Party of one

My people have headed south for the week. G had a conference in DC and the kids are on February break so it seemed like a perfect time for a road trip to the nation's capital. As much as I love a good adventure, I'm brand new in my job and we thought it might not be time quite yet for me to take the week off so, in a strange twist of our usual mode...here I am, holding down the fort. I sent Maddy off with a set of Downton Abbey paper dolls since we would miss watching the finale together. In return, she texted me a photo of the whole cast happily set up on the dashboard of the car. I love her frequent updates and photos of what they're up to.  This morning they attended Supreme Court arguments, had crepes, and walked to Arlington cemetery. How cool is that?

As for me, I've been running a bunch of long-postponed errands (Sam needs a new belt, I need new work pants, etc.), reading addictively on the sofa in the late afternoon, catching up on a few shows on our tivo, and going to bed early.  Wild and crazy, that's me. I'm actually a little overwhelmed with the possibilities every day: get a pedicure? see an early evening movie? go to a museum? explore a corner of Boston? start a project? write? What would you do?

. . .

Changing topics a bit....This week my Sunday School lesson for the 12- and 13-year-olds was about adversity so I was happy to play them one of my favorite talks of all time, The Currant Bush by Hugh B. Brown (fast forward about 2/3 and listen to 17:43 through 28:15 for that portion of the talk). Do you know that one? Many years ago a friend gave me a cassette tape with this particular recording and it got me through many ups and downs in high school and college. It felt like such a personal pep talk (and I've listened to it so often) that I feel like I know Brown personally, with his kind uncle voice and poetic cadence: "God is aware of you, individually. He knows who you are and what you are and furthermore he knows what you are capable of becoming. Be not discouraged then if you do not get all the things you want just when you want them. Have the courage to go on and face your life..."

It's been swimming around in my head lately. So often I feel simultaneously laden with fruit and cut down. It's comforting to remember there's a gardener in charge of all that pruning and growth.

Chicagoing

After opening presents and attending church on Christmas Day, we hopped on a plane and landed in Chicago to spend a few days with my parents and siblings. My aunt and uncle had offered their home to us while they were away for Christmas and it was a wonderful site to gather, smack in the middle of the country.

Joy! It's the first time we've all been together for 5+ years.  It was time.

So that's where I've been:

spending hours around the table

reading on the sofas

going to the Chicago Art Institute

and Berghoffs (remember when I went there with Sam a couple of summers ago? they fixed their sign)

singing around the piano

and doing Muppet impersonations (Chris's Animal ftw)

My people. I love them.

I miss them already.

Lucky timing

Happily, I was able to attend our niece's (G's sister's daughter) wedding this weekend while I was in the west dropping off Miss L at college. I felt a little guilty being the only lucky one to attend from the Boston branch of the family but I was happy to represent; I really do love my in-laws. Speaking of lucky, the happy couple is moving to Hawaii tomorrow. Talk about an extended honeymoon, right?!

 

In retrospect

A few afterwards afterwords...

1. See? I was there, too. I love this photo with Maddy, complete with drunken sleeping guy behind us.

2. Maddy sporting a fascinator. Let's all wear hats more, okay?

3. Sam is at the point where he just tolerates my picture taking.

Me: Come on, let me take a picture (with chocolate smeared all over his face after a nutella crepe). You know how much your mama loves a good photo.

Sam: Annnnnd...you know your son loves his good dignity. Sorry mom.

I didn't take the picture. Dignity trumps photography. Most of the time.

4. Pilgrimage to the Peter Pan statue in Kensington Gardens. This insures that my kids never grow up, right?

. . .

Favorite times: the Fat Bike Tour around London | just sitting in the parks watching people (I even saw John Oliver doing interviews for the Daily Show in St. James Park) | 39 Steps via the Half Price tkts booth | Les Miserables (according to G, the musical that launched a trip to London. It's a little bit true) | Churchill War Rooms | walking around with G on a night out | Portobello Road Market (crazy fun on Saturday mornings) | the London Eye | the Hyde Park ward | seeing Rosetta Stone and Elgin marbles in person at the British Museum

The weather: The weather deserves a starring role in the story of our trip. It was extraordinary. The sun, the lilacs and every other conceivable flowering thing, the green grass, the warmth. We were there during a charmed stretch of days, that's for sure. You can tell in my photos (last post) that I was obsessed with the blue-blue sky. It sprinkled once for about an hour. Truly a London rarity. Thanks, mother nature. We owe you one.

Memorable moments: when I fell down the stairs at Pizza Hut (for starters, it's embarrassing that we were even going to Pizza Hut in London but we needed something fast before a show, okay?), Sam falling down the stairs at the Serpentine, looking over at my kids' faces during Les Miserables (tears were shed). Actually, I had many stop-and-bottle-up-time moments when I just felt so lucky to be with my family, at these ages, mindful of the fleeting time. This was a trip well savored, I promise. At least once we got over grumpy jet lag.

Food: Zizzi | Byron's | pub fish+chips | picnic food from Harrod's | nutella + strawberry crepes from a street vendor | truffles from Harrod's | awesome fresh fruit and delicious bread and croissants

Trip Reading: Vogue & Vanity Fair, Anna Quindlen's Every Last One (me) | The Book Thief (Sam) | Michael Connelly's The Lincoln Lawyer & The Fifth Witness (G) | The Secret Lives of Dresses & Jane Eyre (Maddy) |  Roma & The Postmistress (Lauren)  

Notes for next time (ohpleasemayIhaveanexttime?) things we missed but wanted to see: Hampton Court | Stratford | Bath | Cambridge/Oxford | St. Paul's | National Gallery | Beatrix Potter's Hilltop Farm & the Lake District | Stonehenge | Colchester and ancestral villages | Harry Potter sites | the V&A.

. . .

photos via my iphone + the instagram app

Oh, London.

Hello! London was quite brilliant, really.

(And now there's a little British-accented voice in my head that dictates I write with a British tilt. Sorry. Cheers.)

I didn't take my computer with me and my phone only had very occasional coverage. Hence, no posts. Hence, the (soon, you'll see) barrage of photos and posts. We're in the middle of re-entry: unpacking and laundry and paying the piper for being gone a week. In the meantime, here are a few moments from our first day+, jet lag and all...

More soon, ready or not.

Oscar night shenanigans

We're a movie family. My mom and her sisters have been known to fly across the country to watch the Oscars together, even bringing fabulously eclectic formalwear gathered from searches of secondhand clothes stores throughout the year. Also, ask my Grandma about our ancestor Edwina Booth who starred in a movie nominated for best picture in 1931 and she will fill you in on all of the details including a purported train ride across Germany and some early Nazi run-ins.

Not everyone gets this movie thing and that's okay. I know it seems a titch kooky. I just wanted to point out that we come by this silliness naturally.

When the Oscars roll around each year, we try to take the chance to make it an occasion. We fill out the ballots and keep score for bragging rights (even though we haven't ever seen all of the films). We tune in early for the red carpet commentary and critiques. This year we spread out Lauren's red snuggie blanket for a red carpet and issued this challenge: dress up like someone from one of the movies or in your red carpet finest.  

Originally I tried to get away with going as Mark Zuckerberg in the Social Network, wearing a hoodie and sweats but then when my daughters got into the spirit of the evening, I upped my game a little:

Maddy started out the evening in a black tutu a la The Black Swan. Then she switched to boxers, knee highs and a t-shirt, a tribute to the locally filmed The Fighter. Lauren went as a red carpet movie star, happy to recycle her prom dress from last year (maybe the boned bodice could be a nod to Winter's Bone?). Sam came down in a cowboy hat and badge as Woody from Toy Story 3. Greg, just home from church and home teaching, came as one of the accountants for the Academy in charge of protecting the honor of the voting system. In retrospect, I'm saying that I went as grown-up Mattie Ross (remember in True Grit when she leaves the graveyard in her Mary Poppins-like dress?). Either that, or Tom Hooper's proud mum who found the idea for The King's Speech and passed it along to her son. The line of the night: "The moral of the story is: listen to your mother."

p.s. Overall, I wasn't that wowed by the Oscars this year but I *loved* Cate Blanchett's hair last night (here's the side and back). Really, really. Don't be surprised if I return to my shorter hair of yore sometime this spring. I think I might be up for a change.

Leaving in the fairest of the seasons

Still processing the wonderful, bittersweet weekend I spent with family. All but 4 of my 24 cousins made it (from all over the country) as well as all of my aunt's siblings, her parents and, of course, her children. There was a lot of love flowing along with the tears.

While I won't say everything that's wandering around my mind and heart right now, I will be honest about this: suicide leaves its own mark on grief. 

I imagine her on a long hike with us: over peaks and valleys and across long stretches of desert. She found the journey difficult and debilitating but she kept persisting at it, even adding more to her load by stopping to support and carry others along the way. In the end, she grew depleted and found herself unable to go another step, unable to see or even imagine cool green meadows ahead. I'm going to go ahead and head home, she says. I'll see you all back there. And so she did.

This is too simplistic, I know. It's too pat to account for either the complexity of her experience or the range of emotions we feel--especially those felt by her now-grown children and new grandchildren, who will bear the vastness of her absence in the months and years ahead. 

I do believe in mercy and, that after her long and brave daily struggle, she has found that cool green meadow. 

But I'm still really sad about it. 

. . .

My cousin played guitar and sang Fairest of the Seasons at the family memorial service. So moving.

Holding on

 

"The best thing to hold onto in life is each other"

~ Audrey Hepburn

Yesterday I made 50 maple frosted cinnamon rolls. It was my first time making that many. Or, to be honest, making cinnamon rolls at all. What is it about tragedy that sends us to the kitchen? I wanted to get busy and do something, never mind that the subjects of my worry and thoughts were a couple of thousand miles west of here.

So I hit the kitchen, flour and butter flying. It was comical. I told the kids it was like opening an umbrella in Boston when you hear it's raining in London. In the end, it did make me feel a little better. And this morning a bunch of teenage seminary kids were perfectly willing to be the recipients of my busy worry.

. . .

Thanks to G's urging (and his frequent flier miles), I'm off tomorrow to gather with family for a memorial and graveside service this weekend. I just want to put my arms around my people. And hold on to them. Life truth #398: (whenever possible) always go to the funeral.

. . .

By the way (mind that you don't get whiplash from the topic change) , don't you adore this Richard Avedon photo of Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire rehearsing for Funny Face in 1957? So intimate and hushed and magical. Can I be her next time? Is that too much to ask?

Over the fall of a sparrow

I woke up to such sad news this morning, the loss of a dear aunt, one of my mom's younger sisters. Mary.

I'm thinking of her today. Of her hilarious laugh and great humor, her devotion to family traditions and good meals, her brilliant mind, her compassion, her long and valiant efforts to stay aloft. 

My mom sent this a bit ago, a few words written by my dad this morning (thank you, Dad, I hope you don't mind I'm including this here). I think they sum up my feelings perfectly.

. . .

FreeFall
for Mary

I heard that a thousand birds fell out of an Arkansas sky the other day,
Red-winged blackbirds I think they were.
And not only in Arkansas but in Louisiana, Kansas even Sweden
All over the world these blackbirds, starlings, and sparrows
Beautiful, fragile, delicate birds, falling out of the night time sky
It breaks your heart 

Yesterday a bird fell out of the sky in Utah,
And I don’t know exactly why or what the reason was
Was its navigation system impaired? Was it buffeted by fierce winds?
I think it finally just gave up all hope of reaching a warmer, safer land
And then this beautiful, fragile, delicate bird fell out of the night time sky
It just breaks your heart 

M.Bentley
January 5, 2011
Logan

Ringing it in

This year our first night was...just right (Goldilocks would be so proud).

Progressive dinner + revelry x 7 families = very happy evening for 32 people

1. dinner at our house (featuring aebleskivers by G) 

2. giant round of the game Celebrities

3. travel to H family house, make festive hats

4. ...like this one

5. light sparklers

6. combine festive hat and sparklers (isn't he a good sport?)

7. play more games, then toast the new year with ginger ale

Then, watch movies all night (option 1) or go home to sleep and return for breakfast and games and sledding and, later, chili for lunch (option 2). I'll leave you to guess who chose which option.