got sprayed by the baboon. My father said he and my mother watched a while and saw the baboon urinate then fill his mouth and spray the crowd who again roared with laughter. My parents did too but for a different reason.

My favorite incident I remember perfectly well. We were at the round monkey cage, and my brother who was probably 3 or 4 ducked under the rail and got right beside the cage. A monkey grabbed his arm and tried to pull him inside. I believed back then when I was the tender age of 4 or 5 that the monkey had recognized lost kin. My brother screamed until my father yanked his arm away from the monkey who was dearly hoping to add to her family. If I close my eyes, I can see the cage, the monkey and my brother wearing shorts and a striped shirt and being pulled so that his body was flush with the cage. I lived with making fun of him for years on that one incident. It was like a gift wrapped in bright paper and flowing ribbons.

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“Titles are but nicknames, and every nickname is a title.”

April 30, 2012

It’s a typical Cape Cod spring day at 50°, and I doubt it will get much warmer. It’s a pretty day with lots of sun and only a slight breeze. I slept in this morning which always makes me wonder if my neighbors think I’m lying unconscious on the floor as the paper is still in the driveway at ten o’clock. Even Gracie and Fern didn’t stir until I did and both are having their morning naps right now.

When I worked, I was up at 5 or 5:15 at the latest. My paper was seldom in the drive-way that early so I used to drink my coffee, read or watch the morning news. I’d get dressed at 6 and leave by 6:20 for my ten minute ride to work. The paper was usually delivered by then, and I’d throw it in the car to read when I got home which was usually around 4 o’clock. After thirty-three years of that, I earned sleeping-in.

A rooster was my alarm clock in Ghana. I never needed a real alarm. I went to bed early and woke up early. I had no newspaper to read so I’d sit on my front porch, drink my coffee and watch the small boys and girls walk by my house to their primary school just outside the front gate of my school. They’d stop to greet me. I was always sir, “Good morning, sir. How are you, sir?” The smallest of them were just learning English, and I figured sir was part of their dialogues. Madam would come later as that was what I was called in Ghana, Madam Ryan.

My titles have morphed over time. In Ghana, I was madam even to the women working in the market though sometimes a seller called me miss to draw my attention to her wares. “Miss, Miss,” I’d hear shouted at me as I walked by the stalls. When I got home and started teaching here, it was Miss Ryan to my students. As times changed so did my title. I became Ms. Ryan, but the miss was still around and used mostly by salespeople who didn’t know my name, “Thank you, miss.” they’d say as they handed me my bag. Now I am ma’am which is the shortened version of madam. It seems I have come full circle.

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“Travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on, deep and permanent, in the ideas of living.”

April 21, 2012

The day is cloudy and damp. It must have rained a bit during the night as the ground is wet, and there are now Gracie paw prints all the way down my floor from door to den. Usually my cleaning compulsion kicks in, but I’d be cleaning over and over, each time she comes in, so I’ll be patient and live with the muddy prints.

Once in a while I think about how much fun my life has been. I think it all comes from being a dreamer. When I was a kid, I dreamed about all those places in my geography book, and I promised myself I’d visit them some day. My Dad had been to Europe but that was compliments of Uncle Sam and WWII, and his memories centered around the pubs near his hospital in England. My neighbors went to Martha’s Vineyard every year for the whole summer, and I thought that was so exotic, to stay on an island. Marty Barrett, my elementary school classmate, went to England every few years to visit his grandparents, and I envied him, but I knew, without question, my time would come.

My first airplane ride was when I was a freshman in college, and I flew from Boston to Hyannis, an Easter gift from my parents. The plane was a small prop, and I could see landmarks from the window. My eyes followed the highway as we flew close to the land but over the ocean. I watched waves crash against the beach sand and saw the canal as we crossed to the cape. Before we landed, the plane circled a bit and I saw the parking lots in Hyannis and recognized the stores. When I landed, my dad was waiting for me and right away wanted to know how I liked the flight. I think I gushed, and I am not a gusher by any stretch of the imagination. The trip was almost magical for me. I was hooked, and I knew it. That was the beginning.

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“Clothes are inevitable. They are nothing less than the furniture of the mind made visible.”

April 3, 2012

Today is a perfect spring day on Cape Cod: a bright sun, a deep blue sky and a bit of a chill in the air. My grass is turning green. The forsythia has yellow flowers as bright as the sun. The springs bulbs have all bloomed, and the green tips of flowers are appearing in the front garden. The male goldfinches are almost brilliant yellow. All of the signs say spring.

Even when I was a kid, I didn’t love pouffy dresses for Easter. I remember one year I had my mother buy me a Lois Lane sort of suit. At my grandmother’s I overheard my mother tell my aunt that’s what I wanted when my aunt questioned my choice of an Easter outfit. My sisters and my cousins were bright in pastels with pouff, and I guess I seemed out-of-place.

When I worked, I wore dresses and skirts every day. One time at lunch in the cafeteria, a student came up to me and said she wanted to wear clothes like mine when she grew up. I was thrilled by her compliment. Most of my clothes back then came from small shops which sold dresses from Mexico and India and countries with similar styles. Afer I retired, I seldom visited those shops as I didn’t often have an occasion to wear a dress, but I did buy a new one for a wedding last October. The dress had the same look as back when especially when I added Ghanaian beads and matching earrings.

The clothes I wore in Ghana, always dresses, were mostly made in Ghana. The cloth was beautiful and the colors amazing. I’d sometimes have a dress made with elaborate stitching around the neck called jeremy in those days. Tie-dye was another one of my favorite cloths for a dress. The patterns were intricate with stripes or squares or dots and back then the die was natural. I also had dresses made from batik., and I still have batik I brought back forty years ago.

For Easter this year, I’m wearing the dress I bought for the wedding. It’s a green color which reminds me of spring. I’ll wear the necklace and earrings. I think together, the dress and jewelry, are  smashing!

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“The earth neither grows old or wears out if it is dunged.”

March 22, 2012

Yesterday was summer. It was a sandals and short-sleeve day. I had my bedroom window open and woke up to the sounds of leaf blowers. I could hear people talking and birds singing to the morning. The silence and sense of isolation which winter always brings is gone, at least for now. Today is supposed to be just like yesterday, but the weatherman says the temperature will plummet this weekend. The forecast in today’s local paper for the weekend predicts nights in the 30’s and days in the high 40’s, typical weather for spring on Cape Cod, but we have been spoiled.

I ordered flowers from a catalog yesterday. They’ll be here at planting time for my weather zone. They are flowers I would never have thought of buying except my friend Christer had given me a list, and that’s what I used. He knows flowers and plants, and the pictures on his blog of everything he finds on his walks and what he has planted in his garden always makes me a bit jealous. I was proud of my front garden last year though I knew only the names of a couple of the flowers. That won’t change. Flowers are defined by color for me.

I am going to have a vegetable garden this year. I’ve had an herb garden for years, but I thought I’d branch out, so to speak. I’ve always thought just below the deck would be the perfect spot for a small garden. My landscaper is going to use railroad ties for the boundary and right now he is dumping loam which he’ll mix with cow manure. I’ll have tomatoes and one other vegetable. I thought about zucchini but planting it is akin to having a pair of  rabbits. Two rabbits quickly become many, and, like the rabbits,  zucchini seems to replicate itself. Anyone who grows it is always trying to give it away. Besides, the only way I like zucchini is in a sweet bread. The cooked vegetable always seems a bit boring to me.

Gracie has been out all morning, and I think it’s time to join her. It is amazing that this is the second deck day in a row!

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“Speed, it seems to me, provides the one genuinely modern pleasure.”

October 25, 2011

Rain is coming later in the week, but for now I get to enjoy the sunshine and the coolness of a beautiful fall day. We did get out for a bit yesterday, but I ran into friends whom I haven’t seen in ages, and we chatted for a long while so I didn’t get as far as I’d hoped. Today Gracie and I will go down Cape; yesterday we went up Cape. For those of you wondering what directions I’m describing down-Cape means toward P-Town and up-Cape means toward the bridge. If anyone asked me east or west, I’d be hard pressed to answer.

When I visit Colorado, I ask how far to get somewhere, and they always answer in miles. Here when asked the same question we answer in time. How far to Boston from the cape elicits the response of about an hour and fifteen minutes, but it could be longer depending upon the traffic. In Colorado they’d tell me about 72 miles.

When I traveled in Ghana, the distance was measured in kilometers. I had no idea how far away anything really was. My mind worked only in miles so I always had to convert kilometers to miles. I learned to multiply by .6 so I’d figure out how far away I was from my destination.

Ghana, like Massachusetts, is also a time place. I had no idea the actual distance between Accra and Bolgatanga, but I know it takes 16 hours by bus. I know because that’s what the Ghanaians told me when I asked how far between Bolga and Accra. Later I looked it up and found it was 810 kilometers which didn’t make sense until I figured out it was 486 miles. It may seem like it takes forever by bus, and it does.

Once, when my parents and I were in Germany, my inner race car driver came out while I was driving on the autobahn. There I was driving at 80 MPH and getting passed. I knew this was my opportunity to be Mario Andretti without risking a ticket so I drove between 90 to 100 but I still got passed. My mother commented we seem to be going really fast and kept looking at the speedometer. I told her it was in kilometers, a bold face lie with good intentions, and explained how to convert and I mentioned that we were being passed by other cars going much faster. That seemed to calm her, and I got to be Mario for just a little while.

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“Swinging on delicate hinges the Autumn Leaf Almost off the stem”

October 24, 2011

The morning has a crispness. The grass was wet when I went to get the papers. Across the street, painters are working on my neighbors’ house trim. It’s sunny but not warm. It is, after all, fall.

The birds need feeding. I miss watching them from my window here in the den. Their latest seeds of choice have been a mixture of fruits and nuts, and I have only a small bit left. Tomorrow, at Agway’s, I’ll have to buy more and also another case of canned dog food. I might also mosey over to their garden section and buy some bulbs. Last year the spawns of Satan found many of my new ones in less than a day. My garden was pockmarked with holes. It looked a bit like the lunar surface.

A former students is coming to visit from Thursday through Tuesday. She has been in Cincinnati with her daughter so we missed each other in Bolga. Her name is Francisca Issaka, and she was one of my favorite students. She and Francisca Ateere, another favorite, often visited my house. I remember how much they laughed and how much they enjoyed life. Both of them were sixteen when I first met them. They were the students I told all about Halloween during one of their visits, and they remembered and came trick or treating. Francisca still remembers and said she wants to be at my house for Halloween. On Sunday she is cooking a Ghanaian meal for my friends and my nephews. We are not having bush meat or goat though I wouldn’t mind either. My sister was appalled that I eat goat. She talked about The Lonely Goat Herd and the Billy Goats Gruff. I didn’t think about it, but I should have reminded her about Ferdinand the Bull.

Today I have one errand then Gracie and I are going roaming. I’m taking my camera as it has been a long while since I’ve snapped pictures of the cape, and I think it is especially pretty this time of year. I never really noticed the fall changes until my first year home from Africa. I always thought the cape this time of year was a bit dull compared to the rest of the state as there are so many pine trees which just stay green. I was wrong. The marshes turn a beautiful red, and up and down Route 6A towering, long standing trees turn a different color red than the marshes, and here and there are spots of yellow. The bogs are flooded to spare them the worst of winter. Bushes are bright with color and stand in contrast to their old white houses. The cape is an amazing place in the fall.

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