It was a bit cold -- in the low 20s -- tonight when Micah and I picked the boys up from being babysat at our friends' house. Our friends don't live particularly close to us, and there isn't a really good way to get there from our place. It's two buses or two trains and a decent walk no matter which route you take. Micah was wearing Oliver in the bjorn, with his coat zipped up around him, and I was carrying Simon. We walked to the bus stop, looked at the time table and realized we'd have to wait at least 45 minutes for the next bus, so we decided to keep walking to the closest train station. It snowed a little bit last night, nothing too bad, and the sidewalks were pretty clear. At times we walked into gusts of wind, but they were always short-lived. Simon kept telling us he was hungry and asking for food, despite having eaten quite a bit before we left and having polished off a bag of goldfish cracker crumbs (I don't blame him for confusing "hungry" with "tired" -- I still do it all the time). We turned a corner and started walking up a small hill, and I looked over at Oliver. His nose was red and his drool was bubbling out of his mouth. I felt bad that he must be so cold and we still had a few blocks to walk before we got to the station. And then the thought, "At least you're not walking across the Plains," popped into my head.
I've heard of the ways people suffered as they crossed the Plains, of the cold and the scarcity of food. And it is true that at times I think I'm pretty hardcore, wearing my kids all over the place, carrying who knows how many pounds of laundry on my back in the rain and wind and snow. Sometimes I think we're relatively tough because we don't have a car and we do a lot of walking in all kinds of weather. But I always know that I'm not more than a few minutes away from warmth and food. I can tell my 2-year-old that he'll just have to wait until we get off the train and then we'll have dinner. And I don't go to bed at night hoping my baby doesn't freeze to death.
Micah and I are both descendants of pioneers, some of whom went through truly horrific experiences to get to where they were going. And right now I can't believe that I have taken pride in the "difficulties" of my life. I am grateful that I can do the things I do, grateful that sometimes it is a little bit hard and that I do it anyway, but even more grateful that my ancestors were as tough as they were so that I don't have to be.
Micah's version is slightly different, but I'm writing this, not him.
First, I have been making our bread for the better part of two years. I really liked the recipe I was using, and since I got it from one of my best friends I felt like it was important that I stick with it, if only for the illusion of some sort of added connection between the two of us. But then, over the past few months I started noticing that I was the only one eating the bread, and more often than not at least part of it would go bad before I could get to it. At about this time, I started hearing and reading about Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day from other friends. I was interested, but if I was going to make the switch, I wanted Micah to be excited about it too. Because if I was going to be the only one to eat the bread anyway, I might as well make my special-friend bread and pretend that it meant something special that I was using the special-friend recipe.So I told Micah about it and he was kind of like, "Nyeh." So I didn't do anything about it. And then some friends offered to let us borrow their copy of the book and Micah was kind of like, "Nyeh." So I didn't do anything about it. And then Micah was looking for ideas of what to get me for Christmas and I suggested the book and he was kind of like, "Nyeh." And then I thought, well, I'll just try it and if it is easier and if it Micah eats it, then I'll make the switch. So a few days after Christmas I whipped up a batch of the basic "boule" dough and baked a loaf. And Micah raved about it. We ate three (admittedly small) loaves in three days. So we decided to borrow the book from our friends to see if it was worth getting. We had it in our possession for about 7 hours before Micah was like, "Let's just do it. Let's just get the book and the storage containers and the pizza stone and do it."
And I was like, "Huh."
ps We've been using this recipe (also in the book) to make granola for our breakfast and it is rather tasty. I roast it at 275 for about 1 1/2 hours, stirring every 15 minutes, just until it starts to brown and it turns out really delicious. Like I can't wait to get home from my run so I can eat some. That kind of delicious.
Well, this is a weird feeling. I don't remember the last time things felt so normal around here, like we are actually doing what we are going to be doing for the next couple of years. I am not anxious about anything. I'm not overly excited about anything. I'm not bored or over-scheduled or trying to figure things out. I'm just being me. Running early in the morning, making breakfast, doing dishes, getting the boys dressed and out to go shopping or to the museum or institute or to do laundry, changing diapers, potty training, putting the boys down for naps, making dinner, trying to keep up with friends via e-mail and blogs and phone, planning Primary stuff, trying out new things (knitting, at the moment).You know. The usual. In the back of my mind there are some things that I keep thinking about, but they are the unknowable things, things that I just have to be patient about and for the first time in . . . forever? I'm feeling fine with just waiting, just being. It is fun to speculate on how things will go, but I don't feel the need to obsess about how much longer we can live in New York and where we will end up when we leave, or what our family will be like in 10 years, or when I'm going to be able to start (really) writing again and what my career will be like when the kiddies aren't sapping my brain power 97% of the day.
Yesterday I got my flute out to play some Primary songs for the enjoyment of the little people, but soon turned to some of the songs I learned back when I took lessons. I was playing a particularly emotional song and was just reaching the climax when I turned around to look at Oliver, who was sitting on the couch. He looked like he was fighting back tears. One tear even ran down his chubby cheek. But he managed to regain his composure when I stopped playing. I can only assume it was the power of the music that was affecting him so, and not my extremely rusty flute-playing "abilities." He has a sensitive soul.And also. One day last week I got in the shower and left the door open, as I (almost) always do when I shower so I could peek out and make sure the boys weren't killing each other. I'd just shampooed my hair when I heard a thud and poked my head out to see what was going on. I thought Simon must have fallen, but one look at the couch tipped me off: Oliver was no longer sitting where I had left him. And then the crying started, and it was Oliver's little cry. I was already out of the shower, of course, and ran to pick Oliver up off the floor where Simon had lost the strength to carry him any more. Simon claimed he needed to show Oliver some "new animals" in his room. Ha. Oh well. It was the first time, but I'm sure it won't be the last that Oliver gets hurt as Simon tries to be a good Big Brother. I'm just a little surprised it took 3 months for something like that to happen.
I'm a bit of a language nerd and I mastered in journalism, so imagine my delight when these two loves of mine collided this week in the "On Language" column that runs in the Times Magazine. Micah and I both laughed out loud as we read some of the hilarity that ensues when headline writers try to cut their words down to the bare minimum -- and beyond. "Red Tape Holds Up New Bridge" is a good one, but we both just about busted a gut when we read that the "British Left Waffles on Falklands." And we were both scratching our heads for a minute trying to figure out what the headline writer meant to say when “Google Fans Phone Expectations by Scheduling Android Event” popped up in print. Anyway, I know some of you share my love of a little ambiguity here and there, so I thought I would share it with you. Enjoy. Image from the Times. Obviously.
For those who have small children and are not acquainted with Charlie and Lola, I invite you to make their acquaintance. Charlie is an awesome big brother, and Lola is . . . well, Lola is small and very funny. Simon has picked up some of their lingo (he's always talking about having a "streemly, streemly" -- extremely, extremely -- "happy birthday"), which we don't mind since they are some of the few children's characters we aren't annoyed by in the least. We can't make a trip to the library these days without looking for a Charlie and Lola book and I'm fine with letting Simon watch a few episodes of the show at a time on YouTube. They are fun to read, fun to watch, and they aren't really preachy or anything -- they are just kids being kids. I should rephrase that: they are just good kids being good kids.
Friday is the day Simon and I make a "special treat." Today I started out by throwing some flour, salt, and sugar in the food processor. Then I added some shortening and Simon turned it on. And then he added the butter and pulsed it a bit. And then I added the water and folded it all together.I rolled it out with our awesome bubble-gum pink silicone-coated rolling pin, during which time Simon completely lost interest. I thought he would love using the cookie cutter on it, but I was wrong. So I did it. And I thought he would love spooning some blueberry preserves onto the circles, but I was wrong. So I did it. While he slept. Slacker. But it was probably for the best since it got a little messy when I was pressing them with a fork, and it would have been a complete disaster to let Simon help with the milk wash and the sprinkling of sugar.I was almost thinking it was a waste of time to come up with this project for "us" to do when it ended up just being me, but then dinner time rolled around and he took one look at this risotto I made (ack! it's green!) and said, "I don't like it." And then I said, "Well if you don't eat it, you can't have any pie bites," and so he choked it all down. It took him the better part of an hour to do it, but he managed. And I decided the pie bites were worth the risotto.
woke up early and went for a run in the rain. did the laundry with the boys. in the rain. did the grocery shopping. with the boys. in the rain. before lunch. The casualties included our Costco-sized wind-proof umbrella, which, it turns out, is actually not wind-proof -- and my record of never having given Simon a time-out in public. A mom's got to do what a mom's got to do. Unfortunately, the time out did not have the desired effect and we ended up carrying two baskets through the store anyway.
Simon couldn't stop laughing as I tried to turn our umbrella right side in and keep Oliver dry and out of the wind. At least one of us enjoyed the situation, although Oliver was a pretty good sport about being winded and rained on. I finally gave up on the umbrella and hurried us to the laundromat with it inside-out.
And then I sat on the couch and watched episodes of Chuck and Castle on hulu while folding the laundry. Thing 1 took a long nap in his room. Thing 2 took a short nap on my lap. As I finished folding, the clouds parted, the sun shone. And I shook my fist at it.
We're running the Ragnar Relay this May. It is 178 miles -- Woodstock to the Bronx -- and we are running it with 10 other people from our ward. It's going to be awesome.
Except that we have to start training now. And it is cold. And the days are short. And we only have a single jogging stroller -- not that Oliver is big enough to sit in a stroller yet anyway.
What that means is that I have to start waking up at 6:00 in the morning so I can go for a run in the early daylight before Micah goes to work. I prefer my mornings to start quite a bit later than that, but I also prefer 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep and that's not going to happen any time soon.
