An Outstanding Coiffure

Methinks Mommy needs to find a better place to hide the hair gel...

Vintage Mimi

I've been going through some old family photo albums, scanning pictures and restoring them. I was working on one of my Mom and me from ages ago when L saw it and was intrigued. She was able to identify both of the people in the picture without help, but she said they looked different.

"That's Mimi," she said. "But she doesn't look squishy there. She's squishy now! And that's Daddy when he was a baby. You're still squishy but now you have whiskers."

A Literary Awakening

It's been a lot of fun reading to L lately. She's definitely crossed some sort of literary threshold where books are not just fun things to tear or color on (a threshold N hasn't come anywhere close to crossing), and not just things to keep you from having to go immediately to bed, but things of great excitement and anticipation in their own right. Stacy and I have always tried to spend a lot of time reading to the kids, but up till just recently the attention span has been limited and the interest lukewarm. Heretofore reading has been a great way to cuddle with Mommy and Daddy and to delay the turning out of the lights, but the actual reading part has been pretty much incidental. The story would be tolerable and perhaps even mildly enjoyable for the moment, but you could tell there was only minor engagement and a limited sense of carry-over from one reading to another. Multi-chapter books were somewhat pointless; she would permit them being read to her, but you knew the subject matter of last night's story had no bearing in her mind on tonight's. To stir any signs of real appreciation in her, you used to have to read the same inane Dr. Seuss book for the three-millionth time while trying not to unconsciously verbalize your growing suicidal considerations.

Things have changed dramatically. All of a sudden she is engaged, attentive, captivated and invested. Instead of shuffling around on her bed, hanging her head off the mattress or divvying her concentration up between the book, her covers, the spider hiding in the corner, her brother's behaviour spasms, and the dozens of small doll accessories still lurking in her bed, she is now bolted to my shoulder, eyes fixed on the book, jaw trembling with respiratory responses to the rise and fall of the storyline. Where her chatter used to be an endless interruption of non sequiturs, it is now an endless interruption of interjections on plot twists, setting descriptions and pleas to the characters to heed her good advice. The end of the evening begging for "just one more chapter" still occurs, but now it has nothing to do with dislike for the evening's next event, but now is all about the pain of putting aside the world she had plunged herself into.

I don't know if this change is just the natural progression of age, or because we simply finally found the right, addicting book. It could be either, and likely is some measure of both. A couple of weeks ago I pulled out one of my childhood favorites, Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, thinking it might be time. I was partially motivated in the selection because Stacy has a special fondness for it too: I read it to her once, either while we were dating or shortly after we got married. The opening chapter was met with the characteristic lackadaisical engagement, but with each subsequent chapter I could see signs of smoke, and soon there was a clear flame and then quite a lot of heat. As we plowed through the book, L was awash in concern for the outcomes of the characters and giddy with the thought of edible grass and chocolate rivers. As we wrapped it up I could tell there was that first emotional coming-to-terms with the end of the story that I find so often in my own thinking when I finish a book - a little bit of that sense of loss, of the need to honor the beaten book by a period of almost mournful contemplation before diluting its memory by plunging into a replacement story. We'll talk through Charlie's adventures for another day or so, and then wish him well (I'm sure we'll see him again), and introduce the next adventure. At this point I'm thinking Sheila Burnford's The Incredible Journey might be a worthy undertaking.

As for other literary endeavors, last night I finished My Ántonia by Willa Cather. There is a certain subset of American authors I have always kind of considered to be somehow in the same vein (based on vague impressions of what they wrote and probably with highly suspect reasoning). I included Flannery O'Connor, Eudora Welty, William Faulkner and Willa Cather in that category. Other than O'Connor, I hadn't actually read any of them, but they all seemed to fall into a general American-rural, somewhat Southern or perhaps mid-western type literary space that I knew I should delve into deeper. A couple months ago I read The Optimist's Daughter by Welty, and this time I picked up Ántonia to give Cather a try. The Optimist's Daughter didn't particularly grab me, but I really came away appreciating Ántonia. I finished it around midnight and this morning I'm still in the weird, grieving sort of mood. There's something about that novel's sense of place, its approach to loneliness and the need to belong to a land or setting that really resonated with me, maybe because I have so little sense of belonging to any particular place. (I'm the ultimate transplant.) It is a warm and caring book, bittersweet, but in a sentimental way and not overly tragic, which in this case I really appreciated.

And lastly, in our typical halting and sporadic way, I am reading Stacy The Horse and His Boy in the evenings before we hit the sack. It's been amusing to note that we both could have sworn we read the book at some point eons ago (I remember thinking it was my least favorite Narnia book), but as we read through it now, absolutely nothing triggers any memories. It really is as though we're reading it for the first time. Fortunately the book is not living up to my preconceived notions and I'm enjoying it quite a bit. Stacy is loving it too, but I suspect she's a little biased. Stacy has this flattering, schoolgirlish thing about my reading to her. I think I could read her the Bell Yellowpages and she'd get all teary and gushy. I won't complain. There are so few things that get a beautiful women to hang on me. If books work, its a double victory.

Like Being on the Mayflower Itself!...

L's school had a Thanksgiving feast today and all the parents were invited. I had just gotten off of working graveyard shift for the last two days and was preparing to go back on days tomorrow and was trying to figure out whether to go right to bed or force myself to stay up till evening. I figured hanging out with a bunch of 5-year-olds eating turkey and pumpkin pie sounded like the right way to go.

The kids got to wear costumes that they made; L had been prepping me for it for several days. "I get to be a pilgrim," she said. "Some of the kids get to be pilgrims, and some get to be Indians, and some get to be Native Americans."



They held it in the school library and it actually was pretty cute. All the kids were amped to have their parents there, and N was allowed to sit in and feast away too. They had a real turkey and all the trimmings, complete with pumpkin pie and whipped cream for dessert! Each place at the table had a pretty thoughtful and creative place marker. It was a lunchtime shindig, so it only lasted about an hour and the kids were then marched back to their classroom for the rest of the afternoon, but it was fun seeing L and all of her classmates and meeting some of the parents. Usually only Stacy has the chance to do this kind of stuff.

Mandatory Halloween Pictures

Contractual mandates obligate me to post annual Halloween pictures. I have the same problem at Christmas; there's only so much you can do to make holiday pictures interesting. But I will obey the letter of the law even if the spirit whimpers in the process.

The carvers. The gooier the better!

The annual trip to frighten Grandma Flo.

Stacy put up a cool display in the kitchen window.

I assure you, L is a somewhat sad looking ghost
and not an Islamic jihadist.

The carvees.

Aunt Claudia braves the occult occasion to distribute candy.

There! Done! Maybe next year will bring a more inspired Halloween post.

Haunted Hiking

Saturday Halloweens are the best. I don't have to worry about leaving work early or running over dozens of miscreants on my way home. This year's was particularly nice. Knowing that after dark the world would be filled with demon spawn and other fell creatures of the night, we chose to stay a step ahead of the hellions and venture out bright and early for some family time. Stacy had found a hiking trail up on the Palos Verdes Peninsula that was short and easy and she'd been trying to get me to take everyone up there for a while. It was a beautifully clear, crisp Saturday, so it was a great day for it.

Our kids don't get out much... literally and figuratively, so any time we suggest hitting the great wide open, they spazz out in hyperactive glee, as if we'd told them we'd let Christmas come a month early. L immediately started packing snacks enough to sustain us on a four-day Amazonian bushwhacking and N started gathering all the appropriate toys and stuffed animals needed to accompany such a trip. Once Stacy and I decimated the luggage to manageable levels we headed out. (We now probably would have survived no more than one day of Amazonian bushwhacking.)

The trail is actually only a couple of miles from our house and I was surprised I hadn't heard about it before. It is a short and simple one - a 3/4 mile ascent up a canyon bottom to an overlook, and then the return down the same trail. We got there and unpacked the backpacks and prepped to set out. As we fitted L to her backpack we noticed it dripping suspiciously. We opened it to discover that L thought it overkill to put a top on her water bottle. The bottom of the bag was the remains of a mostly-dissipated alpine lake which was slowly seeping through the fabric. Thank goodness she'd triple wrapped the trail mix we'd made for journey. We set it in the car while we bailed out the backpack. Another near-victim of the flood was a blank notebook and pen L had packed away. I asked her what she planned to do with the notepad and she told me she planned to take notes on all wild animals and natural phenomena she encountered, just like Jack did in her favorite Magic Treehouse book series. I chose not to remind her she couldn't write yet.

The Mighty N,
Slayer of Rabbits

As I mentioned, Stacy had taken the kids on this trail before and kids squealed with excitement over telling Daddy what adventure we'd come across next. They prognosticated the little mile markers and benches with surprising accuracy. L wanted nothing to do with her soggy backpack, though she would not abide leaving it in the car, so guess who got to haul it up the hill. Meanwhile, it took no time at all for N to find his prime and prized hiking possession: a good stick, although he was nearly in tears several times because L kept examining his early finds and declaring them not good enough. (It would have gone so much better for N if she hadn't always thrown them in the gully.) Finally when he'd found a stick that passed L's muster, he held it up to me and proclaimed boldly, "Now I can kill a rabbit!" Not exactly sure where that came from. We generally don't give him much opportunity to impale woodland creatures.



As we ascended and began ticking off the markers the kids would recite what we would find at the next one and we were dutifully compelled to sit at each bench and over look each overlook. Our sites were set on marker 10, because that marker, claimed the kids, two-thirds of the way to the top had a particularly nice bench that would suit us perfectly for our mid-march snack and rest. The countdown (or up, in this case) heightened the anticipation considerably. I kept trying to show L and N the aromatic wild sage and sweet fennel growing along the side of the trail, but they were too hungry to pause for such trivialities and pressed us on to get to our rest-spot. Finally we rounded a bend and found the bench, just as predicted and L and N were all a glow in the flush of their navigational success. We removed all our still-dripping gear and sat down on the bench to indulge in our well-earned snack. As I poured through the backpacks, however, my heart sank. We'd left the trail mix back at the car! Much crying ensued.

Resting at "Starvation Bench"

Not sure we could complete the final 1/4 mile so famished and bedraggled, I nevertheless rallied the sulky troops and we proceeded up the hill. It was a discovery by Stacy that quickly changed the mood -- a good ways up the trail, sitting peacefully in the sun, was a little brown cottontail bunny. N whipped his stick around and sprang into action, but fortunately we were able to catch him before the innocent bunny had a chance to taste the sting of N's blade. We spent a little time with Brave, Brave Sir N, convincing him the bunny would do better un-shishcabobed and he eventually consented to spare its life, but the tight grip he kept on his stick told me his consent was reluctant and he was reserving the right to change his mind at any point. As an alternate plan the kids decided to pet the bunny instead, but the bunny had evidently seen their like before and waited just to the point where they thought they were actually going to get some cuddling in before maddeningly darting like lightning through a hole in the brush. L was halfway through the hole before she realized she was considerably bigger than the bunny.



We continued on our walk to the top and got to see a vista of LA in all its smoggy glory. N, denied his right to rid the trail of ferocious bunny rabbits, took up his second favorite hiking pastime - rock collecting. He quickly amassed quite an impressive collection of gemstones that looked suspiciously like chunks of asphalt. He was allowed to carry one and only one piece of blacktop back to the car so as to not unduly deplete the natural wealth of the area.



As we returned we passed a sign I had noticed on the way up. It amused me no less on the trip down. I had a little verse running through my head the rest of the way down the trail.

Pois porridge hot,
Pois porridge cold,
Pois porridge on an oak
Nine days old.

We eventually made it back to our car and our long-lost trail mix and we wolfed it down like ravaged expeditioners that we were. I tried to illicit some discussion of the hike we'd just taken, but realized that that was old news; the ghosts and goblins and the promise of evening candy was forefront in their minds, so we wrapped up our Halloween hike and headed home to brave as best we could the evils that were to come.

Another Finished Portrait

I finished another portrait in oil painting in class this week, a commission from our baby-sitter Rachel. It is her two nephews and will be a gift for her brother. It was a lot of fun to do.