Summer "Reading"

As I stood Wednesday morning, ankle-deep in the Atlantic on Sandbridge Beach, in Virginia Beach, supervising my kids as they played in the surf, it occurred to me that my kids are doing a lot of reading on this trip, but it's not the kind I would have expected.

Sure, my kids are reading maps, road signs and the occasional local newspaper, and Rhys has become expert at spotting those blue signs along the highway that signal that fast-food and bathrooms might be available soon.  But as we spend time in unfamiliar places, with all kinds of people, my kids are doing some kinds of reading that I hadn't considered before.  They have learned to read waves on the beach--when to swim forward and catch the wave, and when to dive through the wave or scrunch down a ways and bob over the crest before the curl breaks. On Wednesday night, they learned how to "read" a formal dinner setting at the home of our friends, John and Mildred, in Spartanburg, SC. ( John has always taken great joy in putting together elegant and sumptuous meals.  Back in our college days, he was the wizard of the after-concert receptions for his fellow musicians.)  When my kids and I arrived at John and Mildred's house on Wednesday, we were greeted with an elegant table, set for 13 (our 5, plus their 8), with the Roche's best china, silver, crystal, and a white linen tablecloth--a kind of poetry they hadn't read before.

Last night, when my husband's Uncle Jimmy met us at the door in Johnson City, Tennessee, with a dazzling grin and  "Haaaaaaaaa there!",  my kids got a speed-reading class in the broad drawl of East Tennessee.  Aunt Charlotte's sweet smiling welcome made them feel right at home, too.  At some point, I'm going to have to read up on cousin-labelling so that I know how to refer to the relationship between 8-year-old Joe, the youngest child of my husband's cousin, Susan (is that a second cousin?  a third cousin?), and my kids.  They needed no such translation.  They got all the information they needed when Joe showed them his trampoline, his big backyard, and his collection of toy weaponry, and the chasing, laughter, whooping and mock-warfare began.  

This morning, Patti has been invited to "study" the sumptuous jacuzzi tub in Cousin Susan's room, and have a bubble bath while watching cartoons, before we head off again down the road to Memphis, via Nashville.  As the Johnston household heads off to work and day-camp, I'm thinking that my kids need to try biscuits and gravy, Johnson City style in a local eatery, and I'll grab some coffee to fortify me for the road miles ahead.

Coffee, Bach, Schumann...

Greetings from Brooklyn, NY, where I am about 6 feet away from a Steinway that is filling the summer morning air with the most wonderful music !  We arrived at the Park Slope apartment of my dear old music-school friend, Marc, his partner, Seth, and their luminously lovely daughter, Samantha yesterday afternoon after a quick swing through my old hometown, Darien, CT, and lunch at my old school-days hang-out, Post Corner Pizza.

In Darien, my kids got a quick tour, pointing out the church where I first sang in choir, my old elementary school, the childhood home of my longtime friend, Nancy, and finally a loop around the cul-de-sac that was the street where I grew up.  My old house has not changed much, but I was struck by how much smaller everything seemed.  My driveway seemed much longer when my brothers and I used to spend afternoons devising all kinds of wheeled ways to coast down the hill toward the garage.  The route I walked to school seemed much longer when I was happily kicking leaf piles all the way to school back in the 70's.

After arriving here, we walked a part of this wonderful old neighborhood: the Park Slope section of Brooklyn, past Grand Army Plaza, up to Prospect Park to allow my kids to run, wrestle, and flop on the broad green lawn with my friends, and quite a number of New Yorkers who use the park as their own backyard.  Today, we'll be walking across the Brooklyn Bridge for some great views of Manhattan and New York Harbor.  Seth is busy looking up subway and bus routes for our explorations while Sam entertains my kids and Marc fills the air with music and the occasional "inside" comment like, "this sounds like Faure", or "here comes that thematic material again"

But once again, for me,  it seems that the some of my favorite episodes on this journey involve the people: family, strangers, new friends, and old friends whose endearing qualities only seem to intensify with time.  After a delightful evening of talking, eating, and laughing with Marc, Seth, and Sam, my kids and I are spending a relaxed waking-up time this morning listening to Marc, a professional concert pianist and music professor, share his music with us.  He's playing something right now that is by a 20th century Colombian composer, Mejia... poignant, rhythmic, and probably fiendishly difficult to play, but Marc makes it sound like the kind of thing one tosses off right after morning coffee.

Simple Joys

One of the great things that keeps happening on this trip are those unplanned moments of "this is the best trip ever!"  from my kids.  This photo was taken yesterday morning, on a nearly-empty, unspoiled beach in Kittery, Maine.  As you can tell from Patti's beach attire, we hadn't planned on staying at the beach because the day had started chilly and cloudy.  But, once there, with the sun emerging from the clouds, the kids found the powdery sand, the shells, the seaweed, the gentle waves, and the possibility of getting totally muddy and wet to be irresistible.  This particular beach is a residents-only, undeveloped beach:  no bathroom/showers, no snack bar, and a tiny parking area on the end of a winding, tree-lined road.  So, I found the most inviting driftwood log-seat I could find, and took several hours to play hide-and-seek with the sunshine and watch my happy crew dig, splash, shiver, jump waves, and collect treasures.

We have spent a number of very busy, people-filled days with extended family, big meals to prepare, and the daily tasks of maintaining our various "campsites" in my Mom's house, so it was pure bliss to do nothing but sit and simply inhale deeply that potpourri of seaweed and salt marsh and the air of the ocean itself.  For a few breaths, I was once again that happily soggy little girl with sand and seaweed in her wind-tangled hair, chasing my brothers down the beach, or quietly exploring the silky-gritty texture of powder-fine sand mixed with seawater.  

At one point, Patti found a large kelp "tail" that she decided was a huge paintbrush, and she spent quite a while exploring the artistic effects of dragging it along the low-tide sand in swirling patterns.  What artist would not be delighted with a canvas as wide as the seashore?  Eventually, she felt her work was "done" and signed her name, in letters at least 7-feet high.   I'd like to think that someday when my "work" is done, I'd be proud to sign it in 7-foot-high letters.

Today, I got to savor another simple joy. While my husband, my mom, and my brothers entertained my kids and their cousins,  I visited two very dear friends, Brett and his husband, Dave.  Brett has been my friend since our college days (yes, that was a long, long time ago), and is the most gifted voice teacher I know.  After receiving the precious gift of a voice lesson with Brett,  I sat at a delicious lunch (thanks, guys !) with these two loving, generous men and witnessed the grace with which they are facing some of life's most daunting challenges: cancer, aging parents, more cancer, and job uncertainty.  My friends are a couple of incredible Life-gardeners.  A lot of "stuff" has landed in the garden that is their life, and they are "composting" it for the blooming of their quiet and kindly souls into new life.  They are turning their lives into the kind of art that they will be proud to sign their names to, in 7-foot-high letters.

We've got a couple more days here in Maine, which includes another visit with an old friend (Nancy, whom I've known since elementary school, and her terrific husband, Jeff), and a few more meals of great New England seafood in my mom's favorite local restaurants.   And then, it's back to road adventures, and more visits with dear friends along the way.

But for now, it's time for a glass of wine with my brothers, and Andre, while we wait for my Mom's dinner masterpiece to come out of the oven.  To Life!  Salut!