Shiny Things

"Ay, mam i " It's been a while since I was cat-called on the street, probably because I don't walk very much here. It's hard to be cat-called when you're behind the wheel of a car. I had sort of forgotten what it was like. (In case you are wondering, it is not shiny.) This is sort of funny in light of the story a woman I know told me recently: Her work puts her contact with the public a lot. A while ago, a client at her workplace said some inappropriate things about the boots she was wearing and what they signified about her. When she went to her supervisor, looking for some support, she was told she "should just hold on and ignore this kind of thing," because once she's 40 "it won't happen anymore." Yeah. Today I was waiting to cross the street in Shaker Square. A man approaching me from behind called out "You sure do look nice in those jeans." I ignored him. He said it again. When he got to the corner, he said, "Did...

Earlier today I was mulling over how to write a blog entry on the general topic of "surviving vs. thriving" in some way that wouldn't come off as too self-helpy and vague. And then I cooked lentils. I was thinking about self-definition and how it can create or limit our (read "my") sense of the world. To be a survivor is good, even if it sucks that you had to survive something. It means you're strong and resourceful. (I had a whole riff going as I was making my way through the afternoon about being a social/emotional MacGyver.) But how, I wondered apropos of a situation I won't go into here now, does thinking of yourself as a survivor prevent you from *thriving* when you have the space and resources to do so? Maybe this is what a dear teacher of mine once called "the habit of poverty" when he admitted he didn't know how to use the bigger budget his program had been granted. We get so used to creatively making-do that we lose track of how mu...

I came upon this by surprise. I've been thinking about how having children has brought me into contact with people, places, and things I wouldn't have experienced on my own. (This is neither an endorsement for or against having children. Merely an observation of my own experience.) On Friday afternoon, I took Z to see her friend A while their little brothers "competed" in a chess tournament at a local elementary school (it was deliberately not terribly competitive). A's mom, Andrea, is one of my "yoga mom" friends, a group of four of us who met while pregnant more than 10 years ago. She and I were talking to some other women and came upon the topic of how we are much more networked we are as a result of our children (one woman used the term "social capital") and with people we wouldn't have crossed paths with if we stayed in our own circles. Andrea, who is dear to me, is someone I doubt I would ever have known otherwise. Then again, I didn...

Behold the wonderfulness. Why, yes. That is  Thayer's famous peach-apricot vanilla spice ice cream on top. What can I say? Calvin's Day was a delight. The day after was a bit of an emotional hangover (well, and I worked for 10 hours, so that). We slept in, played games and wrote while David ran , had breakfast out, went to the aquarium and got to touch a slipper lobster along with rays and anemone, went to the zoo where an orangutan stuck her tongue out at me and the otters were very playful, and came home and prepared a big feast together. At dinner, I asked the kids what having this day meant to them, partly probing to try to find out if having a dead brother whom they never knew is socially awkward for them. "Having the day off from school" and "We get to play all day" were the answers. Those are fine answers. When I asked what they tell people about it, Z said what she has said before, "I just say I have an older brother but he isn't alive,...

Happy birthday to my otter boy It is the first day of spring, Calvin's Day, as this date has come to be known in my family. Getting ready for bed last night, O grinned at me and looked up through is hair and said, "I can sleep in tomorrow because it is a holiday in our family." March 20, 2013 is the 12th birthday of my first child, Calvin Baker Thayer-Hansen. He was stillborn twelve years ago, and my life changed irrevocably. Or it changed the morning of March 19, when my midwife couldn't find a heartbeat. Or sometime in the 10 days before, when he died without me knowing it -- maybe when I was sitting in the seminar room of the English department interviewing for my first classroom assignment. Or it changed in the first weeks of pregnancy, when something went wrong with the implantation of the placenta or with the combination of my chemistry with that of the embryo or whatever mechanism it was that fucked with my vascular system and cascaded into preeclampsia, the co...

Lovely cormorants. I also saw a heron and an egret, as well as several brown pelicans, one of whom almost ate my face. I just got home from a conference in Florida, where I went blissfully sockless for three days then somehow tripped while dancing in my vintage stilletos. Did I twist my ankle? No. I hurt the lowest toe joints -- the ball of my foot, but on top too, and inside. I don't know how exactly, but I am limpy. The conference was good, but I am a ball of confusion. Returned home to a house dark and messy and full of sleep. David promised Z that I would wake her and tell her I had returned, but she would not wake. Only one cat has roused itself to greet me. I too need to sleep. Reading: Carol Anshaw's Carry the One is really deftly done. I appreciate how each chapter is a  bead on the thread with no messy webbing trying to tie them together too tightly. Also, she manages multiple POVs very well. And, also, the story and characters are compelling, and she has some rea...

Sometimes driving is good. Took a long drive to Columbus and back (a 6-hawk trip!) today for an inspiring meeting. On the way down and back I got to listen to CDs and reflect on a lot of great stuff. Wordy stuff, like some funny Wait Wait Don't Tell Me bits (Michael Pollan and the Japanese high tech toilet quiz, for instance), and pieces from Chuck Palahniuk's book of short nonfiction pieces, Stranger Than Fiction , and the first couple of chapters of Pearl S. Buck's The Good Earth . And musical stuff too, like the David Bowie Reality Tour live album (I recommend it) and the Pretenders' first album. (I also had Scissors Sisters and Preservation Hall Jazz Band CDs that I didn't get to listening to.) The introduction to Palahniuk's book he read himself for the recording. It is a personal essay about the cycles of loneliness and connection, fact and fiction in his work and in American culture in general. He makes this interesting point about the American dream be...