The battle for blue hydrangeas is one I waged for many years. It’s true that certain hydrangeas change their flower color depending on whether the soil veers toward the alkaline or acidic, and they fluctuate between pink and blue, with all sorts of shades in-between. It’s a lesson in science as much as beauty, and that is the crux that appeals to my scientific aesthete.
We haven’t had blue flowers from our hydrangeas in a very long time. Hell, we haven’t had ANY flowers from most of our hydrangeas in many years, but back when we did I amended the soil with all sorts of random metal objects in an effort to get them to go true-blue. Screws, nails, washers, paper clips – anything that could rust got littered about the base of our plants. I tried coffee grounds and soil acidifiers too, but no matter how much I tried, we ended up with pink so I gave up. Those super-saturated shades of deep blue seemed to only be found in the beautiful yards of Cape Cod or coastal communities. Sometimes, you just can’t force nature. Pink was perfectly acceptable – if not glorious in its own right, and I’ve never had a problem with pink so why start now?
This year, however, one of our backyard plants – which are the ones that haven’t bloomed in over a decade – suddenly sent out some flowerheads, and as you can see here, they are starting off with the faintest hint of blue, so I have hope we may get some bluish shades after all this time. Maybe those screws finally rusted enough to have made an impact. Whatever the case, I’m thrilled with the result.
I’m going to guess that if you’re straight and white and reading this, you don’t really know what it’s like for someone to want you dead. Maybe I’m wrong, and I have such a marvelously-varied coterie of friends that perhaps more than a few of you have. I’m not talking about an ex or a sworn enemy. I’m not talking about the person who cut you off for the second time in a week or the one who keeps getting your Starbucks order wrong. I’m talking about some stranger who simply wants you to cease to exist because they hate what they think you are – whether because of race or skin color or religion or gender or sexuality.
This isn’t about the general idea of being disliked or discriminated against. It’s not about the relative with whom you share a mutual and constant dislike – maybe even hate. In all those instances, I doubt those people ever genuinely wanted you to die.
I’ve gotten a disturbing cache of Twitter and Facebook messages that literally wish death upon me just for being gay. “Die faggot” is about as clear and direct as it gets. If you’ve never had that kind of language directed at you, if you’ve never had to really think about and ponder whether strangers want your life to end, then you can never know. That’s why we have a month of Pride. That’s why there’s a Black History month. That’s why you don’t say “All Lives Matter” or ask why there’s no straight pride month.
As this year’s Pride Month comes to a close, it feels like we need it now more than ever.
At the end of ‘Black Swan’, Natalie Portman’s ballet-dancer falls through the air having finished a triumphant performance of ‘Swan Lake’ that literally bleeds the life out of her. Or maybe it doesn’t. That gloriously fucked-up movie leaves it somewhat up in the air. She whispers almost inaudibly, “I was perfect.”
I still want to be perfect too, but it’s a much smaller want, more of a general nod in that direction if you will. Not much more than a whisper to be honest, and it’s taken quite a lot of work and effort to make it to this point. I spent many years pretending, claiming I really didn’t care, when really I did. As soon as I admitted to myself that, yes, being perfect was important to me, was a lifelong goal of mine, it suddenly lost its power. It lost its hold. The spell was broken. And I could, and can, genuinely say it no longer matters as much. That holds a different kind of strength and power.
This journey isn’t quite over, and part of me fears it is so far from being over I will never get there, yet that will be all right too. We aren’t designed to resolve absolutely everything. Without some itch or impetus, we wouldn’t make motions to do much of anything. I’m grateful for the spark that lingers, the electric frisson that lights up all the darkness momentarily, showing the way in tantalizing and all-too-quick fashion, leaving us always on the cusp, ever-wanting for more. We see, for one shining moment, all there is to see, and we spend our lives seeking out how to find that paradise, stumbling over all the paradise that’s right in front of us, beside us, within us.
In the middle of the night, alone in bed, I grapple with the nagging remnants of that need to be perfect. There, I go over mistakes, my face flushing again at my fumbles, my heart racing with remembrance of all my rookie errors. Lately, though, I’ve begun to let go. And I’m getting rather good at it, so much so that I let a lot of it go before I even find my way to bed at night, and by the time I put the book down and turn off the light, I’m able to slide swiftly into slumber.
Reflecting on how much I’ve worked on things over the past several months – a time period in which we’ve all changed in some way – my therapist reminded me of how far I had come. I’d been so busy moving forward, trying to better myself, that I hadn’t taken any time to look back. That was a good thing. When you get lost in a task, it means you are enjoying life – you are flirting with happiness by being more fully present in the moment. It’s a form of mindfulness, and it occupies the space that would otherwise be left for demons and troubles to populate.
Art and beauty can fill those spaces too, especially when you find yourself too overwhelmed or tired to be mindfully present (and that does take a fair amount of effort). Meditation has helped in my case too – canceling out that void of space that would otherwise be bombarded with racing thoughts and worries, allowing it to be empty and quiet for a bit, to exist in silence and stillness. It’s not perfect, but it’s perfectly imperfect, and that’s the best that any of us can hope to be.
The time has come to say a quick goodbye, and we can do it in the Irish fashion if that makes you feel better, or we can do it with a big virtual hug and accompanying fanfare. However you wish to bid adieu, be my guest. For a couple of years, I took the entire summer off from blogging and it was, no offense, absolute bliss. Heavenly divinity. Fucking awesome. Like a summer vacation I haven’t had since I graduated from college way back in the 90’s. That probably says more about my piss-poor attitude than it does about your reading preferences. Regardless, it was a lovely break of rejuvenation that recalled the responsibility-free summers of my childhood.
Not tied or tethered to one port when a world of different seas beckoned to everyone else.
This year I kind of want that again, especially in the heat of the moment. Let’s face it, this heated state of the world is not a place for subtlety, nuance, intelligence or grace. I like to think that at my best I’m a little bit of all of those things. I like to think that at its best this blog is a place for such things. A place for play, for exploration, for salaciousness, for silliness, for beauty, for stillness, for fun. In order to have all these things, however, I have to work and create and write and edit and take photos and make an ass of myself. You might well imagine that being me comes with its own set of challenges, and you would still have little to no idea what it fully encompasses. This is not a complaint, merely a statement of truth. That too seems to have no place in the world anymore.
Yet as I write this, I realize that the act of creating, of writing, or making something, adds to the inspiration. It’s sort of the opposite of what happens when you get too accustomed to staying home and doing nothing. It zaps your energy, draining you of the impetus to keep going. For most of my life I swore if I could afford an existence of leisure where I didn’t have to do anything but lounge around and daintily feed myself bon-bons that I’d be happy. I realize now, perhaps just in time, that it’s not true.
As a plant lover, I tend to attribute human emotions and traits to the plants in our garden. They become like people to me, with the same human flaws and triumphs and feelings that we all have. As such, I’m especially touched when one of them goes above and beyond what is normally expected of them, surviving in difficult conditions or thriving when given the opportunity. Can win point is this tiny little pink petunia, which seeded itself unbeknownst to me, in a crack of cement between the patio and the pool. Generally that space is informally reserved by a thin line of weeds which, depending on how ambitious I’m feeling or how strong my back is on any given day, has been known to get occasionally out of hand. It happens sooner than you’d think, and by the time I get to the end of weeding the space, the place where I began is usually already well on its way to needing it again.
This year I hadn’t quite gotten to it when I noticed this little bright spot of pink – courtesy of a seed that must have remained from a container planting last year (this year’s pink petunias have not yet gone to seed). It touched me – even for weeds, surviving in the thin sliver of a crack between concrete slabs is a feat. For cultivated plants, the odds are even less. Fortunately for us, petunias don’t need to be coddled or pampered to put on a happy show, and this little guy was willing to do so in an unexpected moment when I needed it most.
Our pool remains out of commission (though things are in motion to change that…)
You don’t live in our home, so you don’t get to pass bouquets like this multiple times in a week. Even if you visited the first blog post I did about it, it was soon buried by other posts, and you likely didn’t bother searching it out again because, well, why would you?
So this look-back is for you.
When there’s been a string of hot days, as welcome and appreciated as the sun may be, we all need a respite as the sun reaches its zenith. At those times, I sit down on the couch that is beside the table on which this bouquet once stood. It is cool there, out of direct sunlight, though the room remains bright. It is quiet there too, when the music is off, and quiet is important when trying to keep cool.
Clem has been with us for about as long as we’ve lived in this house – since 2002 – when I planted her beside the lamp post like every good soldier of suburbia did at some point. The common purple clematis vine was once used to run up every mailbox post or other similar structure, and could be counted on to provide this gorgeous show of color every June. As such, I didn’t give it much care or concern, and, to my disgrace, I am loathe to admit I didn’t do a damn thing for her for several years.
My attention and time and manure was given to her step-sister, the sweet autumn clematis, which stole the show in August and September, when flowers were really appreciated, not lost in the big June shuffle. The sweet autumn clematis also ran up twenty feet into the air, leaving its clumsy purple cousin in the dust. Yet this year the sweet one gave up its decade-plus-run and decided not to return after winter whereas the common purple variety beside the lam post came back as it did every year. And so, guided by its perseverance, inspired by its longevity and spirit, I took care to tie it as it ran up the lamp post, something I hadn’t done for years. (If you miss tying it up from the beginning, it will sprawl and contort itself into a vine of such odd angles and turns it proves impossible to tie up in any vertical manner.)
I helped it climb about six feet then it started sending out a proliferation of flower buds, which soon exploded into the violet stars you see here. When lit by the summer sun, they are a stunning sight to behold. I will begin a fertilizing regime to keep it going and better prepare it for next year’s show. It may take eighteen years, but eventually I can learn. The reward was this magnificent display, taking our old and ugly lamp post and transforming it into a thing of whimsical loveliness.
Not in fragrance or stature, size or volume, this Rose campion, a variety of Lychnis, packs its powerful punch simply from its color alone. It’s striking blend of fuchsia, magenta and rose contrasts stunningly with its subtle and elegant gray-and-silver-green leaves, which have an intriguing furry texture lending further allure. As mentioned, the flowers alone are small, held aloft on slender stems that rise from a short mound of leaves, and then go to seed in the slender form of a poppy seed-head (like little salt shakers). These disperse the seeds, which are generally pretty prolific, ensuring the continued legacy of their biennial form.
I planted one of these many years ago, entranced solely by the color of the blooms, not expecting them to last beyond two or three seasons, but they have persisted, and quite powerfully. Seeded biennials produce a crop of leaves the first year, then flower the second, producing a big batch of seeds to carry on. As a lover of perennials, I found such unpredictability annoying, but like foxgloves and hollyhocks, they have proven perennially satisfying. Their smaller stature also means that while they may not grow precisely where they are wanted, I can live with their malleable direction. Flexibility is required when dealing with certain plants, and the color they produce is worth it.
Taking a tentative step toward finding a new normal in a wildly chaotic world, Andy and I had our first dinner out since March last night, and it was a wonderful brush with how we all might move forward. Better than that, it was a chance to see old friends who have always taken care of us with their delicious food and comforting company. A favorite restaurant is more than just a restaurant, it’s more than just food and drink and atmosphere. It’s conviviality, it’s camaraderie, it’s connecting in a world that seems to be growing ever more fractured. A favorite restaurant brings back what’s important: sharing a meal in a place surrounded by people who only want to make other people feel better.
That kind of hospitality is one of the things we’ve missed most since everything stopped way back in March. Every day since then we’ve been in a suspended state of grief and despondence as we navigate how we are all going to be safe and survive in the face of whatever insanity 2020 is going to throw at us next. It felt fitting to make our first night out since then at the place where we dined last.
dp: An American Brasserie is open for dinner business again, employing all the safety regulations for this phase of New York State’s re-opening, and by all accounts, and entirely as expected, they handled it with typical flair and gusto. Under the guiding hand and delightfully-attired élan of Dominick Purnomo, our favorite restaurant was forging its way into a brave new world and bringing the best of what makes it so special – the human connection that only breaking bread together can truly conjure – back into our lives. We knew we had missed it, but we never knew how much.
On a ninety-degree summer afternoon, we cooled down with a Balinese lemonade and shared an opening of octopus, along with some braised rib dumplings. Andy opted for the bakmi while I went for the burger du jour. Easing back into dining out again would require some comfort food, done up in the elegance that is a hallmark of the Purnomo family establishments. We closed out this perfect meal with an exquisite citrus custard and meringue dessert ~ a sweet finish to a celebratory start to summer.
{dp: An American Brasserie is open for dinner – visit their website here for the current guidelines on how to best enjoy a dinner out.}
We have about seven large plant stands of hydrangeas – most of them the ‘Endless Summer’ variety that was all the rage a number of years ago – and though I managed to coax them all into one or two blooms every once in a great while, only the plants in the front of the sun where all the sun goes ever reliably bloomed every year. The backyard plants would, if we were lucky, put forth one or two paltry flowerheads a piece, and for the past several years they’ve done nothing but produce foliage.
I haven’t minded much since their foliage is handsome, and they grow so large they become architectural elements that frame the house and a side entry-gate. I was somewhat annoyed at the fact that we couldn’t keep them on the blue side of their color range – our soil just would not keep them blue, no matter how many coffee grounds, rusty metal objects, or soil acidifiers I showered upon them.
Don’t get me wrong – I love pink – and a rosy-hued hydrangea flower is better than no hydrangea flower at all – but I did give up on pampering and cajoling them into bloom. It was also possible that our weather pattern killed off the buds that were present in the winter. We always got weird stretches of wickedly freezing temps for unprotected stretches of time, ensuring that even those that survived the enormity of a winter season would be felled by a few quick days of all-killing cold. ‘Endless Summer’ was supposed to flower on both old and new wood, but it did seem to favor old wood, if it managed to keep its buds intact.
This year, with a relatively mild winter, I left the old wood standing instead of pruning it all off like I normally would, and for the first time in at least a decade, most of our bushes have a multitude of blooms forming. While these, the first to bloom, are decidedly pink, there are bluish ones coming up in the backyard (worthy of their own post soon enough).
Perhaps the world makes up for its cruelty in this small way. I’ll take whatever bit of beauty is afforded right now. (Stay tuned for that blue one!)
For the last century, the universe has been whispering to humanity to slow down, to dwell in stillness and take in pockets of quietude. Lately, it’s begun to scream and rage since no one seems to be listening. If you’re looking for something deep to help you process everything that’s gone on over the past few months, or if you’re simply looking for something to help you get through the damn day, I found the perfect album for meditative rumination.
A thirteen-song musical cycle that is as delicately-nuanced and shaded as its cover art ~ a corner room looking over what might be either the rise or fall of the sun on a body of water – ‘Welcome Home’ is written and performed by one of my brother’s friends, Karel Barnoski, whom I remember with much amusement from our childhood days of playing hide and seek. Hearing him in this realm makes me marvel at the wondrous possibilities that life lays out for each of us, and what we decide to make of them.
Opening with the jaunty ‘Interplay’ the mood is initially playful, which is fitting for the memories I have of Karel as a kid. By track two, however, things take a thoughtful turn: ‘Bath’ offers a balm to everything going on in the world right now ~ a contemplative, sparse soundscape that seems to encapsulate so much of the quiet and stillness that reveals Barnoski’s mastery of the space in-between the notes.
Title track and album centerpiece ‘Welcome Home’ is tailor-made for 2020. Home is many things to many people ~ not always a place, not always a happy frame of mind ~ but it’s what grounds us, it’s what centers us. We may not have grown up in a perfect household, but even the most nomadic among us carries around an essence of home ~ a place, whether physical or spiritual ~ that speaks to us in its own way. Finding that space, and keeping it sacred, is a big part of our journey in this world. The music here allows that place to exist.
‘2019’ is one of the first pieces I’d ever heard Barnoski play on one of his FaceBook live events. It arrived just as we were all hunkering down in our stay-at-home existence. Maybe that’s why it feels a little more powerful ~ the way a song melds to a moment that, as it’s happening, you somehow realize will be historical and resonant, that you are making a memory that will burn itself indelibly into who you are about to become. Here, it offers calm and beauty, refuge and consideration, a way of sorting out whatever ails your own little world. I’ve kept this one on repeat when writing, and it clears the mind and heart like a mini-meditation.
‘The Knife’ brings an underlying tension to the proceedings, darker shadings and a stormy turbulence that is only partially resolved in its dramatic continuation, ‘The Knife (Jam)’ – seven-plus minutes of musical excitement that is a journey unto itself. About halfway through the storm gives way to calm, and a sort of ambivalent resignation, then swirls back around for one final flourish before letting everything settle down again.
The dim mood conjured by ‘Isolation’ perfectly embodies so much of 2020 and reminds me that music and art still matter, that they still provide a haven and comfort for all people. A work of beauty is an invitation for everyone to appreciate, one of the last and perhaps only truly egalitarian systems we have as a civilization. Barnoski touches upon the events of the past few months in his titles, such as ‘Quarantine’ and ‘Stir Crazy’ and if a pandemic keeping us all home results in such glorious work, then it appears the universe is seeing us through these changes and ushering in a new normal framed with beauty, framed with an appreciation for something quieter, something that sounds like a piano being played for the sake of all of us ~ to keep us calm, to keep us together as much as we are apart, to keep us from going crazy.
Every once in a while a collection of music will come along that so deftly and magnificently captures a moment that it’s unclear whether it was the hands of the artist or the hands of the universe guiding us into such states of rapture and beauty. ‘Welcome Home’ stakes its claim of timelessness thanks to the artistry of Barnoski and the way he blankets a difficult world in swaddling clothes of musical consolation. He plays the hurt into the heart, allowing it to have its time and moment there, then plays it gently away, and we are better for having heard and felt it.
Final track ‘All Together Now’ brings back the theme from ‘Welcome Home’ ~ a happy and hopeful return to a time that may not come again, and that may or not have ever been. That’s the remarkable gift this song cycle ends up being ~ it gets us as close to the human experience as music ever can, carving out the space for us to confront demons, reconcile turmoil, and create a new reality. ‘Welcome Home’ is a session of sonic therapy we could all use right now.
When I first started meditating, it was something I did near the end of the day. At the onslaught of winter, it felt better to trudge through the long, dark days and save it as something to savor before bed, preparing the mind for a restful and calm entry into slumber. As the light lingered, and my working schedule shifted to a work-from-home situation, I moved the meditation sessions up to the moment I shut down the computer for the day, around 4 PM, as a way of establishing a line of demarcation for the work day, and allowing me to decompress from whatever stresses the job had created. As such, it became the midpoint of the day, where it remains more or less to this point.
For weekends or days off, I’ve been moving it up even earlier – around 2 PM – and it is the centerpiece of a good day. My meditation sessions last about twenty minutes now, and are the centering force that have kept me calm in the face of all sorts of insanity, especially now that Mercury is in retrograde until mid-July. In twenty minutes, I can go from agitated and bothered to calm and resigned, and even more than that, this consistent pattern of meditation has resulted in a greater level of calm in the grander ocean of my existence. Studies have shown that regular meditation changes how our brain operates on a daily basis, allowing it to be more focused and calm even when not actively engaged in meditation or deep breathing. I’ve noticed it firsthand.
Things still annoy and bother me, and I throw little hissy fits, mostly in my head, but they are over sooner and quicker than they were before. There is no bitterness or anger that fuels lingering feelings of upset or tumult. As the days pass, I’m working on reducing these reactions and bouts of disappointment even further, until they will hopefully be no more than blips or tiny crests in a sea of gentle waves.
Still, I wouldn’t recommend fucking with me just yet. Mercury is in retrograde and I will not be held accountable for hurting people if they come for me, even in jest. Namaste, mofos, namaste.
Of course we get the best pool weather we’ve had in years in the weeks where our pool is out of commission. I’m chalking it up to the disaster that is 2020 and the current loveliness that is Mercury in retrograde.
This is just for the second night of summer. Turns out I had the foresight to put this on our first summer mix, and it came on over the stereo as I wilted from the midday heat, without a pool or a new summer fragrance. Is there a sadder state in which to find oneself? Don’t answer, universe, I already know there’s nothing to complain about. Certainly not on the second night of summer.
Well it’s the second day of summer
You already got me sweating about it
Oh it’s the second night of summer
And I’m disintegrating without you
Throwing me that shade like I’m not cool enough
Throwing me that shade like I’m not
Like I’m not cool enough
Throwing me that shade like I’m not
Like I’m not
Like I’m not cool enough
Not cool enough
Some songs are no longer relatable to me lyrically. When we’re talking about a woman who’s getting on a plane with a carry-on and without me, well, what’s the big deal? And if anyone is throwing me shade, I’m throwing it right back, and the shade I throw is the stuff of endless night. Some songs I simply like because of the way they sound, the way I did as a kid before I know what ‘virgin’ or ‘preach‘ meant. Isn’t that the point of a pop song anyway? This one is taking me away in a haze of heat, riding waves of hot air like I’m not cool enough…
Sun up and sun down
Sun up and sun down
As for this second night of summer, the heat is on. Beating a hasty retreat to the interior of air-conditioned coolness, I sink gratefully to the floor, where a soft rug awaits my lotus-positioned body, folding in on itself like some intricate piece of origami. Closing my eyes, I take in the start of summer, on its second day – the forgotten day, because everyone only talks about the first day, and what does the second even matter?
Well it’s the second day of summer
You already got me sweating about it
Oh it’s the second night of summer
And I’m disintegrating without you
Throwing me that shade like I’m not cool enough
Throwing me that shade like I’m not
Like I’m not cool enough
Throwing me that shade like I’m not
Like I’m not
Like I’m not cool enough
Not cool enough
