Willie. Weed. Luck.

A radiant Willie Nelson beams through a veil of marijuana smoke on the cover of Rolling Stone. It’s May, 2019 and he’s eighty-six years old. The photo was taken March 15th, one day after Willie rocked Texas Hill Country at an exclusive, intimate music festival he hosts known as Luck Reunion. Some critics said Willie’s performance this year at Luck was his best in the eight years since the festival began. He still tours, too. How does Willie do it? He gives a lot of credit to weed. He also notes that loving well and working hard continue to keep him in the game. And, there’s this: Like me, Willie is a self-proclaimed sentimental and nostalgic sap.

I know all of this because recently I became a little obsessed with Willie Nelson. First of all, his music has always been a part of my life; everyone knows the man is a legendary American roots music outlaw. (He’s also an American stoner outlaw; a country boy raised by his grandparents during the Great Depression who went on to became a longhair more apt to smoke a bong than drink a beer.) Second of all, several years ago Willie came into my life unexpectedly through the mail. Thirdly and best of all, this year Willie came into my life just in time to redirect a run of bad luck. The fact is, there isn’t anything more exciting than getting blindsided by luck. And when it comes to Luck, Texas style, Willie is the man.

The Luck Reunion Music Festival takes place at Willie’s own Luck Ranch in Spicewood, Texas just outside of Austin during the days of the SXSW Music Festival. Tickets are hard to come by and highly coveted. To keep things fair and prices right, Luck Reunion uses a system of four lucky draws. If your name comes up, you can buy two tickets. Only about 2,000 tickets are sold, so if you never win a draw, you are basically out of luck because the chances for scalping tickets are slim.

If you do get lucky and have a chance to make it through the gates at Luck for the festival, you’ll enjoy a full day of the best in American roots music on six stages, you’ll get all drinks on the house, you’ll find the best in local food creations and art, and, of course, you’ll get to hear a grand finale featuring Willie and his family band (yes, that includes his kids and Sister Bobbie) delivering one hit after another with all the feel-good fun you would expect from a successful, satisfied Texan. The entire scene won’t just get you high, it’ll get you feeling sentimental and nostalgic, too. Turns out, science is beginning to extol the benefits of healthy doses of weed, sentimentalism, and nostalgia. But the funny thing is, if anyone has become the unexpected poster child for the joys of weed and faith and fun and luck, it has to be Willie Nelson.

* * * * *

I first heard about Willie Nelson’s Luck Reunion in late February of this year at the same time a long run of personal bad luck seemed to be gaining steam instead of puttering out. My new year, from the get-go, had been defined by bad news: The diagnosis of a serious, painful, chronic illness (son), two consecutive, compromising injuries (husband), life-goal roadblocks (daughter), and serious injury (sister). The crappy blends of bad luck not only cancelled (at the last minute) our traditional family trip and our yearly skiing adventures, but it also snuffed out a few dreams, flooded the worry chambers of my racing brain, and just plain bummed me out.

So after groveling through the early months of 2019 like a timid mouse without a Pixar contract, it finally happened. Luck came my way and when it did, I found myself taking a second look at a misfit guitar hanging on my wall. The one everyone makes fun of. The one that arrived in the mail, from across the country, in a flimsy, torn-up cardboard box. Somehow, the guitar escaped harm. It was more ornamental than instrumental, nevertheless I hung it up on the wall next to other guitars that are played all the time. Why did I hang the guitar up? For two reasons. One: The guitar was purchased at a charitable auction by my brother in a spirit of generosity. Not one to collect things, nor own much of anything, he sent the guitar to me because my husband, my son, and my daughter are all musicians and he thought we might like it. Two: The guitar was signed by Willie Nelson. Yes, of course there are thousands of charitable guitars signed by Willie Nelson; so it isn’t a rare thing to own. But Willie Nelson, himself, is a rare thing. He’s that rare human being who overcomes adversity, isn’t afraid to be an outlaw for art and activism, and doesn’t focus on bitterness, self pity, or despair in spite of running into (and through) more heart shredding episodes of bad behavior and bad luck than anyone deserves. He’s also open minded. Willie Nelson is eager to reconsider long-held positions and take a look at situations from different, often better, perspectives.

Could it be? That the guitar on my wall was a good luck charm? Some kind of fate-filled talisman just hanging around in my home waiting for the right time to make me kick up my heels when all I wanted to do was sit on my butt and stare out the window? Because something kind of cool happened in February when I was sitting on my butt staring out a window on a wall just opposite Willie Nelson’s guitar. My son, the professional musician and an outlaw since long before he was born, called. “Hi Mom.” He said. “I’m playing drums with Lola Kirke at SXSW in Austin. We have two shows. We’ve also been invited to play at Willie Nelson’s Luck Reunion.”

My son.

Performing music as part of a day of peace and love at Willie Nelson’s ranch.

In Texas.

Where Willie Nelson would be performing, too.

I let those thoughts sink in for about a second before I bolted for my computer and looked up how to get tickets. No go. I’d missed all four rounds of the lucky draw. It was enough that I wanted to see my son perform, but then I discovered that the lineup included Mavis Staples. Mavis effing Staples. My heart beat faster. Both Willie Nelson and Mavis Staples are heroic outliers in the realms of American music and American activism. They’d been through a lot. Mavis marched from Montgomery to Selma. I wanted to go to Luck, Texas and get some inspiration from that kind of living history. I had to get to Luck, Texas. Spooky, but true: our family trip, which had been cancelled due to illness and injury, was to have been an excursion to Big Bend National Park near the Rio Grande in Texas…

I stared up at that Willie Nelson guitar hanging on my wall again…

It’s impossible to express the feelings of excitement that kept washing over me as I realized my son would be a part of a peaceful celebration of music and history and passion and art and food and drink hosted by Willie Nelson at one of Willie’s most beloved homes. The mission statement on the Luck Reunion website made every sentimental and nostalgic drop of sap running through my blood simmer with high hopes that luck would get me there: “…Luck Reunion is a movement dedicated to cultivating and spreading the culture of Luck, Texas and the evolution of our American roots. Our goal is to attract and celebrate musicians, artists, and chefs who, like the outlaws and outliers before them, follow their dreams without compromise. By collaborating with a group of creators who share our vision, we aim to celebrate the legacies still among us, while lifting up a crop of individuals who share a respect for those who blazed the trails before them. We are on a mission to cultivate the new while showing honor to influence. Join us in preserving the legacy of Luck, Texas.” (If this mission statement makes your heart flutter, go to the website and get on the mailing list for next year’s lucky draw.)

As February ended, and March began, I still hadn’t heard from my son about tickets to Luck Reunion. I considered writing a letter to Willie Nelson and pleading with him to let me in. I repeatedly checked the Internet for ticket options.

Nothing.

And then one Sunday night, three days before the 2019 Luck Reunion, I heard a twang near the Willie Nelson guitar hanging on the wall. It was my husband’s phone. I knew it had to be my son texting us. I closed my eyes, crossed my fingers, and hoped to fucking die…and go to Texas heaven.

The text: “I can get you in.”

My husband and I flew to our computers and booked flights, a car, and a little cabin near a lake. I bought Willie’s book, It’s a Long Story. My Life. I watched videos of Mavis Staples. We asked friends which acts they thought we should make sure to see. (All of them!) I pored over maps and decided we’d stay near Austin for the music, then spend time touring through the wildflowers of Texas Hill Country and the history and riverwalk festivities of San Antonio, then return to Austin and fly home. It would be a pilgrimage; because when it comes to religion, I believe in good luck and bad luck. I also believe in the laws of physics. Good luck has to follow bad luck, eventually.

As fast as I could (the trip was only a few days away), I scrambled to pack my things and button up our house and affairs so I’d have some time to start dreaming about sitting with a heaping plate of smokey Texas barbecue and a tall glass of crispy American beer. I sighed just thinking about my clothes getting drenched in the sweet, smokey scent of Big Texas Dreams. If bad luck had taken away hikes with my family in Big Bend and skiing powder in the Canadian Rockies with my true love, you can bet your country-girl boots I sure as hell would take the trade of listening to live music while strolling the dusty lanes of Luck, Texas where Willie Nelson holds his unique party in the ruins of an old west town he built to film one of his movies, “The Red Headed Stranger.” (He nurtures rescued wild horses on his ranch, too!) Furthermore, my son was scheduled to play with Lola Kirke in the Chapel. I love chapels. What could be better than a chapel where the altar is a stage for music? At Luck, the chapel is one of the most intimate stages with great sound. The lineup at The Chapel was superb. In fact, the lineup at the entire festival kept my stomach filled with butterflies. After being down on my luck for so long, I couldn’t wait to lift our spirits in Texas Hill Country.

And so we did. We started out on Rainey Street in Austin, fully energized by SXSW revelers. To our great joy, we found a Oaxacan restaurant down the street from the club where my son was booked to play with Lola Kirke. What a blast.

The next day was Luck Reunion. We didn’t know the details of how we would get into the festival, so we lined up with everyone else, living on a prayer, hoping our names were on a guest list. Eventually, the nerves were too much for me. I held our place in line and my husband went looking for some information. When he returned, he brought two, sparkling VIP passes for the parents (us, of course) of one of New York City’s most dedicated outlaw musicians.

The wows kept coming all day. Fabulous details like fresh flowers on tables and elaborate shrines to the departed souls in American music enhanced the feeling of “being a part of the Luck family.” Hearing and watching as many outstanding musical performances as we could, made us feel so fortunate. In fact, we didn’t stick our VIP passes onto our clothes. We kept them carefully protected inside our pockets. One can never have too many lucky charms.

As for inspiration, it was everywhere. When Mavis Staples took the stage—a stage dedicated to female artists—nostalgia flooded forth. She started with “Slippery People” by the Talking Heads. She belted out “Freedom Highway,” the first protest song her father wrote at the time of the tragic case of Emmett Till and just as the famed Staple Singers were joining Martin Luther King’s fight for civil rights in America. She finished with a fresh performance of “The Weight,” inviting the female performers at Luck on stage to join in. Here’s a fun fact: The iconic version of “The Weight” performed by The Band…for the Last Waltz film…the one with those soulful gospel voices… features The Staple Singers. Pops sings a lead and so does Mavis. Pull it up on the Internet and give it a listen. (That injection of nostalgia? Those chills? It’s all good for you.)

Mavis Staples hasn’t let a bit of her soul wilt. She still believes in the power of music and she still believes in her ability to lead the people forward through her art. She’s almost eighty-years old; totally blessed with superpowers. And how about the way “respect for those who blazed the trails before us” plays out among the up and coming crop of new musicians invited to Luck? My son drummed out Lola Kirke’s new rendition of Rick Danko’s “Sip the Wine” at Luck.

Before Willie Nelson took the stage, my son herded us into the VIP area for something to eat. He showed up with a barbecued (or maybe it was roasted?) alligator head. I hesitated. “Mom.” He said. “Peel away a piece of meat and try it. Don’t you want to say you ate alligator head at Willie Nelson’s ranch?” Like a lot of strange meats, it tasted a little bit like chicken. Then my son said, “I just found out we’re going to be playing at Bonnaroo.” As if the day didn’t already have enough excitement to it.

Willie and his family band took the stage at about 11 PM. It was an epic concert under the party lights of one man’s grand Texas dreams. Willie played hit after hit; every song a crowd pleaser. How the heck does he do it? As he writes in his book, he is a sentimental man. And, like I said earlier, science claims there’s something to be said about the benefits of allowing sappy vulnerability to soothe your soul. Willie writes: “My eyes are closed, my prayers are aimed towards the heavens, but in my gut, I don’t feel worthy of so much good fortune. I sing okay, I play okay, and I know I can write a good song, but I still feel like I’ve been given a whole lot more than I deserve…The fuel is love—love of people, places, animals, plants, water. Love of sound, love of space, love of fireflies and star-filled skies. Love of life. Love of home.”

Seems so simple to believe in love. But it’s not. More Willie: “I’d had my share of low moments, but I was learning that there’s always something you can do. You can train your mind to look up, not down and not back.” But then again: “I try to live in the present tense, but I’m always aware of the power of my past.” If you read Willie’s book, keep a computer handy for the interactive experience of listening in on the extensive varieties of music he’s studied and performed both on his own and with a thrilling collection of the world’s greatest musical artists.

Hope to see you at Luck Reunion next year!

Whiskey river, take my mind

Don’t let her memory torture me

Whiskey river, don’t run dry

You’re all I got, take care of me

The Chapel at Luck.

20190314_130627

Lola Kirke and band in The Chapel at Luck.

My son and his friend Lola Kirke after their gig in Austin at the SXSW Music Festival.

20190314_152710

All performers are presented with an exclusive Luck Reunion ring and become a forever member of the Luck Reunion family.

Music is magic. It not only takes us back, but also leads us forward.

❤ Show Mercy to the Unlucky ❤

* * * * *

Enzo Ferraris Aren’t Just For Dudes.

Let’s go on a road trip with a Young Dude I used to know and become our 9-year-old selves. It’s May. Temperatures in New England are rising, so we’ll take the Enzo Ferrari out of storage.

Young Dude will be our driver; we are placing him in command of the super sexy cockpit. Our Enzo Ferrari is red. SO RED. (Believe it or not, Young Dude and his dad know the owner of this dream machine—one of only 400 to ever be created on Earth.)

Blessedly, it’s 2018 and roadways still exist for the classic pleasures of motorcar cruising. We won’t be alone on the roads because as soon as the fruit trees are blooming and the honeybees are zooming in the northeast—upsy daisy go the garage doors of car enthusiasts everywhere and from those protective chambers emerge some of springtime’s most beautiful babies—born when art, design, and beauty feathers a nest with power, speed, and technology.

Young Dude plans to catch frogs, turtles, and snakes along our routes. If we drive past rock shops he’ll pull over so we can all take a look, though we all prefer finding rocks and fossils on our own. As for snacks, we’ll be totally bummed if seasonal ice cream shops aren’t open yet.

Our driver Young Dude is an Uber Dreamster. He dreams all the time. He dreams unconsciously and deliberately and, some would say, irresponsibly. Young Dude is driven more by his dreams than his grades and it appears he is on track to flunk out of fourth-grade. If that happens, we are down with blasting into the sunrise with him. In fact, we’ve hatched a plan to drive our Enzo off the cliffs of Schafer Canyon Road in Canyonlands National Park, which would be more like a runway for the Enzo because everyone knows our Enzo can fly.

(Note to driving enthusiasts everywhere: Schafer Canyon Road in Canyonlands National Park in Moab, Utah is a still-surviving terrifying roadway. If you haven’t already done so, drive it before they pave it, put up guard rails, and install a toll booth. Our family did it in a big Yukon. A complete and memorable white-knuckle frightfest.)

* * * * * * * * *

After our road trip, Young Dude drives the Enzo Ferrari to school where he glides the work of art into a conspicuous parking place in the center of the playground.

He gets us to school just in time for English class.

The teacher hands out a writing assignment.

Ready? Remember, we are nine years old and we are trapped in the fourth grade.

Here’s the prompt: Write about a magic stone that when you skip it across a pond, it comes skipping back to you.

* * * * * * * * * *

Here’s Young Dude’s unedited story, penned when he really was nine years old (a long time ago) and he was my happily-obsessed-with-all-things-cars-trucks-planes-and-trains son.

Dude and the Awesome Pebble

Once in a strange time, there was a weird place called Dudeland. Everyone wore sunglasses, Hawaiian T’s, and shorts and greased back hair. And there was a curious little 9-year-old called Dude McDude. He loved Lamborghini’s and Porsche’s and Ferrari’s and any other kind of sports car. He had a friend called Dudical O’Dude. One of their favorite things to do was to swim and skip pebbles. So here is the radical story about Dude and the awesome pebble!

One day, Dude and Dudical went for a ride in Mr. McDude’s radical Baja Beast. They were headed for a lake in Lamborghini Land. After about fifty billion light years, they were at the stoked lake. They immediately put on their Hawaiian-designed swim shorts and jumped in to play a game of “Lamborghini Diablo.”

They saw all kinds of fish: the Dudefish, Dudish Idol, Picasso Dude, HammerDude Shark, AngelDude, and the Puffing Dudey.

When they were done swimming, they started to skip pebbles. Dude skipped two, then Dudical skipped two. Dude skipped his third. It did three skips—but then began to skip backwards! He pondered. Stumped, he put the stone in his pocket, walked up the sandy beach, and left.

That night, he remembered the stone. Did it really mean something? Yes! He knew it did! He pulled the pebble out of his pocket. Whoa! It was glowing silver in the shape of a Diablo SV! He passed out and fell asleep.

The following morning, he woke up and looked out the window. The sky was blue, the grass was green, the driveway was filled with Diablos…wha…Diablos?! He took the pebble out of his pocket again. But it was now glowing red in a Porsche shape! He looked out into the backyard and saw…Oh Boy…

* * * * * * * * *

Oh Boy is right.

My life as mom to a natural born automobile enthusiast has been enriched by my son’s quests for speed, gorgeous design, and history as told through the stories of people affected by similar, lifelong passionate pursuits. Therefore, last year my husband and I finally reserved a patch of lush green grass on the infield of the race track at Lime Rock Park in Connecticut for three days of camping with some of the most beautiful cars still being driven—physically and mentally—by Uber Dreamsters fast around a race track. We set up our gypsy glam wagon while our son set up a tent amid BMW’s, Porsches, and exotic British Sports Cars. It was Labor Day Weekend when Lime Rock Park hosts Historic Festival and although we’ve been going to Lime Rock Park since my son was a little boy, we’d never attended Historic Festival.

The festival is jammed with vintage car races, vintage race car and sports car parades, car auctions, and an event I recommend to all: Sunday in the Park—Concours d’Elegance and Gathering of the Marques. This is a special experience where more than 300 vintage automobiles along with their histories (as told by their devoted owners) are on display around the racetrack in a setting that becomes an interactive outdoor concert of story telling, wishing out loud, and gratitude—because it is always restorative to my soul to meet other people who are willing to share their passions. It is also always fascinating to have history revealed through the front windshields and rearview mirrors of vintage cars and the goggles of devoted drivers. It rained hard for Sunday in the Park so I couldn’t use my camera to photograph the magnificent motorcars. But I did take some random pics during racing events on the sunnier days of the weekend.

If you or someone you love is an automobile enthusiast, you will understand how much I have enjoyed my newfound car-influenced experiences, all of which enhanced my life when I had a boy who loved cars and, through his undying obsessions, inspired me to become a bit cuckoo for them too. (Full disclosure, Matchbox cars and Hotwheels were some of my favorite toys when I was a little girl.)

It is indeed finally springtime in the northeast. As I notice flowering trees and shrubs, I am also smiling at the blooming of pretty cars zipping around on the roadways. As I listen to the spring peepers and wood frogs, I am also tuning in to the wistful conversations of winter-weary folk dreaming up plans for summertime road trips with unknown destinations.

Yet I can’t help but sense that there are, in our super-speedy modern world, spring breezes blowing in new directions. I wonder…how many more seasons will we hear the rumbling engines of drivers venturing out and about for breathtaking exhilaration on the open road? Or the calm cruise of country drives? Or the excitement of life-changing road trips that puts them in the cockpit of a motorcar where they take control over journeys that don’t need predetermined finish lines?

It’s true, self-driving cars hum on our horizons, ready to transport lazy minds and worn-out souls to nowheres. All I can think is this: How could such a machine ever know that as soon as life says you need to put the brakes on those dreams, it’s time to step on the gas?

* * * * * * * * *

Labor Day Weekend Historic Festival.

Bucolic Lime Rock Park, Connecticut. Trackside camping.

Our campsite.

My son and I trackside.

In the evenings, we rode our bikes around the racetrack as the local fauna made brave crossings on the now-quiet track.

The legendary, super elite Enzo Ferrari.

In the evenings, after dinner, music other than the sounds of tuned engines by my son and his dad.

When my son was not yet 12 years old, everyone looked the other way at Lime Rock and allowed him to try Endurance Karting for the first time in a field of racers much older and more experienced. The race was faster and more serious than I thought it would be. The newbie racer finished fourth to his father’s and his father’s friend’s second-to-last and last place finishes. I was glad when that ended well.

For his 21st birthday, I made my son a monster truck cake. (Donuts for the wheels.) We gave him a day of racing instruction at Lime Rock Park with professional drivers. He had to get his car track ready and show up before the sun was up and the fog had lifted for inspection. Then, he spent the day alternating class room instruction with on-the-track fast and intensive racing. He had one spin out which probably scared only me. Curious, I asked his driver to take me as a passenger during one of the professionals only races. The ride, without a doubt, was the most terrifying experience I have ever had. I didn’t like it at all. Nevertheless, I gained awareness and appreciation for the focused mind and intensely-skilled reflexes of a race car driver and the unbelievable heat a race car’s tires produce after speeding around a track!

Ready to learn how to race.

Leading the pack.

Sun setting over Lime Rock Park. Another day with cars when all ended well.

Another experience of car racing lore which taught me respect for a race car driver’s necessary combinations of healthy body, healthy mind, speed, skill, and intelligence came my way on top of “America’s Mountain” in Colorado. Pike’s Peak is known for inspiring Katharine Lee Bates to write “America the Beautiful.” It is also where the Broadmoor Pikes Peak International Hill Climb (“Race to the Clouds”) takes place offering all drivers climbs to 14, 110′ in little over 12 miles with 156 serious curves. The tales of this race enticed me to ride bikes down the historic roadway with my husband. Even on a bike, the hairpin turns were nerve-wracking for me. I would love to watch someone drive a car up this road, fast. (The speeds at which they do it are beyond impressive.)

Electric race cars already conquer the Pike’s Peak International Hill Climb. The EV’s (Electric Vehicles) can make the climb without concern for the altitude changes, which had always been a factor throughout history due to the loss of power as internal combustion engines react to diminishing oxygen in higher altitudes. (I think. Or something like that.)

I gave my son’s first car, a Cozy Coupe, a new name for him: the Crazy Coupe. He could drive it without snow tires through New England’s most challenging snowstorms until spring.

* * * * * * * * *

Climate Change. Orgasms. Essential Sex.

A spring fever came over me. I slipped away and found myself surrounded by trees in an airship drifting under the command of its captain—Earth’s Climate. Horizon lines blurred behind a vibrant mist tinted ruby red. My neck extended. My head grew bigger and bigger. My eyes widened into bulging beads. Then, my airship wobbled and tipped. I fell out and landed in the canopy of a tree. Upon every branch, bouquets of mini red flowers unfurled.

It all happened after I decided to deactivate my brain and social habits from Facebook for a little while.

There were fucking flowers everywhere. Everywhere. Some of the flowers had male reproductive parts and some of the flowers flaunted female reproductive parts. The sexually active botanical doohickies came in one size: teensy.

I have a microscope. So I righted the airship, loaded it with some of the flowers, and brought them to my laboratory. There was no time to waste announcing these good vibrations of newfound joys on Facebook, or Twitter, or Instagram, or Snapchat.

Thank goodness, because springtime comes and goes before you know it—like all good orgasms. There was fucking flower power and fucking fast breeding going on in the trees and within the growing things hiding out in my favorite romantic forests and valleys and gardens. It was all happening without the use of nuclear power, batteries, engines, or viagra.

The red flowers casting a ruby mist over all of New England bloomed upon branches of the Swamp Maple—Acer rubrum—and an intense curiosity about the Acer rubrum launched my airship at the same time I deflated my social media networks. .

The facts were simply these: After years of partaking in a slow and awkward cruise on social media, my brain had regressed and atrophied. Even though I had tried to believe the hype that social media was the wave of the future and a necessary learned behavior for creating connections and essential networks—the truth is, (for some of us), social media can be as vast a colossal failure as pesticides and nuclear weapons and heroin.

I went to my laboratories and decided to start repairing my brain by encouraging it to re-build new networks and connections.

My laboratories are inside of this restored and renovated old barn (on the second floor) and outside of it too (gardens created and tended by me):

I surrounded myself with twigs, branches, buds, flowers, nuts, leaves, galls, bugs—all of it collected during regular walking treks or bike riding jaunts or dreamy meditative strolls through my gardens and through wildlife conservation land near home.

Studying the little flowers of a common maple tree tossed me into adventure-lands booby trapped with rabbit holes into which I fell. Disorientation and fascination ensued. During one morning’s tumbles, I underlined the following passages inside eight random books on my quest to find out how the Swamp Maple was invented, how it works to make more Swamp Maples, and how its LEAVES are capable of manufacturing oxygen for all living beings. (Without ever using batteries, engines, or viagra.)

Here are some written passages I underlined:

“This process is based on the “doctrine of uniformitarianism,” which states simply, “The present is the key to the past.”

“However, I have never clogged myself with the praises of pastoral life, not with nostalgia for an innocent past of perverted acts in pastures. No. One need never leave the confines of New York to get all the greenery one wishes—I can’t even enjoy a blade of grass unless I know there’s a subway handy, or a record store or some other sign that people do not totally regret life. It is more important to affirm the least sincere; the clouds get enough attention as it is and even they continue to pass. Do they know what they’re missing? Uh huh.”

“Follow your genius closely enough, and it will not fail to show you a fresh prospect every hour. Housework was a pleasant pastime. When my floor was dirty, I rose early, and, setting all my furniture out of doors on the grass, bed and bedstead making but one budget, dashed water on the floor, and sprinkled white sand from the pond on it, and then with a broom scrubbed it clean and white….It was pleasant to see my whole household effects out on the grass, making a little pile like a gypsy’s pack, and my three-legged table, from which I did not remove the books and pen and ink, standing amid the pines and hickories.”

“I have often noticed that these things, which obsess me, neither bother nor impress other people even slightly.”

“…shambles….elegant experiments….The oxygen in the atmosphere is the exhalation of the chloroplasts living in plants….most of the associations between the living things we know about are essentially cooperative ones….symbiotic to one degree or another….Every creature is, in some sense, connected to and dependent on the rest.”

“Seeds are extraordinary objects.”

“Here, away from the pleasant, unintentional, fatal seductions and unplanned blackmail of friends and acquaintances, away from the facade I had built over the years to impress a world with the self I wished I were—a false front that I was obliged continually to reinforce—perhaps I could find my real self, whether it be good or bad.”

***************************************

Will the real Earth last long enough? For embarking on our own magical mystery tours? Tours that lead us to discover the stunning essential existence of leaves, the crazy sex life of flowers, the undeniable links, connections, and networks our lives depend on through the generosities of Mother Earth?

***************************************

Here are some sketchbook drawings of my brain establishing new connections:

I found grass growing under one Swamp Maple with red tints running through the graceful blades. What caused the colorations?

My gardens. Catmint. Iris. Pinks. Phlox.

I stand with the Paris Climate Agreement and France’s vow with all who do, to—

“Make The Planet Great Again.”

We need to save the birds and the bees.

******************************************

A Helicopter Mom Crashes And Hands Over The Controls.

“The Jews are undoubtedly a race, but they are not human.” A.H.

This quote comes before Chapter One of Art Spiegelman’s brilliant graphic novel, MAUS, a story about the Holocaust. I have picked the book up from a position of prominence on a shelf in my daughter’s quiet bedroom. It is one of her all-time favorite books. She read it, perhaps, when she might have been too young to process the intense themes throughout the story and I’m sitting in her room thinking about that because this daughter of mine is about to graduate from college and make her dreams come true.

A mother can never know the exact moments when dreams begin to formulate inside a child’s heart, although we do our best to create supportive and enriched dreamworlds. We set our children free to go leaping through books and movies, to go traveling among the peoples and places of the world, to go wandering in and out of classrooms and onto playing fields. And then, when we aren’t looking, our children escape to discover for themselves sanctuaries for hiding their most cherished dreams—places where no one will trample those dreams nor steal one bit of the sparkle necessary to keep them shining.

I am remembering watching the movie Freedom Writers with my daughter. In the movie, a teacher devotes herself to a large group of the least-promising students in a California high school. The students, through the skills of learning how to become writers, achieve much more than their own personal goals—they also learn the devastating history of the The Holocaust and arrange a remarkable meeting with Miep Gies, the woman who risked her life to protect Ann Frank’s family from the Nazis. I am sure I felt the presence of The Dream Fairy sitting right next to my daughter while we watched that movie. The fairy was quiet, but my daughter was not: I am going to work with the kids no one believes in. She declared. She had not yet finished junior high.

Words from the preface of another book I have found on my daughter’s bookshelves, Black Like Me: “This may not be all of it…but it is what it is like to be a Negro in a land where we keep the Negro down. Some whites will say this is not really it. But we no longer have time to atomize principles and beg the question. The real story is the universal one of men who destroy the souls and bodies of other men (and in the process destroy themselves) for reasons neither really understands. It is the story of the persecuted, the defrauded, the feared and detested. I could have been a Jew in Germany, a Mexican in a number of states, or a member of any “inferior” group. Only the details would have differed. The story would be the same. This began as a scientific research study of the Negro in the South, with careful compilation of data for analysis. But I filed the data, and here publish the journal of my own experience living as a Negro. I offer it in all its crudity and rawness. It traces the changes that occur to heart and body and intelligence when a so-called first-class citizen is cast on the junkheap of second-class citizenship.” John Howard Griffin 1959

I keep time tripping through my daughter’s bedroom because she called me last night to let me know that she’d been offered a position as a counselor working with teens in a residential treatment center where she will deal with the diverse needs of those confronting mental health and behavioral problems, addiction problems, juvenile justice problems, personal trauma problems, and family dysfunction problems. The treatment center is not the kind of place where the rich and famous show up.

My daughter called after spending several hours at the treatment center during a second interview:

“Mom, ” she said, “I’m so excited. But I’m nervous. This job is outside my comfort zone.”

“What makes you uncomfortable?” I asked her.

“How will I know the right things to do?” She said. “Or how to handle difficult situations.”

“Do you feel safe?” I asked her.

“You know,” she said, “risks go along with the kind of work I want to do.”

“Well,” I said, “you’ll be trained and have to learn as you go.”

“I guess this is the real world.” She said.

“Yes,” I said, “so much more of a real world than any of the protected and hidden worlds where we’ve always lived.”

“Some kids just want to go home,” my daughter said. “They want to reach their goals and return home, but home is not safe for them.”

“All kids want home,” I said. “And so many begin their lives without any luck. It’s not fair.”

I told my daughter about the teachings of Mother Teresa:

From her book, In The Heart Of The World, (a gift from one of my sisters): “There is so much suffering in the world. Material suffering is suffering from hunger, suffering from homelessness, from all kinds of disease, but I still think that the greatest suffering is being lonely, feeling unloved, just having no one. I have come to realize that it is being unwanted that is the worst disease that any human being can ever experience. In these times of development, the whole world runs and is hurried. But there are some who fall down on the way and have no strength to go ahead. These are the ones we must care about.”

And from one of Mother Teresa’s letters, reproduced in Joseph Langford’s Mother Teresa’s Secret Fire: “Poverty doesn’t only consist of being hungry for bread, but rather it is a tremendous hunger for human dignity. Not only have we denied the poor a piece of bread, but by thinking that they have no worth and leaving them abandoned in the streets, we have denied them the human dignity that is rightfully theirs as children of God. The world today is hungry not only for bread but hungry for love, hungry to be wanted, to be loved.”

I recall our family’s recent trip to Oaxaca, Mexico. One day, in a bookstore there, my daughter bought the book, Crossing With The Virgin, Stories From The Migrant Trail. The book tells the harrowing stories of Mexicans crossing into the dangerous deserts of Arizona and the people who choose to help them with food and water.

Mother Teresa encouraged people to find the “Calcuttas” in their own countries, their own states, and their own communities where they could work to restore the promises of humanity which include the basic values of human decency and dignity.

My daughter doesn’t believe in or practice religion, so when I tell her about the teachings of Mother Teresa, I remind her that I am sharing the teachings because I believe they have meanings for all of us.

She tells me, “Some people say that I should trust in God and that God will bless me.”

I say, “You know they mean well. I hope if there is a God that He will bless and protect you, too!”

“Well, ummmmm,” she says, “how about if I trust in myself! Duh!”

Which inspires me to return to the lands of literature with a quote from one of my daughter’s favorite dreamworlds, the world of Hermione Granger at Hogwart’s:

“Are you planning to follow a career in Magical Law, Miss Granger,” asked Scrimgeour. “No I’m not,” retorted Hermione. “I’m hoping to do some good in the world!”

********

From Erin Gruwell of Freedom Writers:

“…if you change enough communities you can change the world.”

Here is a video of the challenging community where my daughter believes she will help change the world:

Preschool self-portrait by the little girl, now a woman on the move to heal our world,

who makes me a better person:

Brooklyn. Over and Over Again.

“I look out the window and I see the lights and the skyline and the people on the streets rushing around looking for action, love, and the world’s greatest chocolate chip cookie, and my heart does a little dance.” Nora Ephron, Heartburn.

This blog post is dedicated to my neighbor down the street, Lisa, who, like me, has lost a child to Brooklyn. She wanted some ideas for things to do in Brooklyn. First of all, anyone who has lost a child to Brooklyn should buy this book: City Secrets New York City, Robert Kahn, editor. I’ve had the book for a long time, but ever since my son added his heartbeat (four years ago) to all the others keeping the Center of the Universe alive and vibrant, I’ve started to make my way through all the dog-eared pages of the book. It’s been a lot of fun.

Wintertime in the northeast can be cold and snowy. If you’re looking for some heat, there’s good news: This weekend’s forecast for New York City is promising BALMY temps. So put on your stylish boots, sassy scarves, and go.

We usually base ourselves in Brooklyn because, like everyone else, we love Brooklyn. Here are some of the things we might do on a warm winter’s weekend in Brooklyn:

Stroll the neighborhoods of Brooklyn to enjoy adorable dogs, graffiti decorated buildings and warehouses, charming ethnic enclaves of cultural foods and languages, parks, colorful human beings, neat architecture, cool cemeteries—it’s everywhere in all parts of Brooklyn.

If we are feeling brain dead, we might choose to go to a museum. The Brooklyn Museum of Art is filled with surprises. Try going without researching what is there. One of the treasures I came upon the first time I went to the Brooklyn Museum of Art was their fabulous Art Nouveau Butterfly Gate by Emile Robert. Can wrought iron be sensuous? It sure can!

In Long Island City (not far from the borders of Greenpoint/Williamsburg) there’s the Isamu Noguchi Museum. Perhaps a bit too esoteric for some, but maybe not. Restful, civilized. Tres serene.

We have a process for visiting the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan which is to slowly see the permanent exhibits by choosing one or two exhibits, instead of trying to walk through the entire museum. That way, we don’t have to spend an entire day in the museum or subject our brains to a meltdown. The Met has a suggested admission price—you can decide for yourself how much you want to pay or you can choose not to pay at all if you can’t afford to pay. If you are only heading in to see one thing and planning to stay for under two hours, (probably not possible, but maybe), you could pay less for your admission. That’s what we do. Since it’s going to be a balmy weekend, a walk through Central Park to the Met (or from nearby subway stops) would be very nice. Here are a couple of cools things to choose to see at the Met. (Don’t be surprised to find yourself falling down rabbit holes as you try to see just one thing):

The Gubbio Studiolo featuring mesmerizing intarsia—an elaborate form of wood inlay marquetry created in 15th century Italy. Bazillions of pieces of walnut, beech, rosewood, oak, and fruitwoods have been used to create a stunning interior. This Italian studio from the Ducal Palace is a masterpiece of human obsession and a surprisingly charming place to find oneself in NYC. You will feel such delight if you go. It’s the most fascinating treasure hunt to find objects in this artwork. Hopefully you’ll have the studio all to yourself.
The 6th century BC Etruscan chariot. Craftsmanship? Without climate-changing industrial manufacturing plants? Whoa.
Not far from the chariot display there are Roman rooms with lovely frescoes, including one from Boscoreale, a village north of Pompeii, which was buried in the infamous eruption of AD79.
The Damascus Room. Here you will find, of all things to find on a winter’s weekend in NYC, the residential winter reception chamber from a wealthy Syrian 18th century residence. Poetry is inscribed on its walls—forty stanzas—inspired most likely by the 13th century poet, the eminent Sufi, Imam al-Busiri of Egypt. He wrote what many believe to be the most recited religious poem in human history, the Qasidah al-Burdah, also called The Poem of the Mantle and The Celestial Lights in Praise of the Best of Creation; written as an ode praising the Islamic prophet Mohammad at a time when the poet had suffered paralysis from a stroke and was healed in a dream.

You can find translations for the poetry in the Damascus Room on the Met’s website and read it while you are riding the subway. (You do ride the subway, right?)

Back in Brooklyn:

If it’s balmy, walk over the Brooklyn Bridge. Read Walt Whitman’s Crossing Brooklyn Ferry and an old blog post of mine Doing Lines in Brooklyn. 😀

https://theresajohnsonbertz.wordpress.com/2015/11/05/doing-lines-in-nyc/

It’s fun to walk to Manhattan at sunset, watching the sun fade away. Then walk back in the dark with all the city lights. Remember to spot the Statue of Liberty on the horizon!

Saturday morning: Grand Army Plaza Green Market—a farmer’s market I’ve never been to during wintertime, but I would check it out on a warm winter’s day.

FOOD! Here are some fun food stops in Brooklyn:

Radegast Hall and Biergarten. Afternoon happy hour with lively bands. My husband and I were the oldest partiers there during one afternoon in October. Our kids didn’t mind.

We all like to draw in my son’s journal when we are observing, and participating in, beer hall behavior.

PEACHES HOT HOUSE. Bedford-Stuyvesant. Southern comfort food. You will want to be comforted by everything on the menu. Nashville-style HOT chicken. Not a fancy place. GOOD food.

FETTE SAU. (Williamsburg I think.) It means “fat pig” and it’s a barbecue place in a converted garage (so, you know, HIP) where the chaos of craft beer, beef, and American whiskey will make you feel like a jolly fat pig. We stood in a line that snaked outside and we ended up eating outside. Maybe it will be warm enough to eat outside during the upcoming balmy weekend.

THE BROOKLYN STAR (Williamsburg.) Great for Sunday brunch. All kinds of comfort food and drinks to soothe overstimulated, overfed, and overindulged brains before you exit The Center of the Universe at the end of your weekend. Get in line early. Family bonding over shared mac-n-cheese is a new kind of religion for Sunday mornings in Brooklyn:

As always, before traveling to Brooklyn,

REMEMBER TO READ THE FINE PRINT:

***ALSO***

***THE NEW YORK TIMES TRAVEL SECTION JUST DID A “36 HOURS IN BROOKLYN” FEATURE THIS WEEK with a lot of great ideas! You can find it on the Internet!***

We love Brooklyn. Share your ideas with us too!

NE Patriots. Cheating. And WIN WINS.

This blog has a happy, hopeful, and fun ending. But first, true confessions:

I live in New England and the Patriots are my least favorite team. Why? Because they are cheaters and they have cheated more than once and they never even had to cheat in order to become champions. (Please note: By calling this a true confession, I am admitting to knowingly having committed a sin. I know it is a sin to doubt the integrity of the NE Patriots, especially if one lives in New England.)

Does this mean I think it’s okay to cheat sometimes if that’s the only way to become a champion? Yes. I think it’s okay to cheat sometimes. I will, in fact, look the other way if cheating allows you to achieve something you otherwise might not have achieved because you weren’t given a fair chance from the get go. For instance, I think it’s okay that some women have cheated by using a man’s name in place of their own name so that their writing would be considered for publication. I also thought it was okay for Gloria Steinem to cheat and became a Playboy Bunny (even though she never wanted to be a champion bunny) in order to investigate how women were being treated in Hugh Hefner’s clubs.

I’ve done some cheating in my life, too. And, of course, since I am the writer of this blog, I will choose to share one of my more charming cheating stories:

One sunny spring day, my fourth grade teacher made me skip recess so that I could administer a spelling test to students who were continually failing spelling tests. I was annoyed I had to miss recess. Soon, my pain was replaced by the pain of my classmates who not only had to miss recess, but would continue to miss recess until they learned how to spell. One doesn’t realize how one will handle positions of power until they are placed within such vainglorious places. I had been chosen by my teacher to stand as a leader (preferably an honest leader) before students in an American public school classroom and to administer a spelling test to those students. (My peers.) Indeed, in front of me sat a handful of bad spellers with papers, pencils, and wistful stares which never looked at me, but were bound instead for the world beyond the classroom windows where all the good spellers enjoyed the privileges of romping in sunshine and fresh air on a playground. Behind me loomed the chalkboard with beautiful, fresh, long white pieces of chalk. (All students, back then, lived for any opportunity to write upon the chalkboard.) So, I called the classroom to order and commenced announcing the spelling words. The students didn’t furiously begin writing the words onto their papers. So I said, “Raise your hand if you don’t know how to spell the words and I will write them on the chalkboard.” As you can imagine, this established me as a great leader. Everyone passed the test; we all returned to the regular schedules of recesses; and poor spellers were never denied equal access to recess again.

Fast rewind back to the true confessions beginning of this blog. If the Patriots aren’t my favorite team, which New England team is? That would be the UConn Huskies WOMEN’S Basketball team. They are not, as some male sportswriters claim, boring to watch. They play basketball with artistry, finesse, and athletic excellence in harmony with true teamwork. The universe will never again bring forth a greater organized group of women athletes. Soon to come—UConn’s 100th straight victory. After UConn, I like the Celtics (LOVED the Larry Bird era), the Red Sox, and then the Bruins. Sports are fun in the scrappy city of Boston and the fan base is wide ranging. The rivalries are energizing, too. Here’s a pic from the immigration line as my family was entering the US after traveling through Oaxaca, Mexico. I don’t know if these two hombres were good or bad or legal or just passing through, but they obviously could deal with their differences and probably enjoy one of the most enduring rivalries in American sports: (In case you can’t see, it’s a Red Sox cap chillin with a Yankees cap.)

20170115_072435

My differences with the New England Patriots have created a lot of great discussions with my family and friends. We all know that when it comes to cheating and being caught and being punished and being superstars, things can get unfair. But then—

The Trump thing landed in deeply blue New England. The leaders and the star quarterback of a team called the Patriots in New England were outed as fans of the new president. Ick. Ick. Ick! But not surprising.

What to do?

My daughter (a Trump disliker and total Boston sports fan and all-around awesome kid) reminded me: “Mom. Don’t judge a whole team by the political views of some. Don’t judge the entire NFL by the bad behavior of some. And don’t judge a person’s whole life by their political views.” And then she did what I suppose I might have taught her to do—she expanded my consciousness by bringing to light something good.

“Martellus Bennett,” she said, “will not be going to the White House with the team to celebrate their Super Bowl victory.” That’s nothing unusual—Tom Brady didn’t go to Obama’s White House. Larry Bird refused a visit to the White House. So did many other sports superstars.

Nevertheless, I decided to see if I could find out why Bennett had chosen to protest Trump. What I found (via Internet postings, a Forbes article, and Bennett’s Twitter) was that Martellus Bennett appears to be a pretty cool and obviously fun man who doesn’t want to be defined as “just an athlete” or someone useful for promoting the products of other companies or someone without a strong moral base or someone without a voice.

Bennett wants to be the product he promotes and what he promotes is imagination.

WIN!

His company is The Imagination Agency (www.theimaginationagency.com) and he is the Creative Director of Awesomeness. Bennett was inspired by his love for his daughter to create a black female protagonist in picture books—a protagonist with all the freedoms to dream and imagine adventures the way many white kids grow up so freely imagining such things. When Bennett was young, he wanted to be Willy Wonka. He also wanted to go to Hogwarts. One of his favorite quotes is from author Ursula Le Guin: The creative adult is the kid who survived.

From Bennet’s website: The Imagination Agency is a wondrous group of monsters and imaginary friends tasked with creating, drawing, writing, and imagining fantastical adventures for kids all over the world.

According to the heartfelt beliefs of Martellus Bennett, you can have more than one dream. He has always been an artist—drawing, making films, animating, writing—and he claims that, “Every day I wake up a new me. I go to sleep in a cocoon and wake up a new beautiful butterfly.” Pretty fluttery sentiments for a man who is 6’6′ and weighs 270 pounds! Bennett wants his daughter and all children from all backgrounds to grow up learning how to let their imaginations run wild. He wants to inspire a sense for unlimited adventure.

It all sounds so wonderful doesn’t it? Lots of WINS!

Bennett’s Imagination Agency also features the HugFootballMartyPillow on their site and a campaign to “Spread the Hugs.” The pillows can be purchased for children undergoing heart surgery at Boston Children’s Hospital and are used to alleviate pain by giving the children something to hug when they have to cough after surgery in order to keep their lungs clear. For every ONE pillow purchased, ANOTHER pillow is donated to a child recovering from heart surgery. WIN WIN!

(BTW—when the scrappy Boston fans call Martellus, Mahty, it only makes him feel more at home.)

Imagination is a powerful, powerful, powerful attribute to respect, honor, and develop. We can use our imaginations in good and bad ways. It is always refreshing and restorative to discover the ways people are using their imaginations in positive ways to create a better world for ALL children from ALL backgrounds.

Bennett says, “Football is not something I can hand over to my kids. Creativity lasts forever.”

And now for some Friday Fun entertainment. Here’s Martellus Bennett in an animated story of the time he saved a fan falling over a railing. Bennett says he is just your friendly neighborhood superhero and he has actually saved several lives. “People need me. I am there for the people.”

If the video fails to work on this blog—just go to youtube and search for “Martellus Bennett saving a fan.” The video is funny, the animated art is great, and you might get inspired to awaken the adventures and superheroes inside your own imagination.

All wins.

I dedicate this blog to my daughter. Thank you for keeping the conversations going. You have always been about LOVE and I was so proud to use your childhood artwork to make my sign for the Women’s March.

20170120_101455-1-1

A Happy Ending Story For 2016. With A Bright Start for 2017.

Ah, life. Reads the last line to one of Kurt Vonnegut’s dismal short stories. In the story, a random, wonderful thing (the birth of a baby) becomes a random, horrible thing (the baby dies) for an everyday couple. The couple goes on to accept their fate, the world regards their misfortune as too bad, and the couple resumes the days of their lives as best they can.

I depend on Vonnegut’s two words with the little comma between them, whenever life tilts, then tumbles into misfortune—the kinds of misfortunes that don’t come with happy endings or silver linings or brighter sides.

Ah, Life.

Who better than Vonnegut to write, with his unfairly wounded heart, those words as the final answer to a sad story? He had experienced the WWII bombing of Dresden, Germany while hunkered down in a slaughterhouse as a POW. He lived to deal with what he had witnessed and what he had been ordered to do with the carnage. And, as if an experience of war wasn’t enough, Vonnegut never escaped burdens of personal tragedy and heartache on his home fronts. On top of everything, he was afflicted with PTSD and depression.

And so it goes. (KV, also.)

And so it does go. For a lot of us. Sometimes it feels as though we can’t bear to shed another tear or expend another ounce of energy to keep our hearts pumping through the adverse challenges of illness, relationships, addiction, responsibility.

Ah, the heart. So high maintenance! Mine soldiered on and on through 2016. It soared; it crashed; it held the line. By year’s end, the Holiday Blues were getting the best of me until one day in December when I heard a simple story that blindsided my weary heart with happiness. In fact, I needed to give myself a happiness time out when I heard the story—just a minute or two—when I gave myself permission to stop and feel really happy because something good had come to light. The feeling wasn’t going to last forever, I knew that. It was only a moment of grace.

But what an amazing grace it was.

Because as much as bad news and the blues can drag me into my own slaughterhouses of self-loathing and self-destruction, good news can make the sun blaze a smiley face tattoo all the way through my thick skull and onto my parietal lobe where science claims human happiness gets juiced. According to contemporary maps of the human brain, the parietal lobe sits behind the frontal lobe which, in my life, too often gets used as a hammer—to pound stakes through my heart.

Heart, soul, brain, belly—wherever it is that happiness hangs out, it’s always good to welcome the spirit when it comes to abide.

Here’s Vonnegut on feeling happy:

“I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ‘If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.'”

Vonnegut’s words aren’t earth shattering unless you know a little bit about the man voicing them. Or unless you, yourself, can recall your own descents and/or relapses into the pits of grief and despair. One never forgets how hope becomes the most amazing grace when the darkness begins to fade—how one sighs, then breathes again—murmuring a happy prayer of relief and gratitude: If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.

Maybe we don’t really know what nice happiness feels like anymore. Many of us live in worlds tilted off balance—worlds where getting juiced with what we think is happiness is triggered by pings emanating from electronic devices which are often followed by pangs—of bewildering angst. Soon, an addiction to fake happiness develops. Desires for instant and constant and big-bling gratification become crippling. Useless emotions like jealousy or envy arise to ruin the day. The little things in life no longer delight us—little things that are actually the beautiful and surprising blooms from seeds we planted long ago and never stopped tending.

As I mentioned a few paragraphs ago, I was surprised by a nice story this year. The story was real, not fake. I received a genuine boost to my spirits—on all fronts—when the story came to me.

Let’s see if I can tell about it:

So. Once upon a time. This year. A week before Thanksgiving. My father saved my mother’s life. Mom was sitting in her wheelchair watching the news on a morning when Dad had decided not to go to the gym. Dad heard Mom utter an unfamiliar gasp. He sprang from the breakfast table. He called out to her. No response. He searched for a pulse. None. He began CPR. He dialed 911. He resumed CPR. The medics recharged Mom’s heart with a defibrillator. They rushed her to one hospital where she was then airlifted to another hospital. For several days, Mom was confined to the ICU as she entered into the brave new world of medically-induced hypothermia. Her body was cooled to preserve brain function by, hopefully, reducing the number of brain cells damaged due to loss of oxygen when Mom suffered sudden cardiac arrest. Basically, Mom was sort of safely frozen.

A big freeze descended on all of us as we waited to see whether or not Mom would survive, and, if she did survive, would her mental abilities be as sharp as they were before the sudden cardiac arrest which had caused loss of oxygen to her brain?

It was a dreadful experience. Over a few days, Mom’s body temperature was slowly restored and we encouraged her as she struggled to get her mind to achieve its baseline.

It’s hard to determine the exact moment of miraculous intervention which helped Mom’s perky mind thaw out as well as we could have hoped. It was definitely a team effort between Heaven and Earth. But it also might have been this: Dad’s CPR broke Mom’s ribs. He got through to her heart and kept it pumping when it mattered the most. (And Dad has his own health challenges. And Mom is paralyzed on her left side. So I have to wonder if some strong guardian angels came to the aid of my parents until the medics arrived. Maybe one of those angels went by the name of Cupid.)

During the longest days of panic, exhaustion, and worry, my sister and I were talking and suddenly remembered it was Christmastime. She told me she was going to order a wreath from a local flower shop where Dad lived and have them deliver it and hang it on his door.

Dad was home when the delivery arrived. The doorbell rang, he opened the door, and there stood a man with a wreath. The man said: “Do you remember me?” At first, Dad didn’t recognize the man, but as soon as the man introduced himself, Dad remembered him for sure.

It had been many years ago. Back in the days when Mom and Dad hauled their family of seven children from Indiana to Arizona to Connecticut, always on the move for better opportunities. In Connecticut (the family’s final frontier) Mom and Dad worked several jobs. Dad was an executive and Mom was a real estate broker. In their spare time (:D) they bought, restored, and sold homes. Mom and Dad spent many late nights and long weekends ripping apart, hammering together, and fluffing up neglected properties. They poured their hearts and souls into the homes they renovated.

One of those homes—we call it the Ironworks House—came to them unkempt with overgrown landscapes, cars and tools rusting away in side yards, and a neglected pool. It took Mom and Dad a year to renovate that house. While they worked, people watched the transformation. One evening, a man out walking stopped in to talk to Dad while Dad was working on the Ironworks House. Dad was installing a new wall that night. There was no time for breaks so Dad kept working and while he worked he explained to his visitor, through real time demonstrations and detailed explanations, how to build a wall The Right Way.

Whenever my parents completed a house renovation project, they acted just like any other great team of artists—proud and unsure about whether or not they really wanted to sell their beautiful work. But, my parents knew what it meant to have a family in a happy home and it gave them a great deal of satisfaction to match their homes with the right buyers.

When it came time to sell the Ironworks House, Mom determined that all offers must at least meet the asking price. Immediately, she had two offers—one for the asking price and one for less-than the asking price. The man who had stopped in to visit Dad one night while Dad was working on the house, had offered the asking price. Another man, from New York City, had offered less-than the asking price.

When Mr. NYC heard my parents had accepted the offer from Mr. Visitor, he increased his bid for the house.

But Mom and Dad said no go.

Mr. NYC didn’t give up. He was well-equipped with buy and sell and deal-making maneuvers.

But Mom and Dad said no go.

I think there was some discussion among the seven kids in those days—failed attempts to talk sense into Mom and Dad—like: “Are you guys crazy? Someone is offering you more money for all of your hard work!” (Mom and Dad probably said a prayer for the transformation of our greedy little souls.)

Mr. Visitor and his wife showed up at the closing for the Ironworks House without completing a home inspection. The attorneys said to them: “You haven’t had the home inspected yet.”

Mr. Visitor replied: “Have you ever watched these people build a house? There’s no need for an inspection.”

Boy do my parents love that part of the story. I do too.

So then along comes 2016, many years after the sale of the Ironworks House. Mom and Dad had moved several towns east along the Connecticut shore from where they lived when they were hard-working home makers. Mr. Visitor went on with his life and after retirement, liked keeping busy as a delivery man for a local florist. Yes, he was the one who showed up to deliver Dad’s Christmas wreath and hang it on his door.

And what became of the Ironworks House? Mr. Visitor and his wife raised their family there and created a home so happy that they passed it on to their daughter where she is now raising her family.

IF THAT ISN’T NICE, I DON’T KNOW WHAT IS!

On this, the last day of 2106, my mother is going to come home from the hospital.

Happy New Year to all from my heart and happy home to yours. I urge you, in the days to come, to notice when you are happy. When you do, take a happiness time out.

Allow the spirit to abide.

Gimme Shelter.

So here we go after Election Day, 2016.

America drank the political party kool-aids, but I am still nursing a brutal hangover. Maybe I should have known better than to listen to anyone at any of those parties. And now I’ve got an uneven, smeary kool-aid mustache stain marking my upper lip. How about you? Are you sporting a political party kool-aid stain on your upper lip? What color is yours? Red? Blue? It’s been more than a couple of weeks now. Will this thing ever fade away?

Meanwhile, in the fun election-results column, my state of Massachusetts (nouveau-hip Massachusetts) legalized marijuana for recreational use. (Just in time to make all parties going forward more fun than those November election parties!) I’ve lived in the berry blue state of Massachusetts for a long time with preppy, bookish, more-fashion-wrong-than-fashion-right liberals. I’ve also lived in America’s midwestern and southwestern regions. I’ve spent most of my life traveling throughout my country’s still-united states, staying with family and friends or opting to make new friends in campgrounds, roadside motels, and posh resorts. My family is large, with more conservatives than liberals at the table.

But a lot of unexpected things happened inside my American head and heart amid this year’s election noise when I tuned in to listen to surprising conversations with family, friends, and fellow Americans. I found myself confronted with points of view that will never come into focus for me. I realized, in many cases, others won’t ever “get” me and I might not ever “get” them. Worst of all, that old buddy-buddy bromide, “let’s agree to disagree” failed to inspire civility.

All I can say is: Choose your drugs, America, and find your escapes because the country is going to pot. Things are getting crazy and the crazy isn’t crazy fun. It’s crazy effed up.

It happens. Abraham Lincoln did not win the popular vote his first trip to the White House. Would you have voted for him? One of his campaign promises was to allow slavery to continue to exist in the states where it already had destroyed, and was continuing to destroy, generations of human beings. From the day of Lincoln’s election to the day of his inauguration, the ultimate in protest behavior ensued when slave-holding states began to secede from the Union. Were there any other protestors beyond those seceding in the southern states? Tens of thousands, perhaps, from up north? Marching on Washington to let Lincoln know that they were not okay with even a little bit of slavery?

What forms of injustice, and in what quantities, do we allow one administration to create an acceptance and tolerance for, in order to establish a false peace? Do we go along with a little bit of racism? A little bit of misogyny? A little bit of xenophobia, homophobia, Islamophobia? A little bit of big government controlling the press? Influencing social media? Running personal businesses through the White House and using the White House as a promotional brand? There’s more but my head hurts.

Maybe the impending gentrification and normalization of Dystopia America won’t hurt a bit when our amber waves of grain become verdant stands of pot plants. Some citizens could go back to the closet, back to the kitchen, back to another country, back to un-evolved times in history—while the stoners get to keep coming out of the drug dens.

So whether your vote was influenced by drinking the cherry cherry red kool-aid or the berry berry blue kool-aid or the protest-vote, triple-awesome grape kool-aid or the internet troll-spiked-with-Russian-vodka kool-aid—Hello!—I am among the walking wounded, (as I mentioned earlier), and we are nursing brutal hangovers. America’s 2016 election beat some of us up pretty good. We the people of this great country, in order to form a more perfect Union, did not deserve to have our lives and our relationships ravaged by such epic political drama, dysfunction, and damaging hate served non-stop in heaping helpings from all sides and all players.

America—

—is a nasty country.

And although I’m looking forward to baking warm cookies, decorating the drug den, and hosting a Peace and Make-Love-Not-War pot party for any friends I might have left, I also know it would never heal a heart like mine to create my own utopia and pretend I saw no evil, heard no evil, and spoke no evil.

My America is in tatters. It’s shattered. We are not walking the good path of establishing Justice nor are we doing the good work to ensure Domestic Tranquility. And to those who have a simple command for someone like me: America! Love it or leave it!—I have a more complicated response: Hello! (Again.) I am a woman and a mother. I can’t abandon what I love. Any person who has ever parented one or more uber-rebellious adolescents knows love and loathing must often be battled all in the same heart. Any person who has ever managed to build a successful marriage knows this too. Any person who has ever been one of the marginalized citizens of his or her country knows this too.

And here’s the thing. Many of us have already left our religions (for me, that would be Catholicism) because we didn’t love or accept religious ideologies or want to teach our children that women and other designated human beings were unworthy of the most revered positions of leadership, the most honorable acts of respect, and equal seats at the table with God, if such a phenomenon as God exists. We accept the freedom for such religions to exist. But when it comes to America, we do love, support, want to live by, and are willing to defend the fundamental truths of her Constitution and her Declaration of Independence.

A few days after America’s 2016 election was finally over, I escaped to the woods for a walk in the cold rain and happened upon a pop-up, feel-good arrangement by some fellow citizens promoting The Kindness Rocks Project:

20161115_121924

I stopped to admire the heartfelt effort and thought about the ways we human beings try to make ourselves, and others, feel better in a world where hate is so prevalent, misunderstanding is so warped, oppositional heartbeats thunder so persistently inside our aching chests,

and too many of us end up feeling unwelcome and unsupported in our own country.

I picked up the bronze Peace Be With You rock, stuffed it into my pocket, and continued on the trail through the rain and deeper into the cold, empty forest.

20161115_124512

The rock grew heavier in my pocket.

I was thinking about my children. My family and friends. Americans I talk to wherever I go. How to shore up my soul and settle it down. How to believe in a promised land when, as a woman, I am one of the publicly shamed citizens of my own country—and the world.

I could walk through a thousand forests and never understand the allure of corruption, deceit, and deliberate cruelty. I suppose my cognitive processing problems are exacerbated by the very act of choosing to go walking through forests—Shared Forests, Preserved Forests, Beloved and Appreciated Forests. Alas, I’m not only a Woman, but I’m also a Flower Child and a goddamned Tree Hugger. Where is my promised land? I pressed the Peace Be With You rock into the disturbed soil at the base of a mighty tree that had been upended by a terrible storm. Maybe someone else would like to admire it.

There are, of course, things we can do to work at restoring Justice and Domestic Tranquility in America. December’s issue of the The Sun Magazine features an interview with Ralph Nader entitled It’s Easier Than We Think. Ralph Nader On How We Can Change Society. Trigger warning: Ralph doesn’t like a lot of America’s popular politicians. Furthermore, activism isn’t about hitting the send button on an electronic device where you’ve recorded your own angry thoughts and feelings.

We can also learn to dance and I recommend the Tango. Perhaps America needs to start establishing tango parlors—special places where the Peace-Be-With-You Groovies can go to get some shelter.

Once, I traveled to Buenos Aires and landed in a tango parlor inside an abandoned warehouse. We were delivered to the venue courtesy of my niece (she was a student in Buenos Aires) and an angry taxi driver who, when we asked him if it was safe for us to visit the tango parlor, hollered: “Nowhere is safe! You shouldn’t even be in this country!” in between shouting obscenities at protesters blocking our route. My niece translated the taxi driver’s warnings to us using her soft and sweet inside voice, which made us feel bold and adventurous.

A gigantic, anatomically-correct sculpture of a human heart hung from the ceiling of the cavernous tango parlor. It appeared to float in the darkness. Not until after midnight did the musicians arrive, and that’s when the city’s tango dancers emerged from their nowheres. As the musicians played and the couples tangoed, the big heart swayed.

The Tango involves unique and intense forms of intimacy between the dancers and the musicians. Its history and development does not include academic or privileged pedigrees. The dance arose from passion—the kind of passion that sets hearts afloat on small boats in vast and uncertain oceans where mean and nasty sea monsters want to eat them up.

I had created a work of art influenced by my excursion to Argentina and the quiet conversations I had with people I met—people who shared stories from their own dark histories of oppression, exile, and return.

The work was a triptych representing fragmented maps, trails, and walls. I used black walnut ink, which I make from Black Walnut trees in my garden. I included text from my journal, written after the night at the tango parlor.

It surprised me to come upon this work of art, recently, while I was searching for something else.

The art spoke to me all over again from a completely new perspective as I sat in the shelter of my own utopia—surrounded by the serenity of my own gardens—as the sea change of a troubling election bore down on my beloved America.

…The light of la luna falls onto the peaks of the Andes Mountains from skies where darkness conceals our embarrassments as we try to slide the tango into our bodies and out of our feet. We are all pressed up against each other, our faces so close we only have to whisper. Some of us stumble. Others escape. Musicians play. More beautiful dancers, everywhere, find a place for their secrets in the dance and the music. They know to keep truth well-hidden under lowered eyelids and safely quiet behind barely parted lips. Worries are danced away by the pleasure of bodies, alive, leaning in on each other. We want to dance. We need to dance. The music is all we can trust.

20161129_091822-1

Trails. Walls. One Heart, Blooming.

Artwork by Theresa

Here is the final paragraph from Abraham Lincoln’s first inaugural address. Lincoln was just a man. A man so imperfect and so wrong about slavery and African Americans, yet president of the United States of America. He believed these words, though, and became a better man.

Where, oh where! Are the better angels of our nature now?

“I am loathe to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield, and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearth-stone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”

20161118_163325

May the gods bless and restore to America, the better angels of our nature.

O! Canada. And a Recipe for Relief.

America keeps coming undone. We act so shocked, but, honestly, what would America do without the drama of dysfunction? It’s as though a plague of uncivilized humanity has escaped from Hater’s Anonymous rehab to indulge in PDR’s: Public Displays of Relapse. They dream of reestablishing a culture of coddled cads who think PDBB’s—Public Displays of Boorish Behavior—should be acceptable forms of discourse.

It’s utterly repulsive. I don’t like America right now. I’m not feeling the love and I loathe what is becoming of my country. America—with its farce of an election—is being dominated by a cesspool of withered minds and floppy mouths belching forth a stench so foul, I can’t breathe without gagging. This does not mean I’ve lost faith in America. But still—my broken heart!

The good news is, there are some bright horizons—like the one to our north, and downeast from Maine. If any Americans out there, (like me), are seeking some relief, stop for a minute and say a prayer of gratitude for our position on the planet next to Canada.

Because across the border and into the Maritime Provinces, my husband and I have always found kindness, resplendent scenery, powerful tides, rejuvenating hikes and bike rides, nurturing food and drink, and wonderful music. These maritime—“of the sea”—lands include Nova Scotia and Cape Breton Island, Prince Edward Island, and New Brunswick. I’ve traveled to all of Canada’s Maritime Provinces, though not as often as I’d like. From where I live, Halifax is an easy flight out of Boston. Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick are road trip excursions. At the end of those road trips, a soulful and quiet peace awaits. It’s a welcomed type of slow travel that rarely moves beyond first gear, especially if you travel late into autumn which is what my husband and I just did.

On one hand, the Canadian Maritimes-style peace is so slow and so quiet that I don’t want to tell anyone about it. On the other hand, I’m not so sure people are interested in true peace anymore.

—Or their own souls.

—Or the souls of others.

Upon arrival in Canada, we stayed in a campground overlooking the Bay of Fundy from the town of St. Andrews, New Brunswick. The date was Canada’s Thanksgiving holiday weekend. We cooked dinner outside, the sun set, and soon a fellow camper stopped by our campsite to invite us over to his campsite for an evening of music. Thus passed our first night away from America as we found ourselves taken in—and taken away—by a fiddle player, guitar players, and singers performing songs and hymns in the distinctive, Celtic-derived traditions one looks forward to hearing in the Canadian Maritimes.

A few days later, my husband steered our motorhome into the belly of a ferry bound for Grand Manan Island—part of an archipelago of islands afloat in the mouth of the Bay of Fundy. The great American woman and writer, Willa Cather, spent many peaceful summers on Grand Manan, which is how I first learned about the island.

On Grand Manan, we found North Head Bakery and bought ginger molasses cookies, macaroons, warm baguette, sugar donuts, and still-steaming raisin bread. We found walking trails at the very edge of majestic cliffs with only fresh air to steady our wobbling legs. We found islanders that waved hello whether we were driving our huge motorhome on their narrow roads or riding our mountain bikes up and down their hilly routes.

We biked to the infamous island outpost of Dark Harbour where we enjoyed a unique place to have a picnic. We discovered dulse, a superfood sea vegetable (aka seaweed) harvested by hand from the ocean and dried on rocks under the summer’s sun.

Willa Cather wrote: When kindness has left people, even for a few moments, we become afraid of them as if their reason had left them. When it has left a place where we have always found it, it is like shipwreck; we drop from security into something malevolent and bottomless.

America is shipwrecked. It has been sunk by malevolent and bottomless madding crowds.

A history of shipwrecks surrounds Grand Manan Island. Her cliffs are dangerous, wild, and windswept. One stands on the edges of the island in the year 2016 and considers the consistent tug of Earth’s greatest tides, those forces always at work eroding the truths we no longer seem to value and uphold as self evident. Indeed, a faraway island can leave a traveler like me, a woman unmoored from her own country, feeling hopeless and stranded. I found myself wishing the tides of the sea could take me away. Then I wanted them to promise to bring me back. I wanted to present the Bay of Fundy tides to the rest of the world, so everyone could notice how powerful and precious and vast they were, and how small each and every one of us becomes when we stand facing the phenomenon of Earth’s relentless waters.

img_2229-2

I asked the tide to bring me sand dollars—

Intact sea urchins—

Pretty sea shells—

Fossils from a time when the Earth was not yet ravaged by the egos of men and women.

The tide took me from the island of Grand Manan to Fundy National Park where one of the most stunning campsites, Site 59, overlooked the whole wide world, in peace.

2016-10-13-10-57-38

Our hikes there included premier trails through coastal forests, good doses of satisfying physical exertion, and solitude. Our bike rides and walks upon the ocean’s exposed floors elevated our spirits to our most grateful selves while pastoral settings inspired us to believe romantic thoughts about life. Cliffside picnics made our egg salad sandwiches taste royal enough to be served on golden paper plates.

We found friendship in the small, small village of Alma at the base of Fundy National Park where we were given the last of the season’s fish chowder on an outside deck at Tipsy Tails as the weather began to turn. Our server said: “Two bowls of chowder, two beers, and two blankets?” then she invited us to join in with the town later that night to celebrate the morning’s anticipated launch of the lobster fishing fleets when the tide would be high enough to float all boats. From our campsite, perched over the village, we heard the music commence as the moon was rising. We bundled up and walked into town using a sturdy, cliffside staircase comprised of more than 100 steps. Sea ballads, Scottish and Irish folk songs, and more hymns filled the night. The next morning, a bagpiper played as gale winds and dark clouds cast shadows over the faces of babies snuggled in the arms of mothers and grandmothers and aunties. Young men clung to boats jammed with lobster traps and before long, the boats sailed through the winds and out of sight. All of the fishermen faced long, hard, hopeful days at sea.

20161014_080727

Upon re-entry into the United States, a guard asked us if we had any plants, fruits, or vegetables from Canada in our motorhome. We said no. He said he was going to have to come on board and see for himself. He opened our fridge, seemed satisfied, handed us our passports and said, “Welcome home.”

We did have one vegetable on board and I’m glad it wasn’t confiscated. It was the dulse, which hid itself well in spite of smelling like the boldest of low tides. The taste of it, right out of the bag, is just as strong and gamey as the aroma. But it is a legendary superfood with phantasmagoric health benefits and I was determined to learn how to cook with it.

Within a day of our return, I created my own version of fish chowder inspired by travels through the Canadian Maritimes and our discovery of the world-renowned dulse harvested in Dark Harbour, on Grand Manan Island. I used simple ingredients kept stocked in our kitchen. As I cooked, I reminded myself of how kind the people in Canada had been to us. When speaking about America’s sordid election, the Canadians we met didn’t hesitate to express their faith in America and many showed compassion for the unfortunate relapse into dinosaur-brained recklessness going on throughout every state. One man assured me, “America will do the right thing.”

But I don’t know…Willa Cather’s peaceful visits to Grand Manan ended in 1940 when safe passage to the island was threatened by German submarine activity in the Bay of Fundy.

If America wants to be great again, it must become kind first. Where there is kindness, there is reason. Where there is reason, there is peace.

COMFORT AND KINDNESS FISH CHOWDER

4 cups chicken stock (I used a 32 oz. store-bought carton)

2 cups chopped onion

1 T butter

1 T flour

1 cup half and half

1 big carrot, peeled and cut into half moons

6 red potatoes chopped into half inch squares

8 scallops (I keep a bag of Trader Joe’s jumbo frozen scallops handy)

1 handful of langostino tails (also a Trader Joe’s frozen seafood product—tastes like a combo of lobster, shrimp, crayfish)

3/4 lb. of fresh cod, cut into one inch pieces

Chopped thyme, chives, and parsley from the garden

2 T chopped dulse

2 handfuls of dulse, cut into strips for frying in olive oil

Slices of baguette bread

Saute the onion in the butter until soft, but not brown. Blend in the flour, cook slowly and remove from heat. Slowly pour and stir in two cups of the broth. (This is a Julia Child all-purpose chowder base.) Add the carrots, add the rest of the broth and cook until just before the carrots are tender. Cook the potatoes in a separate pot of water until just before they are tender. Drain them and add them to the broth and carrots. Heat on low. Add spices, salt and pepper, and chopped dulse to taste. Pour in the half and half and gently heat up without boiling. Place all of the seafood into the chowder and let cook for ten minutes. The fish will break up, adding texture and flavor to the broth.

Heat olive oil in a pan. Working quickly, fry the strips of dulse, turning them once and draining them on paper towels. Toast a few slices of baguette in the olive oil. Fried dulse is tasty! It’s good dipped in salsa, too.

Serve the chowder hot with fried dulse on top and on the side.

Dulse from the market in Canada.

A handful of dulse.

Dulse separated into strips for frying.

Fried to a crisp, glossy green.

Baguette dulse-flavored by toasting in the remaining olive oil.

The chowder only needs some pepper and fried dulse on top.

I set our table with a small arrangement of buttercups I found on the edge of our last mountain biking trail in Fundy National Park and some thyme and lavender still blooming in my garden went we came home. I found the vase at NovaScotian Crystal in Halifax when we traveled through on our way to Cape Breton two summers ago. The vase is perfect for small and sweet bouquets from the garden.

Believe in kindness.

❤

Tools for Sustainable Loneliness.

What do you have to show for all of your loneliness? Destructive addictions? Obsessive behaviors? Too many hours spent staring at the cobwebs cluttering up your vast funks? You ask the spiders: Are you depressed? Or are you lonely? They bite you.

Same.

One of the most pleasurable obsessions I have to show for all of my loneliness is an attraction for tools. I especially love hand tools and have loved them since my own days of yore when we young ones were neglected and allowed to play with really cool, authentic things that didn’t come to us road-blocked behind rules, regulations, age restrictions, or trigger warnings.

On any given summer’s day in the times of yore, I’d take a few slow laps around the family garage before setting out to wander through the fading frontiers of America’s un-gentrified, suburban free ranges. Many family garages displayed a good selection of random tools and mine was one of the best being managed, as it was, by my dad, the United States Air Force man who grew up as the oldest boy on a farm. I went for Dad’s hammers, saws, shovels, maybe some pliers, and an ax. I’d load my wagon with Dad’s tools and leave home. Texting Dad in order to ask permission for engaging in the behavior of helping myself to his tools was, blessedly, not possible. Besides, I was following orders from Mom: Go outside and play.

On my way to the ancient childhood hinterlands, I’d stop at new-home construction sites, peruse their junk piles for lumber and add choice finds to my wagon. I planned to repurpose everything into an outpost. My outposts were repeatedly attacked, sacked, and plundered. I repeatedly rebuilt and reinforced. Dad would ask, whenever one of his carefully maintained tools went missing: Why? Why can’t you remember to bring the tools home? Why can’t you put them back where they belong? Why can’t you return them in the same condition you found them? Where are they?

They are somewhere in the woods of Indiana and/or the foothills of the Sonoran Desert in Arizona. It was in those places where I learned, on my own, how to love being lonely. A lot of children discover how to love their loneliness within the pages of books. For me, it was tools. If you take a hammer and hold it like you mean it, it becomes like a divining rod—leading you on to worlds of creative possibilities and sustainable satisfaction. Pounding a nail true, hits the spot every time. Success. Pleasure. Purpose.

I’m still a lonely girl, and I’m still loving—and losing—tools. Recently I lost one of my favorite gardening tools—my soil knife. She is a substantial hunk of steel fastened onto a sturdy handle. Her hunk-of-steel blade has one sharp edge and one serrated edge, making her a champ for slicing into the soil to lift out weeds and/or for sawing apart the gnarly root balls of plants. There’s also a handy v-notch cut out of her blade for ripping through twine. The handle of this tool, BTW, is neon orange—designed especially to help lonely wanderers, afflicted with an array of distraction disorders, find their tools when they lose track of life. My gardening tool will come back to me when my prayers to Saint Anthony make it though the queue. Until then, I’ve distracted myself with the old pitchfork, an outstanding hand tool for the quiet work of digging out unsustainable turf in order to replace it with beautiful, and more sustainable, gardens.

********

So it should come as no biggie surprise that when a lonely girl like me lands, in her luxury gypsy motorhome, in the parking lot of a truck stop near Gardiner, Maine, late at night, with the husband she met when she was too lonely to care about boys, and that husband says what do you want to do tomorrow—Lonely Girl looks at a map, opens a couple of cold beers, and can’t wait to answer the question. I open the windows, too, and speak to the hum of idling truck engines, all at rest after long days on the road. I keep romantic ideals about what I want to do and what I hope to find tucked in, and simply suggest a list of options for the next day’s adventures:

The Liberty Tool Company in Liberty, Maine. The Davistown Museum, across the street from Liberty Tool. And Morse’s Sauerkraut Euro Deli in the middle of one-of-the-best nowheres, which just happens to be on our route to Camden, Maine, the next day’s destination.

To lonely people everywhere, I say go to where lively spirits live their obsessions. You might discover that what you thought was loneliness might only be a longing—for what’s real and what’s cool and what’s peace and what’s good.

There are a lot of places in Maine where scholars, intellectuals, and classic passionate folks maintain playgrounds for those of us who choose to sustain our most lovely lonelinesses through the practice of learning all we can about what we like. For those of us who aren’t lonely at all, unexpected excursions and serendipitous discoveries are just plain fun. Liberty, Maine is an amusement park for the brain. (Go before the bourgeoisie litter the sidewalks with their Starbuck’s cups.) Even just watching the following video, about The Liberty Tool Company, offers the viewer a restful excursion:

********

If you go to Liberty, remember to pace yourself. The Tool Company will take you far, far away. I found a prayer card for fifty cents, a book by William Trevor for a buck, (The Day We Got Drunk On Cake), a chisel engraved S. J. Addis from London (late 1800’s?) for $2.50, an L.S. Starrett Co. divider for $3.00, and two Road and Track Magazines for $3.00 each. My husband found tools to keep in the motorhome for random repair work.

Hopefully you’ll reserve some brain power after your excursions through the tool store, because a trip across the street to the Davistown Museum will pretty much set your brain on fire. It’s a hands-on experience. You can touch and hold tools from a long time ago. Like a pitchfork from the days of the Revolutionary War, procured from Concord, MA. Slip your hands through the wooden handle and think about the work you might have performed, while keeping three day’s worth of provisions and weaponry strapped onto your body. You were an elite Minuteman, one of the Sons of Liberty in Massachusetts and, as such, you lived your life ever ready to enter into battle at a moment’s notice.

Or kneel beside the cobbler’s bench and examine its piles of tools. All of those tools and one artisan needed to fashion shoes, by hand.

Peer through a hazy glass case at a curious collection of wampum, one of the largest in New England on public display.

There’s a historic Wantage Rule—used to measure the volume of beer—it’s one of the earliest examples of American colonist’s Robert Merchant’s fine workmanship which came to equal the quality of work being produced in England long before the Revolutionary War.

There’s a fabulous children’s corner. Children can invent and build tools. Adults can gain access to research and resources supporting the value of studying the art and history of toolmaking.

There’s art—a lot of great art by contemporary artists at work in Maine.

There are so many tools, from so many chapters in history, to admire.

There’s a Civil War crutch.

There’s a chilling display of prison tools—made to be used as weapons by prisoners.

Some things are for sale. I bought a painting and two hammers. One of the hammers is completely hand made.

If you need to take a rest, there’s a nice porch where you can sit awhile.

********

After our time in Liberty, we hit the road for Camden State Park where we planned to set up camp for the next several nights. En route we had no choice but to stop at Morse’s Sauerkraut Euro Deli as per a recommendation from our son. He goes to Union, Maine with his comrade-in-drumming arms and fellow Slow Roasters musician, Freedom, to mine stone from ancient quarries for building percussion instruments. They also study drumming and percussion practices from secret sources. Upon hearing that we would be rolling through Union on our way to Camden, our son alerted us to the existence of a gastronomic outpost known for serving and supplying all comers with the most flavorful German food in the universe.

As it turns out, Morse’s wasn’t the only unexpected German-themed thing that happened to me as a result of my road trip via Liberty, Maine to Camden. There was a surprise literary excursion into one of those Road and Track magazines I’d acquired…an issue dated May 1972…which I thumbed through before packing them up to be sent away to my son in Brooklyn.

That part of my adventures and special finds in Liberty, Maine must remain secret until my son receives the magazines. He is the most passionate automobile enthusiast I’ve ever known—and Maine has plenty of places where that kind of lovely loneliness is sustained, too. Like the Owl’s Head Transportation Museum in Owl’s Head, Maine, (not far from Camden), where we went a few times when he was a little boy. There, his lovely, often lonely, attraction to automobiles and cool airplanes was sustained. We enjoyed car shows and once, we flipped out over the super-exciting experience of watching—and listening to—a GeeBee Racer airplane fly.

The state park at Owl’s Head is free. The rock beach there still rocks.

Random collections of Porsches were sunbathing in the parking lot of Owl’s Head State Park when we made our most recent journey there while camped in Camden.

And the tide pools…

It all makes me want to get lonely.

********

Liberty, Maine.