pomegranatesandpaper

(De)Stress Reading

 

 

I've been complaining for the last few years that my reading habits have crashed due to the Damn Internet. Instead of a book a week, I am reading skeeteen million blogs and obsessively looking for new pictures of my grandson when my daughter posts on Instagram. 

I have now, however, solved my Internet-induced ADD due to my HAD (hyper anxiety disorder)! Yay for the Damn Internet!

You see, one of the few parts of my body   that still get a great aerobic workout and  keep my cardiac rhythm pumping overtime are my well-exercised adrenal glands. Kids, they are in the best shape of their lives - 60 is the new 20!

In order to tame these little monsters, which  have the sleep habits of a two-month old, I tried the following, to wit: 

•  meditation (completely bogus - if you can't concentrate, then you can't meditate)
• preslumber exercise (induced leg cramps)
• midnight eating (hence the 35 lbs I had to lose the past year)
• Pinterest black holes, 
• TV (wakes up the dog who whines to get out of his crate)
• obsessively predicting worst case scenarios for every mistake I have made in every case, investigation, or trial; diseases I suspect I have after in depth research on WebMD; and financial ruin (from all the shit I can buy on Amazon in the middle of the night).

After a few years of this, I realized that as long as I am going to shine the monitor  light into my face in the middle of the night and therefore completely upsetting my circadian rhythms, I would be better off reading books than scrolling down FB and "liking" a million pages about labradors and Cape Cod. 

So yay, I am not sleeping any better, but I am much more well read!

 

KINDLE-ING

Last night (and part of this morning, thus late for work by a half hour but it's Friday and I had an in office day) I finished The Girl on a Train.  Fast-paced mystery as seen from the vantage point (mainly) of an alcoholic, divorced 30-something woman who has invented a storybook life for a young couple she sees from the train every morning, only to find out that appearances are deceiving. It was very smooth, interesting,  well-plotted, and scary enough to divert my attention from my own under the bed horrors. As a middle of the night book, I highly recommend it for when you absolutely know that no matter what you do, you are going to be awake until dawn.

For when you are just off your game enough that you keep waking up but are not having night sweat anxieties, just mere why-is-it-so-hot-no-one-turned-down-the-freaking-heat, or will he EVER stop that FREAKING snoring, I cannot recommend enoughThe Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing. Unless you find completely compelling endless pages about invading your family's privacy by throwing out their belongings without permission, or you enjoy staring at the ceiling wondering if your socks really do feel exhausted from being bundled into pairs instead of being folded flat,  I can completely recommend this book as a cure to any insomnia. And seriously, aside from being snarky, what exactly does she give as practical advice other than that you have to completely your declutter your house in one fell swoop or its just going to be be messy, which we learned in kindergarten.

For those nights when you are just fed up feeling anxious and old, please pick up India Knight's "Older, Wiser, Happier".  I really did like parts of this book, especially the make up and skin care parts because I love English products and just clicked on Amazon and ordered the English tooth-whitening toothpaste that she recommended (of course see above: middle of the night shopping straining budget and marriage). She is funny and has a great handle on all the crap that bedevils middle aged women like bad knees and stiletto heels, stepchildren, affairs, and what to wear to a cocktail party without looking like a fat frump. Personally, I haven't been to a cocktail party since my daughter's wedding,  have never had an affair, and haven't worn stilettos since my twenties,   so not really relevant but it's nice to know that I have avoided being that woman of a certain age who has had too much to drink and has lipstick up around her nostrils. 

LISTENING

Sometimes, I find I can fall back asleep pretty quickly if I put in the earphones and listen to a book. Of course, I then have to replay the whole thing in the car the next day, but that's okay.  Vanessa and Her Sister: If our mandatory online 24 hours of biannual Continuing Legal Education was taught by English barristers, I'd have it all done in the first month. I will listen to almost anything read in an English accent, and the narrator of this novel is just perfect and you will learn that Lytton Strachey is pronounced Stray-chey not Stray-key.  

All the kidding aside, this novel was very unsettling for me, which you will understand when I reveal that I have had a a photograph of Virginia Woolf on the wall of my study since college, where I  wrote more papers about her writings than anyone else. I have every novel and all her diaries. When I am trying to write, I often think of her in her deep, upholstered chair with her wooden writing board on her lap, turning out masterpieces with a fountain pen and foolscap, and wonder why I cannot do the same lying on my bed with laptop on lap.

So it was disturbing to find out that her sister Vanessa should have bitch-slapped her about a hundred times  but they were all so Bohemian upper class, which means that   all the Bloomsbury gay men were having riotous serial affairs with each other, the straight men were all sleeping with their friends' wives, but  the women were all stiff upper lip and just sighed and frowned discretely when their sisters poached their husbands right out from under them. It was somewhat soothing to learn at the end that   Vanessa had affairs throughout her life but remained married to Clive Bell; that her true soul mate  was Roger Fry, who paid Virginia no mind despite her best efforts;  and that she had a child with Duncan Grant, and she, Clive, Duncan, and his gay lover, all raised and lived together in Charleston house.   The Real Housewives of Anywhere have nothing on The Bloomsbury Group. 

The Miniaturist is a novel I really wanted to like, and did in major parts.  It takes place in the 1600's in Amsterdam but has a decidedly modern sensibility as it debates the role of women in the world and the abomination of the persecution of homosexuals. The city, the international spice trade, the food, the homes, the mores of society, and the costumes are beautifully and evocatively illustrated. Some of the characters are superbly developed and disturbingly unique. However, the eponymous thread of the narrative, though skillfully and creepily woven throughout most of the book, is left hanging, unexplained and tattered by the end. It is worth the read for the author's sheer brilliance at bringing to life a historical era not much written about and a strange, unrequited love story, but as a satisfying ending to a mystery, it falls short.

This week, I began listening to Joy Fowler's "We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves". It is fast, witty, sardonic, and self-effacing. I already knew the plot hook and I am glad I've reached the part when it is officially revealed, but I find myself wanting to fast forward to find out how it all went down, which means that I am finding it more interesting for the plot than for the characters. Too soon to say, however, and I'm sticking with it. 

HARDCOVER, MY HEART 

There are tons of books around here. Really, it's a sickness when your TBR could only be read if you quit work and became a book reviewer for a living (I AM AVAILABLE AT VERY SHORT NOTICE). But whatever, I love books, book covers,  hardcover, paperback, and they are not going away. 

So here is the one I can't wait to continue reading tomorrow, Saturday!  H Is For Hawk.  I had just started it and knew it was going to be great when my cousin Alison, who has great reading tastes and is in love with ospreys and hawks, etc,  asked me if I had heard of it and my daughter laughed because the book was on the back seat of the car. If only I could be a writer with such writerly skill as to entwine with great love and care her grief over her father's death with a study of goshawks.  I've only read the first few chapters, but I'll let you know more. 

 

So, it is midnight, Mr. Pom is not snoring yet, and I need to go to sleep so I can wake up early, go to Starbucks and read H is for Hawk.  There's rumor of a fast trip to DUMBO to go to Jacques Torres' chocolate shop to look at huge chocolate chickens and bunnies and have more coffee and buy some Easter basket goodies. See y'all later and let me know what you are reading/kindle-ing/and listening to. 

 

 

 

Snow Is Falling On Marvel Mountain

Anyone else here have the words to every Raffi Christmas song imprinted in the brains of each member of the family?

If you could see out my bedroom window this moment, or I wasn't too lazy to go downstairs and find my phone and take a pic to upload, you would think it was Christmas Eve and we were having The Best White Christmas Ever.  I took a pic with Photo Booth, but it sucks and no matter what filter or adjustment I make, you can't see the snow coming down. 

So just picture a snow globe with heavy flakes falling quickly and thickly, and you have the damn scene outside the window.

The mister and I are very grateful that we blew out of the Cape at of 9:15 this morning because neither of us knew this was forecasted, and if we got caught on the New England Thruway in this mess, we'd both be crying. 

WIFE: What's the weather supposed to be today?

HUSBAND: Supposed to be sunny and above freezing.

WIFE: Really, looks like snow.....

HUSBAND: Nope, no snow today. 

 

I say no more.

It's been quite the week of travel, training, training, training, and then an unexpected FOURTH day of training, which resulted in me landing in New York Friday night at 10:30 PM and dragging my heavy suitcase all by myself up to the rooftop parking lot as the wind howled around me. 

I am not being that dramatic.

Then we jumped out of bed, rounded up the dogs, and  left for the Cape at 7:15 the next morning. (I hadonly agreed to so Mr. Pom wouldn't drive by himself and then  I had to drag him out of bed,  he who was in his PJs drinking wine when his wife pulled into the driveway and didn't hear her, and he who didn't have anything but spoilt milk for her to put in her tea after being away on business for a week.....)

But I digress. 

Someone on IG  described us such an adventurous couple when I posted that I was in Chicago at 6:30 PM and on Cape Cod by way of New York 18 hours later. 

Let me disabuse you of this notion: our idea of adventure is cappuccinos in the city on Saturday morning. 

 

We did not go to the Cape for the adventure, we went because of this:

 

 

And this:

 

 

And also this:

 

 

The top photo is the mountain of snow left by the front loader that bulldozed the driveway clear for us so an oil delivery could be made. The regular guy who plows couldn't do it because it was  2 feet of snow and 6 inches of ice on top. The middle pic is our bay beach - Cape Cod Bay - where we swim every summer. That little black dot is a crazy peson walking out on the water like you know who. I suppose I could have walked to Boston and visited The Graphic Designer. I usually sit on that bench to watch the 4th of July Fireworks and bat away the no-see'ums.   The bottom pic is one of about 6 rows of snow 20 feet high that stretch the length of Nauset Beach parking lot, apparently dumped there by the town. 

Nauset has been decimated by the storms and I'm not posting pics here, you can see them on FB or IG, because it is too depressing. Suffice to say that Liam's may have to cordon off a section of the parking lot to put the picnic tables before they fall into the ocean. 

We hadn't been up there in 6 weeks and we were scared to death that the roof was about to collapse, or the water in from the street  had frozen. Flip, who cleared the driveway, put us in a panic when he told us that our cable/internet line was laying in the street, and we weren't sure if the electric lines were down also.  We were very, very grateful, giddy almost, to discover we had water, heat, and electricity, no limbs or trees down, and only a few inches on the roof. 

[Question: If I can go on IG and FB and receive texts whilst hurting down I95 at 65 mph (with Mr. Pom in the driver seat, not I), why could I do none of the above whilst in my own house when the internet service was down? Why??]

And due to this  blasted snow, although we rushed home in plenty of time for our once a week Squishy visit,   the roads are too bad to get out and we won't see him for another week.

Oh good grief, what sunny, happy pics can I show you??

 

 

Chicago was just as cold and snowy. I was deliriously happy just being able to walk through this concourse at O' Hare and pretend it was spring. 

 

 

I tried to surreptitously snap pics of the floating glass sculptures as I pulled my 45 pound suitcase and laptop bag along without looking like a total tourist gawker. 

 

 

These beautiful window peels were created by students and I am trying to google the exhibition, but am coming up with naught. Sorry. 

The effect waslike walking into a tunnel of sunlight and summer, and very welcome after a week when my only contact with fresh air was from the space between the hotel door and the shuttle to corporate and back again at night. Without a car, few of us went anywhere for dinner, and instead became  fast friends with the hotel pub, where we had healthy and  balanced dinners each night  of tomatoes (Bloody Marys) and veggies (free popcorn).

 

But look who picked me and drove me to the airport, and took me to dinner and lunch!

 

 

Vermont and New York collide in Chicago! And Miss Carol showed up at lunch at Portillo's, which I knew nothing about and now am all jazzed to take my colleagues there to eat hot dogs  in October, when I return.  Or at least the Famous Chocolate Cake. 

 

So although our baby learned to clap this week, and I wasn't there, and although all his aunts have held and cuddled him all week, and I wasn't there, and although the snow has erased the time in the next week that I can see him,  and I will in truth probably pass out well before Downtown Abbey, I'm not bitter.

 

 

Just in a total funk.