pomegranatesandpaper

In Which I Tell You Everything, Yet Nothing

 

 

 

Sometimes an idea hits you in the head; sometimes ideas accrete, piling up little bits of this and that until it becomes a firm foundation for the next step.  I think I figured something important out. I hope to implement it in the near future. I do not like to be coy. I am not a fan of the 140-word oblique reference. You'll know soon enough. And if you don't, then you'll know I am still working on it. 

 

 

 

 

I do my best thinking in the car. I am, like The Empress, a ruminator. I think, ponder, fret, worry, and dwell. To combat this, I put on my earphones as loud as I can stand it and sing along as I drive. No, it's not the same if I put music through the speakers. My brain is so swirly-whirly that I need to have the music get right to the ear drum and into the brain cells directly. Kind of like shooting up into a vein (I suppose) but without the horror.

 

 

So I drove and drove yesterday to be here on the Cape. I escaped heavy the blindingly heavy downpours of the night before,  but there was  an intermittent drizzle that sometimes turned into regular, large plops. The northeast is wet, cold and soaked through. The mountain laurels are heavy with bud but too cold to blossom. The heat is still on; the hammock is dripping and about to moss over. 

 

 

When I got out of the car at The Cottage, my heart hammered a little because the garage door was covered in some kind of brown goo. When you are are not a full time occupant of a home, it can do strange things when you are gone. You find a tiny puddle of water in the middle of the laundry room; tor he dirt in the corner where you swept before leaving; or a near-record accumulation of twigs and small branches on the front lawn in the space of 4 days. 

 

 

 

I realized after a minute that the brown goo was not an outbreak of, let's say, carpenter ant excrement, but leaf casings, the tiny brown hull that protects the leaf before it buds out. The house and yard  was covered with a paste of this gummy, wet stuff  that looked like crepe paper  put through a mesh and sprayed everywhere.

 

 

 

My mind is kind of like that at times. The discarded emotions that others can quickly discard tend to linger and get all mixed up with the current emotions and suddenly I am clinging to  thoughts, words, and emotions that have nothing to do with current circumstance. It, too, creates quite a mess.

 

 

So today, with a house full of kids, dogs, mud, rain, battered leaf and leaf casings, and the noise of too many people disappointed in a wash out of a holiday weekend, I am not trying to escape, but sitting in their midst, drawing and cooking,  finding a deck of cards, some bones for 3 (!) dogs, and very grateful for those very tiny, very useful  earphones.

 

 

I am giving you some photos from another weekend. Let's all pretend it's this one!

Around the World in 7 Days or So It Feels

 

 

Don’t you hate when you get so behind on blogging that you don’t know where to start?

 

 

 

 

 I've been out on Long Island most days for a new work assignment. We've been coming up most weekends, so I go from one car to the other and one highway to another. 

 

 

My new are at work has me conducting deposition that last for hours each day.  When I get home, I try to write the report from that day so it is fresh in my mind and I don’t have to overly refer to my four hours of notes.  There's not much time for much else besides prepping for the next one, conducting it, and then writing it up. It's not unlike law school where you are in class all day and then rush home to do the reading and writing for the next day. And then doing it all over again until the weekend comes and then you try to catch up on all you didn't get done despite the long hours put it into.  How long I can keep this up is anybody’s guess.

 

 

 

This week, I went to Buffalo with a colleague to do some depositions up there. We didn’t see much of anything but downtown Buffalo, and there’s not much to see, but our Buffalo colleagues took us to a great  microbrewery and we ate Buffalo wings and drank Blueberry Blonde beer. 

I walked to the office each day with a Starbucks in hand and admired the very old buildings in between the empty storefronts and run down, empty mall areas. 

I really loved walking to and from work. I wish I worked in the city and could walk to work here. Of course, it is spring and even up there, it is warm and sunny. I suppose in winter it would be harsh, but just walking a lot made me feel more grounded and less harried than I do here where I am driving 70 miles roundtrip most days for this new assignment,

 

 

This is the atrium of the Ellicot Building where the court reporter is located. Isn’t it magnificent? The building was built about 125 years ago and is floor after floor of marble and oak, with operable  transoms, engraved door knobs, marble-lined restrooms, elegant elevators, and an amazing mosaic tiled first floor

 

 

 

 

The court reporter companies in the Bronx are in the basement of a building across from Yankee Stadium. The bathrooms are not marble and the stall doors don't stay shut unless you hold the bottom. The elevator does not have a free-standing marble podium surrounded by brass for the call buttons.  There’s a story that a rat fell out of a ceiling during a depo. I can’t confirm that story,  but I was there when water damage caused a ceiling to fall in on the table in a room  I was about to enter with a witness. 

 

 

We ain’t no sissies in my office. (Not that my Buffalo colleagues are, either. They have a huge workload!)  But seeing how things are done in less gritty urban setting was a pleasant change. The actual depo room was nothing more than a standard conference room, but the corridor doors were quarter sawn oak and had antique frosted glass on top.

 Downtown Buffalo has been hit hard by the recession.Very few business are open. The main industries appear to be lawyering (a fancy new federal court is there) and parking garages.  It is pretty sad to see all the shuttered storefronts and the dilipadiated tram that runs from one end of the business district to the other. We took it the first day but realized walking was much more pleasant. What probably was considered a stroke of genuis in urban planning 30 years ago has somehow now had the reverse effect of having pedestrians desert Main Street and stores are closed and rundown.

 

 

 

However, every few blocks there is a remnant of turn-of-the-century architecture. Some of the old buildings are breathtakingly beautiful and feature levels of craftsmanship that do not exist anymore.

 

 

This building is covered with terra cotta frieze and pillars.

 

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My colleague took a later afternoon ride to Niagara Falls but I had to catch up on some things and didn’t go. 29 years ago, I was in Buffalo for a press conference with the Attorney General’s Office for a case we were working on when I first found out I was pregnant with The Bride.  My boss and I drove to the falls but it was the coldest day in Buffalo’s history and the mist from the falls was a frozen cloud that obscured both sides. All we could do is listen to the rushing water and imagine the spectacle. I’m sure we’ll get sent up there again, so I’ll have another opportunity to see it. This time I’ll bring my passport since I understand that the best view is from the Canadian side.

 

 

 

 

 

The ride up and back was long but went through some pretty scenery. One stretch of road was as picturesque as it gets for western New York. Valley and hill rolling with huge tracts of  planted acres and dairy farms. My colleague was a good sport about slowing down so I could take  pics.

 

 

 

 

We are all converging on The Cottage this weekend to celebrate The Bride and Groom’s first wedding anniversary. I know, can you imagine? Where did that year go? So much change, so much good, and so much heartbreak. We are going to  grill and hang out with our kids and their significant others. I am sure there will be a campfire and I will be sitting under a blanket and remembering how The Empress was annoyed that we kept lighting camp fires last year becaue she hated to smell of smoke. I would find her in the lving room reading on her Ipad. She would come out if promised coffee and cake, and the girls would wrap her in a big blanket, where she sat until she stood up and said to my older sister, "Time to go home!" And home they went. 

 

She is always with us.

 

I will post more this weekend. We’ve been up and back more times in 2013 than ever beforeand I have lots of adventures to share with you.  The week after next Mr Pom and I will be there for a whole  week and I cannot wait!

 

 

Everyone be safe on your travels, have fun and kick back!  Dance between the raindrops. 

 

Happy Mother's Day of the Heart and Soul

Emersonian

Catch Us If You Can

(I apologize for the terrible paragraph formatting; typepad is having issues tonight.) 

This is the side of one of our favorite restaurants in Wellfleet. We've gone here for years under different owners. It used to be a very basic seafood joint: brown plastic trays, lobster or seafood broiled or fried, noisy, crowded tables, you know the sort. It got a lttle chi-chi in the last few years: candles on tables, outdoor seating with heaters, and a 4-page menu that includes sushi.

Chi chi matters little to us. We like the bar. Is that as bad as it sounds? Let me explain that the bar is outside and adjacent to the raw bar. It has awnings and plastic sides in winter and toasty heaters for spring. They reopened last week and we went up, choosing to sit at the chilly outdoor bar rather than in the empty except for a 90 year old couple dining room. (We are highly unfashionable on the Cape, eating by 6 and often in bed by 9.)

The new owners are also the owners of several other restaurants and a large fishing company. The seafood is FRESH. I don't experiment much with the menu. I am in Wellfleet. I like oysters. Wellfleet oysters are the best in the world. Decision made. 

What goes best with oysters? Most people say champagne but champagne makes me break out in a sweat and get a headache. So the best thing for oysters is a very cold glass of Chardonnay.  Un-oaked Chardonnay. 

Sitting at the bar, you get to pick the bartender's brain for the best of Chardonnays and other wines and ask questions about all the pretty drinks that people are sipping. I love looking at the pink and red and blue drinks and watching the bartender pour in foamy egg whites and coconut juice. Mr. Pom doesn't like a sweet drinks and I cannot drink them, so we just enjoy finding out what's in them and learning their names, like Sunsetters and Fresh Breezes.

Above the bar are huge glass jugs with spigots. One is full of tequila and hot peppers; one rum and fruit; a third fresh sangria. They are for the mixed drinks and shooters. I wondered if anyone late at night, after a real summer weekend crush of people, has stood under the shelf and pressed the spigot and let the tequila drain right into his or her mouth. 

Our bartender was around thirty, with a ponytail and a tan (already) and was expecting his first baby on Thursday. He'd cooked at several restaurants and was hoping to open a new restaurant in the coming year. We bemoaned the lack of good restaurants in our particular town, hence our 20 minut drive up to Wellfleet.  If I had the slightest ambition, I suppose that could be our niche. It's funny that of all the occupations I've fantasized about (bookstore owner, quilt store owner, illustrator, librarian, master gardener, interior design) I have never, ever wanted to run a restaurant. The closest I come is fantasizing about is an artsy coffee house. 

The oysters this Satuday were  ones of the best we've had anywhere. Even the bartender admired the dozen we were served. They tasted like the best of a fresh, breezy day on the ocean. There was the initial coolness, then the brinyness, then the sweet aftertaste as it slides down your throat. They are indescribably delicious and it makes me chuckle and think "more for us" when others tell me how they could never put an oyster in their mouths.

The Chardonnay that night was the same wine we'd had the week before. I had the same one glass as I always do. I don't know what happened but after about 10 minutes, I realized that if someone yelled, "Fire!", I'd have to roll out the door. The restroom was about 5 feet from me and I spent about a half hour planning how I would get from the stool to the door without falling on my face.

My remedy for those moments is to start drinking copious amounts of water and after three glasses, I was able to see straight and navigate to the restroom, though I think I may have been humming loudly and I am sure I was giggling in the can.

Amusingly, another couple our age were at the bar. They ordered some fussy drink that looked like a cross between a pina colada and a lemon drop. Then they each had another, and another after that. And sampled some of the sangria. Both were completely sober, by appearance at least.  They turned down a FOURTH round because they had dinner reservations at 8. I can't imagine how they could have eaten anything in an hour and a half, nor could I imagine how they would be awake in an hour and a half.  I would never make it on the cocktail circuit, so it's a good thing I can drink anyone under the table - as long as the drink is coffee.

We are home this weekend, Mother's Day and all. We need to mow lawns and weed beds, pick up dry cleaning and go to the bank. We need to catch up with children and sisters and buy groceries. 

We'd like to tell you that going to the Cape as often as we have this winter and spring has taken the edge off the siren song of the ocean, but it has it anything, only made it more irresistible. 

When we were about to leave, the bartender asked us if there was anything more he could do for us.  Sure, Mr Pom said, tell us the secret password to bypass the two-hour wait for a table come July 1st. The nice young guy laughed and said if he knew, he'd be a rich man.  I think the adjustment to Summer Cape is going to be a steep learning curve after 7 months of empty beaches, clear sailing over the bridge, and a seat at a table at any restaurant (except a handful) any night of the week.  We are going to miss driving right up to the water and letting the pups race up and down the dune paths and chase the waves. We will miss having our French coffee and pastries at the bakery where the line in season goes out to the parking lot.  We will miss most of all, driving up on a Friday night which is impossible due to traffic after Memorial Day.

But like that huge lobster being hauled aboard on the side of the restaurant, the allure of the Cape keeps dragging us back.  A problem we are happy to endure. 

Patron of the New who is Yearning to Acquire.

 Photo courtesy of analog/dialogue, who sources it from  acquiremag.com.

 

I LOVE these little wooden nautical flags.

 

I've been looking for art to hang in the cottage's laundry/room mudroom wall that can be seen from  the kitchen and eating area, and these are perfect. They are vaguely vintage but not hokey, nautical but not "sea-themed" and incorporate all the colors we use in the house. 

"Acquire Magazine" is the best name for a magazine I've ever heard. Why be subtle?  I can't actually find the link to the flags, but take a look at the website because it is a masculine luxury line whose target audience is either The Most Interesting Man in the World a la Dos Equis or  for the Wall Streeter who also owns a food co-op in Williamsburg and supplies it with rare funghi that it finds whilst mountain climbing in the Himalayas.

I found lots of beautiful goods.

Especially the bags.

For me. 

(Mr. Pom is more of a I-need-a-grocery-bag-to-put-my-clothes-in kind of guy when we go away. After 32 years, he is the perfectly distilled Mr. Pom, so let him be.)

As a lawyer who has to drag files to and from,I am always looking for THE briefcase/tote bag. Leather is too damn heavy once it's loaded and too boringly '80's. Have you ever seen a leather briefcase that made your heart quicken? No matter how supple the leather or how heavy the brass fittings, it still is just a boring work briefcase.

(Confession: what is worse than a conservative leather briefcase? A horrid  fabric rolling one with plastic wheels and an ugly, retractable aluminum handle as tall as myself. I recently got a new assignment requiring me to drag around a lot of files and laptop and after getting tendonitis in my elbow and shoulder, I caved and bought one of these hateful contraptions. The first one I bought was TOO SMALL, - can you imagine what I am lugging around?  And yes, I did consider my niche could be to design beautiful, funky ones, but who are we kidding? I will deny owning it if asked, by the way.)

I,too, want everyone to think that being a lawyer is just my day job and that in my  real life I crew for my alma mater,Oxford.

Mr Pom gave me a gorgeous red leather Coach tote for Christmas, but now that spring is here, I need to find something more lightweight. Also, we spend a lot of weekends on the Cape, and I am always looking out for the IT bag that I can cram everything into without looking like a shlub.

These are some interesting bags that Acquire spotlighted; they have that clean yet funky styling that I like in a bag:

 

 

From Stanley & Sons. In denim. Luscious and love the rivets. Probably too casual for work use, but it would be in heavy rotation on weekends for laptop, journal, beach towel. 

 

 

Love the leather handles and tabs and especially the outside pocket. Not suitable for most court appearances, but I certainly would use it for the office and  as an overnight bag.

 

Hickorees Tote Bag, another beauty from Stanley & Sons and my favorite with beautifully woven fabric and hand-hammered copper rivets. Neutral enough to be used anywhere. 

 

Love this, love this. 

 

The name of this bag is "Wantles" and I do wantle it.

 

This is from Dior, and I do believe that I could jam files into it. Elegant yet earthy.

 

A classic duffel that sets my heart aflutter. At several thousand dollars, however, I am very happy with the one I bought a few months ago from Amazon:

 

(FYI: I originally saw it on Kings Lane, but it was "in someone else's cart", and I was prompted to "check back later". Ah,ingeniously manipulative marketing ploys. After checking back a few times like a fool,I googled the name of the company and found the bag on Amazon for less than the supposed "deal" price. It comes in other colors for those of you that are not as enamored of the nautical look. Sturdy yet lightweight, and balances well on the shoulder and hip when loaded down with clogs, jeans, turtleneck, laptop, and too many books).

 

 

 

When in doubt, stick with a Spade, in this case Jack.  This is my favorite, especially for the shoulder strap links. 

 

 

Another darling Jack Spade at only  $38.

 

Acquire has all sorts of stuff for the men in your life or for your masculine side. I only looked at accessories and the pages are full of wonderful small leather goods, Iphone and I-whatever cases, as well as fun stuff like rolling leather dopp bags and leather pocketknife cases. 

 

 

This is ingenious: leather Iphone case with felted sleeve so it doesn't get scratched in your bag. I suspect it is rather heavy,though, and I am trying to get the dent out of my right shoulder blade from the usual weight of my bag.

 

 

I would plunk down cash for these vintage-inspired small wallets, particulary the blue zippered one with the sweet label. At a couple hundred each, I will have to be content with Yearning to Acquire. (By Jove, I think I just invented a new blog!)

 

 

When I saw this image, I literally gasped, much to the surprise of the table next to me at Sparrow's. Quamta's Sunburst Collection is  elegant simplicty. I love the thin profile, the quiet attention to detail, and the tan, red, and blue colorways, a favorite combination. Very elegant and completely unpretentious. Despite my best googling, I cannot determine the price point, but considering their as "luxurious leather goods", I believe they will become yet another entry in the Yearning to Acquire inventory.

The Quamta company not only produces these elegant and charming pieces, but also employs highly over-educated copy writers who heavily-influenced by Isaak Dinesen and Ernest Hemingway:

 

AS THE DAY BREAKS WE FIND OURSELVES OPENING UP TO AN ORGANIC FUSION OF UNTAMED SUMMER; BURSTING WITH PLAYFUL COLOURS AND RADIATING THE VIBRANCE OF AFRICA AND HER PEOPLE WHO, THROUGH THEIR CONSTANT JOURNEYS, HAVE ALWAYS BEEN INSPIRED AND MOTIVATED BY HER INTRICATE AND ELEGANT PATTERNS.

 

And I certainly would like to Acquire them.

The Quamta website identifies two stockists in New York, one of which is Patron of the New on Franklin Street. I would like to be a Patron of the New. In fact,  Yearning to Acquire is now facing competition from Patron of the New as a monikor for my new pretend blog.  The shop itself looks like it needs its own blog post, but that would require an in-person visit as their website is quite discreet.  Better to dream.

 

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We are enjoying the cool sunshine on the Cape before we bug out. Lots of exciting new outdoor work being done up here. Can't wait to see it all put together!

Have a good Sunday!

This post is not sponsored but brought to you free by Patron of the New who is Yearning to Acquire. 

 

 

 

 

Simply Put

The blessed month of May.

 

 

Navigating my days with my head pointed up.

 

Imagining myself a squirrel lost in a blizzard of petals pink and white.

 

Delirium of heaven.

 

Wind driven petal storms, a confetti of springtime.

 

 

Blue and white and pink.

Soul colors.

Floating in heaven colors.

Newborn earth. 

Turning weary eyes to the sun. 

The colors of prayer, freshly squeezed.

Imagine God again.

Infinite patience.

No yearning.

Steeped in the bliss of moment.

Yet fleeting.

Impossible to contain.

Infancy cannot stall and live.

Greening begins.

Fully leaf out.

Be.

 

 

Tours Trips and Staying Home

 

Spring is the time for wandering. For some, too, the time to stay home and dig out from the accumulated detritus of winter:

• That's where that magazine went!
• When did I order all these spring sandals??
• Why do we have so many winter coats and boots?
• Could we have more unread newspapers in this house?
• Stop shedding right now! Woof!
• There isn't as much dirt in the world as there as on the screen porch.
• Why can't I zipper any of these capris?
• Why did I ever think I could wear capris?
• My favorite: The realization that you have used the last PG Tips Decaf and you don't need to re-order until the first brisk winds of autumn.

 

 

 

 

The Pomegranates have been whipping to and fro on the weekends. First, to the cottage to try to line up some people to do work on various things like the tree that came down in the last nor'easter,  a fence for the dogs so we can bring them up there without walking them seventy million times a day, and the possiblity of turning the garage into a family room/art studio. Many, many people have come over with clipboards in hand. Many, many plans discussed. Excitement! Enthusiasm! And then....nothing. Either they never send an estimate, never return a call, or just disappear into the ether. I suppose they are all watching the herrings run. And who can blame them?

 

Last weekend it was time to visit Micalangela and in the true spirit of her parents, she knew where to get the bet seafood at the cutest seaside town. We toured the military academy at Annapolis and read the names of all the Captains lettered on the front steps of the officers' housing. We swooned over the Chesapeak at the foot of Main Street, the Victorian B &B's, and, of course, those sailors in their dress uniforms. Nothing beats a broad-shouldered man in a double-breasted military jacket with one of those flat white hats a la Top Gun. 

 

Just to put the icing on the cake, all my love of the South came flooding back when we hiked up the hill to see the Maryland State House, which was the capital of the United States for two years in the late 1700's. Cobblestoned streets, ancient trees, cottagey houses next to pillared mansions, and tiny shops filled with old chairs, chinoiserie, and pink and green  dear bibelots.  I fear I would abandon the Cape if I could inherit the AMAZING little bookstore we stumbled into in the historic part of Annapolis.

 

But home is where the heart is. There's plenty to see around these parts. Had a wonderful trip into Manhattan a few weeks ago with the Traveling Painter Sisters. It was a cold, rainy gloomy morning and then this:

 

 

 

The Sisters of the Traveling Paint Caravan (we change the name with each writing), took off for Soho for the opening of a new store that the fearless and chic Betti Zucker knew all about: Gudrun Sjödén Concept Store, 50 Greene Street.

Never has there been a store as bright, fresh, creative, and whimsical and it was just the antidote for the long, lingering late winter miasma.

  

 

Here is the beautiful Gudrun hereself, posing with our own colorful, chic character, BZ, who is wearing one of the beautiful outfits created by Gudrun.  Doesn't Gudrun just emanate joy and peace? 

 

 

 

Get our your watercolors, pastels, and colored pencils and dream up some of your own textile designs. We can all be Swedish for the day!

 

If you are not one to wear hand-printed textiles and layers of color, there are gorgeous home furnishings to brighten your life. 

 

 

Look at the darling entertainment! I am so sorry that I did not get the name of this duo, but I am sure they will be at Terminal 5 in a few years. Can you imagine walking into a store of shoppers on a busy afternoon and just....singing? They were wonderful and wanted to take them home.

 

We left loaded down with goodies in the fabulous cloth shopping bags that are a feature of the store. Gudrun believes in making all her products as green as possible. Her lovely bags make perfect journal bags, beach bags, or even with a quick seam, a beautiful pillow case. 

A photographer was employed to take photos of the customers as we left the store. Some of us had to be dragged in front of the lens. Others? Well, let's just say  that "presence" is their middle name.

Great fun!