Month: August 2018

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On Living Slow

Recently I was walking home from the Metro after another evening of working late – tired, of course, and hungry, because as usual I didn’t know that I’d be working late by the deadline to order dinner on the firm.  As I trudged up the steps to my front door, I waved hello to my next-door neighbor, who was gardening in her front yard.  She waved back, then frowned, and said “You must think that I have no life.”

I thought about that.  There she was, enjoying the peace of a long summer evening with her hands in the dirt, transplanting bunches of echinacea.  And there I was, just hoping that I’d made it home in time to kiss Nugget good night before he fell asleep (no hope on Peanut, who sacks out at about 6:45 every night).  “On the contrary,” I told her, “I think you have a lovely life.”

I wouldn’t classify life as particularly exciting at the moment.  I’m not a Hollywood starlet or an Olympic skier, or Meghan Markle.  But it sure does seem to be fast-paced.  My weeks are often spent at a breakneck speed, rushing to and from work, school or camp, and home.  From the time the kids wake up until the time they drop off to sleep, I’m either parenting – bumping around the kitchen making lunches, searching for sandals and lost toys, breaking up fights – commuting, or working.  If I’m lucky, some of those hours are made up with reading stories or playing trains.  But no matter what, it is constant.  And it feels as though it’s all happening at the speed of sound.  That’s not a comfortable or enjoyable pace for me, and I’ve found that the only way to get through this extended busy season is to take every opportunity I do get to slow down.

I’ve always been drawn to the idea of a life lived at a seasonal pace.  Even in high school, I dreamed of retreating to the mountains to live in a little cabin surrounded by lavender and mountain laurel.  I’d keep chickens, grow a big garden, and spend my days roaming the trails, swimming in a pristine lake, and writing the Great American Novel.  In the winter, I’d snowshoe through a balsam forest and then come home and curl up under a cream-colored blanket.  In the summer, I’d strum a guitar by a campfire – never mind that I don’t know how to play the guitar – and stockpile garden bounty for the colder months.  (Basically, I wanted to homestead before I knew that homesteading was a thing that happened outside of a Laura Ingalls Wilder novel.)  Sometimes, in this fantasy, I had a family.  Other times, I was blissfully alone.  Of course, I knew that it was never going to happen.  But it sure was fun to think about.

I may not be living in an isolated mountain cabin.  My busy lawyer-mom life is a far cry from the hermit life I dreamed of living.  That’s a good thing.  I’d much rather live this life I’m living, hectic as it often is.  I wouldn’t trade my husband and kids, or our bustling city lifestyle.  But I do try to slow it down, especially on weekends when I have the luxury of doing so.  I love the slow things in life – long leisurely lunches, complete with a crisp rosé in the summer.  Picnics in the sunshine.  Long walks through peaceful wooded paths; bonus points for a breathtaking overlook.  Reading for hours.  Sipping a cup of tea while watching the rain pour down outside my window.  The extended process of bread-baking.  Sitting curled up on the couch in the children’s section of the library, watching my kids play with the latch boards and bead boxes.  Knitting a shawl.  Paddling my kayak down my favorite (gentle) stretch of Potomac or around an Adirondack lake.  The rhythmic sound of my running shoes on the Mount Vernon Trail.  Long conversations with a good friend.

Fast-paced things have never drawn me.  Steve loves fast cars and shoot-em-up video games; I don’t get the attraction at all.  I’m glad he knows what makes him happy, and glad to indulge him in his own personal joys.  But for me – I want something simpler.  I want time, time with friends, time with family, time with my kids.  I want quiet, and peace, and rest, and when I get those things I try to make them last.

What slow things make you happy?  Or do you like to live at a faster pace?

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Top Ten Books of 2018 (So Far)

Well, it’s only August!  The summer is flying by – as usual – and it just occurred to me that I haven’t done a “top ten books of the year so far” post.  I’ve been seeing similar posts pop up on other blogs over the past few weeks, so maybe we’re all running late?  In any event, completely unscientifically and vaguely in chronological order, here are my ten favorite books read in the first – errrrr – seven months of the year.

Period Piece: A Cambridge Childhood, by Gwen Raverat – Steve and the kids gave me an absolutely gorgeous edition of Period Piece for my birthday in 2017, and it was a lovely reading experience to start off the year.  Raverat grew up as Gwen Darwin, granddaughter of Charles, in Victorian Cambridge, before becoming an woodcut illustrator and marrying Jacques Raverat, himself a well-known artist.  Raverat is one of the first professional female artists to gain reknown, and Period Piece, her charming memoir of her childhood, is illustrated with her own work.  I love woodcut illustration, and I love Victorian childhood lit, so basically I was here for all of it.

Consider the Years, by Virginia Graham – Graham was a genteel, upper-class lady, married and moving in the best social circles, when the world came crashing down in the form of the Blitz.  Consider the Years is her collection of poetry from the beginning of World War II to just after the war’s end.  It’s beautiful, sad, sometimes funny (oh, Nanny!) and altogether wonderful.

Behind the Lines, by A.A. Milne – Somehow, despite reading his Winnie-the-Pooh books more times than I can count, and despite being well aware that Milne also wrote many books for adults, I’d never read any of his work not set in the Hundred Acre Wood.  That is – until I saw Behind the Lines on another book blog and scrambled to obtain a copy for myself (it’s out of print).  Milne’s Home Front poetry is witty, funny, poignant and delightful – much like When We Were Very Young and Now We Are Six, except with newspapers and barometers.

84, Charing Cross Road, by Helene Hanff – People have been telling me to read this book for literally years and I finally got around to it (and in great style, in the form of a fire engine red Slightly Foxed Edition – so pretty).  Hanff is a Manhattan bibliophile who writes to a London bookstore in search of some inexpensive used books to complete her self-assigned course of education and personal enrichment.  She gets the books – lots and lots of them – but something better as well: cross-Atlantic friendships with the store’s entire staff, all of whom write to her at various points.  The letters they exchange are hilarious, chatty, and sometimes sad as Hanff details the financial woes that prevent her from coming to London and having a cuppa with all of them in person.

Space Opera, by Catherynne M. Valente – Eurovision in space?!  What’s not to love?  Valente is one of my go-to preorders; I think she’s one of the most original authors writing today.  Her latest novel was such a fun romp.  Decibel Jones is a washed-up and aging glam rocker who finds himself in the unusual position of being the only hope for the survival of humanity after a blue birdlike alien arrives and informs everyone that unless Decibel and the remnants of his long-dispersed band manage not to come in dead last in an intergalactic singing competition, Earth will be obliterated.  No pressure, D!

Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen – My choice for the first read of my new book club wasn’t very popular, sadly.  But Northanger Abbey is one of my favorite Austens, and every time I read it I remember just how much I love it.  I adore naïve Catherine, sweet Eleanor, handsome Henry, and even the clueless Mrs Allen.

The Last Watchman of Old Cairo, by Michael David Lukas – I’d have picked this one up for the cover alone (I mean, does it get more beautiful?) but I had read and loved Lukas’ debut novel, The Oracle of Stamboul, years ago and was eagerly awaiting his sophomore effort.  This didn’t disappoint – it was just as richly imagined, gorgeously written, evocative and absorbing as its predecessor.  I got it from the library, but I might need to buy a copy, because I loved it so much.

Brensham Village, by John Moore – The second volume of the Brensham trilogy, a lightly-fictionalized memoir about English country life from the Edwardian days to World War II, was a definite highlight.  (I also read the first volume, Portrait of Elmbury, which was excellent, but included one very jarring paragraph with a couple of racist sentences.  I wouldn’t throw out the baby with the bathwater, but Brensham Village pulls ahead by being more charming in every respect and also, no racism.)  I have copies of each book in the trilogy in gorgeous blue and green Slightly Foxed Editions, and I look forward to returning to the world of cricket on Brensham Green, followed by pints in the Horse Narrow, very soon.

I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made For Whiteness, by Austin Channing Brown – I have been trying to stay abreast of the important memoirs about the experiences of people of color, and while there are many standouts, I’m Still Here has been my favorite.  Brown’s writing is elegant and compelling, and her life experiences well worth reading about.  I devoured it in a day.

North and South, by Elizabeth Gaskell – This classic is a must-read that has been on my list for a long time, but I finally picked it up to get me through the grief of losing a loved one too soon.  The family member we lost had loved this book and encouraged me to read it, and now I finally have.  The first few chapters may be a bit splotchy with dried tears, but I was able to close the book with a smile and think to myself, you were absolutely right, of course.

Some good reading so far this year!  I always gravitate to classics, but I did so this year more than most, as you can probably tell from this list.  There’s just something so comforting about a big cup of tea, a warm woven blanket, and a classic novel when the winter winds are howling outside (or really, anytime throughout the year, although I might pass on the blanket in the August heat).  I also think that as the world outside gets scarier and more unpredictable, my bookshelves become more and more of an escape.  Everything else is moving so fast – I just want to take things slowly and keep it simple at home, and that probably shows in the reading I most enjoyed in the first half-ish of 2018.