In Remembrance

The fact that my father and his five siblings all managed to survive their WWII childhoods and adolescence as Germans on the Eastern Front and live out the rest of their lives as immigrants in the same Wisconsin community teaches a child many lessons about survival and resilience, the hand of fate or divine intervention, an indomitable work ethic, and an abiding sense of gratitude. In their lifetime, they went from fleeing the Soviets by horse and wagon through decades of incredible, rapid change and invention until they might receive this very piece I write here and now on my laptop and send their way on the Internet by hitting a single button on my keyboard.

Let me not be too Pollyannaish: life in a new home in the midst of an evolving world was more than challenging and each faced their own share of trials and tribulations. In fact, as is true of my own life, I often think of their lives in phases, not as a single story but many strung together which often perplex us and contradict our present understanding of the individual. Humans are complex, of course, despite our belief that we really know someone. We likely only know a piece of someone like the square on a quilt which makes up our lives.

My Aunt Mara, who passed away last week, is a perfect example. My direct interactions with her as the mother of my closest cousin primarily encompassed the first two decades of my life. By this time in my memory, her life was primarily defined by her ailing health. The suffering of WWII was rarely discussed, and I only knew tangentially of her young adult years, primarily through photos I occasionally glimpsed which, in my imagination, strung together different stories of her life before her body betrayed her. For example, despite their very different personalities, she joined her older sister, Irene, as part of an acrobatic duo, a vaudevillian act in the post-war years. This must have been quite a stretch for her as she was definitely the less outgoing and animated of the two.

After arriving in America, I saw photos of her and my uncle Werner living the quintessential 1950s life in black and white photos with deckled edges. In one, they stand beside the large, shiny body of an American-made car full of pride. In another, they are dancing close together in an era when dance halls, ballroom music, and cocktails dominated the social scene. They enjoyed dancing and excelled, or so I heard, and must have been quite a sight on the dance floor as he was over six feet and she under five. In each still picture, Aunt Mara had her jet black hair slicked back in a chignon on the nape of her neck. She wore heels and impeccable suits or dresses tight on her small waist with full skirts. Her lips wore paint, and she added sunglasses or pearls or scarves or hats to her ensembles. Her entire look was reminiscent of Audrey Hepburn.

In contrast years later, when I stayed at my aunt’s house to play with my cousin or spend the night, I often remember her in pain, laying on the couch in a housecoat and watching her favorite soap opera. Still, I know she instilled in me an appreciation of some of her fineries in life that relate directly back to the Kodak stories. I simply love a good dress and retain a penchant for pearls. I love coffee which she often served from a china pot in cup and saucer with cream in a creamer and sugar in a covered sugar dish to be stirred quietly with small, silver spoons. She introduced me to soft-boiled eggs and taught me how to eat them from egg cups, a set of which I now store in my own kitchen cupboards.  She made large dumplings unlike anyone else I knew, especially in a dish called Königsberger Klopse. She prepared beautiful tortes for Kaffee und Kuchen on the weekends. I remember the mocha and hazelnut tortes in particular and know the seeds of my love of European bakeries and delicacies from my own hands took root, in part, in her kitchen.  Again and again, my memories include the smell of lilacs and the taste of ripe raspberries, gooseberries, and currants which grew on the bushes around her home.

However, my most vivid memories took place in Aunt Mara’s basement which housed a reel-to-reel music player of big band music, including songs like Begin the Beguine, Sentimental Journey, and Some Enchanted Evening. My cousin and I would don her old ballet costumes and create elaborate stories for ourselves under the most exotic pseudonyms we could think of like Manuela and Katarina. The storylines always included romance and tragedy and were acted out with great drama. My aunt and uncle watched numerous scenes as we danced to the music and swung round and round the metal support poles in the center of the basement. I am not sure if Aunt Mara saw a bit of herself in our performances, but I know I saw a part of myself in her as the music moved us or when, on occasion, she laughed fully and uninhibited at our antics.

I grew up and my life moved on to new places and experiences, but I return to Aunt Mara’s house often in my mind. A second home for some very formative years, she fed me delicacies as well as doses of security and spurred the imagination and esteem of a very shy, reserved child. Over the years, I have journeyed down a very different road far from my childhood home to write my own string of stories. Aunt and niece, we never knew each other completely, but for a period of time we knew pieces of each other intimately. Such connections shape us forever and give life such fullness and color to complete our own quilt. As I see it, living life in relationship to other remains one of its greatest gifts for which I thank you, dear aunt.

Trees

Each beginning is the end of a waiting. We are each given exactly one chance to be. Each of us is both impossible and inevitable. Every replete tree was first a seed that waited. (31) Lab Girl by Hope Jahren

No doubt we are about to enter the time of year when we see the world through the colorful leaves of a tree. Truth be told, I have seen the world through the lives of trees throughout my life. I remember planting trees with my dad as a child, when one maple in particular was planted just for me. I also spent many days of my childhood, playing beneath the weeping branches of four large willows that thrived in the often wet, low-lying reaches of the backyard. Willows are so great for imaginative play!

I walked the lake shore path more times than I can count on my way from my dorm to classes and back again my freshman and sophomore years of college in Madison, and I awakened to love in spring beneath the large oaks that lined Bascom Hill, fed a thriving squirrel population, and towered over pairs of college students soaking in the sun's rays as winter broke and pheromones rushed anew. Once a tree toppled in a storm in St. Paul and almost crushed my sister-in-law's car.

My older daughter hugged trees repeatedly as a toddler walking around the neighborhood and parks of Boston, and both girls buried each other in fallen leaves from the numerous, mature trees on our property in State College. My younger daughter and I collected enormous acorns each day on our walk home from elementary school in Ithaca. We stuffed our pockets to overflowing, filled any number of jars and hurricanes, and strung them with beads as decoration which I still keep in the basement in a plastic bin marked Seasonal Decor.

Now, I am taking a tree class offered by the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards. I am learning how much I don't know about trees and meeting some of the dedicated people who study and care for them in my new home. The class is a place to meet new people, explore my new surroundings, and connect with nature to renew the spirit. A walk through the old growth forest of Montpelier on one of the first cool and foggy mornings of autumn will never be forgotten.

Tony Russell, Master Naturalist with the Virginia Native Plant Society, summed up trees so eloquently:

In our paved, constructed, developed culture, we sometimes need to remind ourselves that trees are our living relatives--very distant relatives, but nonetheless fellow beings with whom we share not only history but genes, DNA, and fundamental life experiences. Like us, they are born, they live, and they die. They breathe in and out, they have circulations, they suffer injuries and sicknesses, they have sex lives and offspring, they respond to light and dark and cold and heat and hunger and thirst. They are both individuals and part of communities. If we have the feeling, when we enter a woods or forest, that we are at home, it's because, in some deep and calming way, we are. We are entering our ancestral home, surrounded by distant, beneficent kin who are quietly tending and nourishing the world.

I think of this often when out in nature as climate change wrecks havoc on the delicate balance of the biodiversity of a particular ecosystem, and I know my species is to blame. I know we would all benefit from seeing the world more often from the vantage point of a tree. If you are game, you might enjoy reading Lab Girl by Hope Jahren. I just loved this memoir which juxtaposes chapters on the author's life to becoming an acclaimed, female biologist with chapters on what science now knows about trees, the awe-inspiring, puzzling, and urgent. Most importantly, th prose on trees is deeply moving and poetic.

Of course, you might like something shorter and more concise on trees. My only recommendation is to simply be with a tree, up close and personal or immersed in text written about trees. Both are revelatory. You might start with Merwin, who also echoes my sentiment as trees have many fellow admirers:

Elegy for a Walnut Tree

W.S. Merwin

Old friend now there is no one alive

who remembers when you were young

it was high summer when I first saw you
in the blaze of day most of my life ago
with the dry grass whispering in your shade
and already you had lived through wars
and echoes of wars around your silence
through days of parting and seasons of absence
with the house emptying as the years went their way
until it was home to bats and swallows
and still when spring climbed toward summer
you opened once more the curled sleeping fingers
of newborn leaves as though nothing had happened
you and the seasons spoke the same language
and all these years I have looked through your limbs
to the river below and the roofs and the night
and you were the way I saw the world

Autumnal

I traditionally ended the notes I sent in August with "Enjoy the fleeting days of summer." However, as the weeks of hot, dry weather continued here, I found myself adjusting to the new temperament of the seasons in the mid-Atlantic. No longer am I wishing that summer linger a bit longer. Rather, I am longing for the cooler days of  autumn which I am told is only second to spring in Virginia.

September is foreshadowing the upcoming season with a nip in the air one morning and a blustery wind another. The harvest moon was spectacular the other night as seen in a video from The Washington Post. And, as the days noticeably shorten, the autumnal equinox arrives this week.

This morning it rained steady and soaked the parched landscape. The mums bowed their heads, the berries dripped with moisture, and the leaves held onto each drop of water for as long as possible. I know the heat will return but not as intensely. Pumpkins are beginning to dot the landscape as I transition my wardrobe and dress the house in dabs of orange and yellow, too.

I would like to nap like the cat but am instead nesting, deeply appreciative of the weather and the quiet which allows thoughts to roam and creative juices to flow. I am prepping and planning for the busy months ahead. So much is new and yet one can rely on some things nonetheless. So, I close instead with "Enjoy the fullness of transitioning days this September, dear friends."

September

Linda Pastan

it rained in my sleep

and in the morning the fields were wet

I dreamed of artillery

of the thunder of horses

in the morning the fields were strewn
with twigs and leaves

as if after a battle
or a sudden journey

I went to sleep in the summer
I dreamed of rain

in the morning the fields were wet
and it was autumn

Diversity

I have been thinking about our human propensity to want standardization and uniformity. We desire sameness, to be around those who look like us, think like us, believe the same things as us. With sameness comes inclusion and acceptance and safety but also apathy and boredom. In contrast, when you examine the biological world, it is filled with variability.

Simply look at the diversity of the natural world around you and note how it is ever changing, adapting, and evolving. No black and white here: nature embraces the complexity of grey. Such heterogeneity and ongoing adaptation may be to our benefit, or not, yet cannot help but inspire and challenge us to adapt in response.

Last weekend, I attended the Heritage Harvest Festival at Monticello. Monticello immerses you in the complex life of Thomas Jefferson, often called America's first botanist. I wandered through the flower and vegetable gardens, grape vines, orchard, and woodlands. With camera in hand, I snapped images of the diversity of beauty around me despite the intense heat.

Throughout my visit, I kept repeating Ralph Waldo Emerson's words, "Scatter joy!" I was reminded of the power of a single seed, the challenges a seedling faces as it bursts from the soil, and the potential of the diversity of living things to coexist and elicit happiness. Nothing like planting a seed and embracing difference.

Looking for the Differences

Tom Hennen

I am struck by the otherness of things rather than their same-
ness. The way a tiny pile of snow perches in the crook of a
branch in the tall pine, away by itself, high enough not to be
noticed by people, out of reach of stray dogs. It leans against
the scaly pine bark, busy at some existence that does not
need me.

It is the differences of objects that I love, that lift me toward
the rest of the universe, that amaze me. That each thing on
earth has its own soul, its own life, that each tree, each clod is
filled with the mud of its own star. I watch where I step and see
that the fallen leaf, old broken grass, an icy stone are placed in
exactly the right spot on the earth, carefully, royalty in their
own country.

Letting Go

Less than two weeks ago, we dropped our older daughter off at her dorm to begin her freshman year of college. Here she is almost 17 years ago. When I look back, I realize that her personality was already fully developed back then: observant, full of pregame anxiety, intelligent, gentle, and kind. She is loving college life and even though we miss each other (this became evident, because I was a little too happy when she called today just to check in), I haven't been feeling any of  the "empty nest" syndrome you hear so much about.

Of course, we have our younger daughter at home, and she keeps us busy. And, we are still just beginning to settle into our new home. And, I can hear some of you thinking that she hasn't really left home yet and may even move back in after college as seems to be the case so often these days. I know, I know. Still, I have been reflecting on the idea that being a gardener isn't so different from being a parent and somehow has prepared me to let go.

When you garden just like when you parent, you prepare the soil to plant a seed. You dig and mulch and water and fertilize and weed and fend off pests. You celebrate the seedling and each blossom and mark their growth. You make mistakes: wrong plant, wrong place, wrong climate, wrong time of year. You realize that there is so much you can't control from disease to invasive species to weather. You learn. You keep at it. You give it time, set your face to the sun, and release all your hopes and dreams out into the universe. You tend. You work really hard. You nurture. You love in abundance.

As gardeners are apt, parents often forget that what is happening below the surface is perhaps more important than above the surface. All the growth in the root systems of plants remains unseen from us. Healthy soil, healthy roots, healthy plants. Think of all the time and effort that comes into play from planting to harvest. Same is true for our children. We cared for them completely, taught them how to think about themselves, others, and the world around them, set expectations and helped meet them through innumerable choices that fed into the health of their root system.

Eventually, we send them off to face life in the larger world at college or otherwise, realizing that only time will tell what the harvest will produce. We sit back and watch with some trepidation and a good dose of faith. There are so many things we wish we had done differently, better, or at all. No matter now. Parents are universally imperfect. We still tend just not as intensely. We let go. And, although once we led the way, now we follow. The fruits of our labor are yet to be tasted. Harvest season is just beginning.

Learning the Bicycle

Wyatt Prunty

The older children pedal past

To supper, bath, and bed, until at last

Stable as little gyros, spinning hard

We also quit, silent and tired

Beside the darkening yard where trees
Now shadow up instead of down.
Their predictable lengths can only tease
Her as, head lowered, she walks her bike alone
Somewhere between her wanting to ride
And her certainty she will always fall.
Tomorrow, though I will run behind,
Arms out to catch her, she’ll tilt then balance wide
Of my reach, till distance makes her small,
Smaller, beyond the place I stop and know
That to teach her I had to follow
And when she learned I had to let her go.

Routine

I usually long for routine and school to begin this time of year anyway. By mid-August, the girls begin bickering, the heat and humidity begin to weigh heavy on my shoulders, and an absence of structure breeds a lack of motivation and numerous slothful ways called relaxation earlier in the summer at the cabin on the lake but now are the harbingers of shame should they continue much longer.

My yearning for routine has turned into an ache this summer. With the move, new schools at hand for the girls, including academic calendars that start weeks earlier than ever before, and extreme heat warnings which turn the tables on us -- we now hibernate inside in the summer just as we did up north when wind chill warnings kept us in the house in January -- routine has been hard to come by.

I know that as you get older they say that changing up your routine is good for brain health, and I buy into that advice. I also know that I may have a propensity for routine and order given my personality. No one loves to organize more than I do! And, I remember some of the routines of my childhood fondly. 

I am not talking about the routines around holidays or special occasions, but the routines that revolved around daily life like playing at the playground on Saturday mornings as my dad played soccer nearby and then took us for soft serve at Boy Blue on the way home. The way we listened to radio plays, lying on the living room floor on Saturday nights (so good for the imagination!).  The way my dad would slather butter and honey on a thick slice of German rye bread as a treat to help me sleep on the nights when my anxious ways kept me up. Or, the way my mom made paper bags full of homemade popcorn slathered in butter and salt to eat the one time each year that The Sound of Music or The Wizard of Oz played on television. (As I write, I am reminded why I am such a foodie!)

I am looking forward to building back some routine in our family life and also adding in some new routines as family life evolves with teenagers turning into young adults, building lives of their own. And, even as my usual level of routine continues to evade me, I appreciate the fact that the cat is leading the way back to a regimen. Cats are nothing if not bound by routine. Freddy has an internal clock that marks mealtime and bedtime so precisely that an alarm clock is simply not necessary.

Only ten days into living in our new home, Freddy has begun a morning routine, pulling me along unwittingly. After I wake, I feed him while I wait for the water to heat in the kettle. I make a cup of coffee and head to my desk. He tags along and heads straight for his cat bed that sits between my computer screen and the large window. He licks himself clean after breakfast and settles in to sleep the morning away with the sun glistening off of his fur.

I sip slowly and appreciate the view. Then, I turn to my email, to-do-list, and writing with companion at hand and see life slowly unfolding. Routines are slowly building. Life is good.

The Cat

Lawrence Ferlinghetti

The cat
                              licks its paw and
        lies down in
                            the bookshelf nook
                                                                 She
                                    can lie in a
                                              sphinx position
        without moving for so
                                         many hours
and then turn her head
                                to me and
                                          rise and stretch
       and turn
                       her back to me and
              lick her paw again as if
                                    no real time had passed
                     It hasn't
                                    and she is the sphinx with
                        all the time in the world
                                             in the desert of her time
             The cat
                    knows where flies die
                               sees ghosts in motes of air
                                                   and shadows in sunbeams
She hears
                  the music of the spheres and
       the hum in the wires of houses
                           and the hum of the universe
             in interstellar spaces
                                                      but
                prefers domestic places
                             and the hum of the heater

Rain

"Oh, lord of life, send my roots rain." Gerard Manley Hopkins

I was completely exhausted, 100% beat, and still couldn't sleep. After the arrival of the semi filled with our belongings, a foursome of the most appreciated movers efficiently unloaded our entire household not without a glitch or two of course. After making a small dent in the disarray primarily by setting up our beds, we collapsed the first night in our new home, and I lay awake.

I couldn't turn my mind off and two things were plaguing me. First, I was thinking of all the work ahead: the stacks of boxes in every room filled with individually paper-wrapped items that would need to be undone and placed accordingly. Naturally, our new home isn't set up exactly as the previous one and the placement of everything would take time. Furniture needed to be positioned. The kitchen needed to be organized. Storage over four floors (oh, those stairs!) required thought. Like a computer running an algorithm, I was working over the puzzle and wouldn't rest until I knew where to begin and had an initial plan in place.

Further, I was adjusting to the noises of the house. The moans and creaks unique to this abode. The double click of the air conditioning as it turned on like the sound of the small metal clickers we had as children: one click as you pushed the metal in with your thumb and forefinger and one click as you released your grip. The sound of the floorboards as my younger daughter paddled down the hallway to the bathroom in the middle of the night. The incredible cacophony of insect life outside reminiscent of the hot, humid late summers in the Midwest as I slept beneath the screened window as a child. Here, our climate controlled house is sealed shut and yet the racket could convince you otherwise.

The cat was as unsettled as I was. He was still in shock from the long car ride in his carrier, the noise of the move, and the lack of familiarity in his new home. Freddy likes to imagine he is master of his domain, but he is a scaredy-cat to his very core. As my older daughter astutely observed, when it comes to his flight or fight response, Freddy is all flight. All night, he paced throughout the house, making his displeasure with us known and exploring every nook and cranny. As daylight broke, the birds added to the din outside. The night was shot.

Yet, here I find myself a few mornings later, writing at my new work station which is so very inspiring (more on that later). Stacks of boxes still line up behind me, requiring attention, but I made a real cup of coffee in the kitchen this morning, a notable accomplishment. I work with Freddy asleep on my desk as companion. He is settling in, too. Living the academic life, I have moved over 20 times in my lifetime, and it doesn't get any easier midlife. So, despite the challenges, we simply increase the amount of help we get to meet them. Why? So that we may continue to thrive and grow by sending our roots wide and deep. Thus, we are nourished and quenched internally just as the earth is soaked with rain outside this very morn.

Midlife

Today is the last day of July. It is also the last day I will live in the town I and my family have called home for nine years. My husband and I couldn't see ourselves, both professionally and personally, staying in place for the foreseeable future. So, change has been in the air for the last few years; transitioning concretely for 12 months was the right decision but not without its challenges as well. Truthfully, I am now more than ready to say goodbye after all this time.

Tomorrow, I head to a new home and into the home stretch of turning 50 in November. I consider this a milestone, midlife. This may be a bit optimistic as it naturally means I would live to 100 in a most active, productive, and joyful manner, of course. Nonetheless, I consider the coming year to be one of opportunity, the opportunity to become the change agent of my own life.

With so many positive changes at hand for the members of my immediate family unit, including the increasing independence of my children, I want to seize the year as one of setting concrete personal goals, challenging myself, and trying new things. I may have far fewer than 50 years left, and I don't want to leave the gift of this life with regrets or allow my fears of the "new" to hold me back.

So, tomorrow I will take the first step, trusting that I learned how to walk a long time ago. One mantra I repeat applies here: "If you don't use it, you will lose it." So, I will practice a bit of courage in the coming year and commit to change. I don't know the final destination or what I might harvest from the seeds I plant, but I begin with a heart full of trust in the process and knowledge that the seed desires nothing more than to sprout. I will write about the journey here -- stay posted.

Trust

Thomas R. Smith

It's like so many other things in life
to which you must say no or yes.
So you take your car to the new mechanic.
Sometimes the best thing to do is trust.

The package left with the disreputable-looking
clerk, the check gulped by the night deposit,
the envelope passed by dozens of strangers—
all show up at their intended destinations.

The theft that could have happened doesn't.
Wind finally gets where it was going
through the snowy trees, and the river, even
when frozen, arrives at the right place.

And sometimes you sense how faithfully your life
is delivered, even though you can't read the address. 

Cairn

What it takes to get through January

is what it takes to get through Life. 

~ Vivian Swift When Wanderers Cease to Roam

January has been really tough on me this year, one of the toughest Januaries I remember. Honestly, I am ashamed to say this and realize I have no one to blame but myself for the last 31 days as even the weather has been more cooperative than usual. I have had some rough Januaries like the January after my husband had a heart attack at the age of 41 or the January I was pregnant with my youngest daughter and the anniversary of our stillborn son was fast approaching. Nothing, and I mean NOTHING, of that nature or magnitude has happened to start this year.

Rather, I am sitting and doing little compared to my usual busyness, often stewing in my own negativity. I am waiting for spring to arrive, for the move next summer, for the results of decisions completely out of my hands such as what colleges will accept my older daughter (really, all of them ought to be delighted to enroll her!), what options will lie before her, and what choice she will then make. Or, what will life be like in our new hometown for each one of us. What challenges lie ahead? What unexpected delights? Our circle of thoughts can be our greatest nemesis!

The only reason this is a tough January is that the month has made the best of my weaknesses, my desire to control life and to worry about the worst outcomes when I can't control it. I prefer to prepare for what's next and keep moving, working to meet the next goal. However, our life is on hold right now as we transition slowly which demands a patience I seem to be lacking at the moment even though I am primarily a two marshmallow girl to my very core.

I believe in fate and karma and serendipity, all things far beyond our control. We can only put our best foot forward just like our daughter put her best foot forward and see what happens. So, I am writing this post to dig deep and find my optimism and faith not in a higher power but in the knowledge that what will come, will come, and we will meet it when it does.

Stress and immobility come when the veil of our naivete of control is lifted. Much of life IS out of our control. We can only try to make the best decisions with the information we have in any point and time and face the rest with flexibility and hope. In fact, the lack of control is what makes life interesting, complex, surprising. For now, being present in the present is challenging, but the present is really, really good. Most of the time, I know this and live it. Sometimes, I need to remind myself, encourage my best self, and write a post like this.

So, I decided that perhaps I need to build my own cairn, my own heap of stones piled high as a landmark on this road. One stone placed each day in February can serve as a reminder of all my best intentions, my hopes and fears, my thoughts of gratitude and supplication. These cairn photographs from a recent hike are from Sapsucker Woods and the Andy Goldsworthy cairn found in its midst. A friend introduced me to his work, which anyone who loves nature will appreciate. With my cairn, I hope symbolically to heap my fears, to loosen my grip a bit, and to embrace February and all it may bring....

Launch

"Do you think any generation before has ever been this obsessed about food?" Jenny asked as four of us sat around her small, round kitchen table.

It was early January, and I had just walked across the street and through the neighbor's yard to her house just cater corner from my own for an impromptu gathering in the early afternoon. I joined another friend, Melissa, Jenny, and her husband, David, for a cup of tea and the fleeting opportunity to try English Christmas pudding, David's masterpiece and a family tradition.

As I thought about it, I came to the conclusion that food has always been an obsession for our species, primarily for survival. Now, some of us on this planet are privileged enough to obsess about food in search of the freshest ingredients to make the most tantalizing recipes, using the finest techniques. Somehow, the juxtaposition of our plenty with the food desert so much of the world's population still experiences puts me to shame.

Yet, sitting with my friends, I was reminded that in our modern, technological era, food serves a most primitive purpose. It connects us to cultural histories, familial traditions, and some of our fondest memories. As David sliced his Christmas pudding, moist and dark with dried fruit soaked in port and served with custard, he shared a piece of his English heritage.

The original family recipe hung on the wall above us, typed, matted, and framed, a family heirloom proudly displayed. David showed us the pudding molds with lids, large for gatherings and small to gift at the holidays, and added that coffee tins make excellent substitutes. Of course, the shared experience led to discussion about our parents and childhoods and holiday traditions.

I absolutely loved the pudding, and hope to try my hand at it, too, next December. More importantly, I will remember the gathering, the friends who extended the offer and shared so openly, and the reason food is one of my obsessions: the gatherings. The conversations and connections at the table with food in hand nurture relationships and cultivate learning in exceptional ways.

So, I hope you will join me as I divide my efforts in the blogosphere between two blogs. First, I will continue A Measured Word as a vehicle for me to write reflective pieces about my life and life in general on the better side of 40. Second, I am launching Gatherings and the Culpable Cook to focus on recipes, all things culinary, and the art of hosting the simplest gatherings at home with friends, old and new. As I contemplate my hand at beginning my own business in our new hometown next year, I hope to use these blogs as a springboard for things deeply personal, my internal, and daringly public, my external persona. If you like what you read and see, subscribe and join me on the journey.

Resolve

I am glad that 2015 is behind me. Don't get me wrong; it was a very good year in so many ways. It was also a challenging year, one of big decisions, sifting through life's clutter to focus on the essential and adjusting one's compass accordingly. 

I turned 49 in November at the end of months of discussion about refurbishing life along with my immediate family. It required plenty of soul searching, listening, and reflection. It required plenty of flexibility and compromise and personal evolution. It has resulted in plenty of personal growth, which I deeply value.

So, 2016 is the year all of these decisions will be implemented, beginning with a move so that my husband can pursue a new opportunity at another university two states south, and I can pursue my interest in small business in another college town. My younger daughter will begin high school there. My older daughter will be accepted to college.

Change is certainly afoot and the New Year began with all the preparations for selling our beloved home which hits the market this week. I was prepared for the work involved but somehow forgot how stressful change can be. I am reminded why people stay in one place and can't begrudge anyone coming to that conclusion, but I am incredibly proud that we are willing to accept a new challenge and allow life to throw new opportunities our way without ducking. 

So, I resolve like May Sarton the following in 2016:

1) To declutter both personal possessions and personal baggage that sap energy and joy from the present.

2) To approach life's challenges with humor and an open heart; to try new experiences and embrace differences.

3) To care for myself and my family so that our essential needs are met and our core connections remain steadfast.

4) To remember that to whom much is given, much is expected, requiring a life of integrity and grit; gratitude requires daily practice.

5) To cultivate friendships both old and new spread near and far so that the earth might truly be my garden. (I contribute this notion to Goethe who said, “To know someone here or there with whom you can feel there is understanding in spite of distances or thoughts expressed that can make life a garden.”)

6) To turn to nature for renewal and remember that still waters return soon enough.

New Year Resolve

May Sarton

The time has come

To stop allowing the clutter

To clutter my mind

Like dirty snow,

Shove it off and find

Clear time, clear water.

Time for a change,

Let silence in like a cat

Who has sat at my door

Neither wild nor strange

Hoping for food from my store

And shivering on the mat.

Let silence in.

She will rarely speak or mew,

She will sleep on my bed

And all I have ever been

Either false or true

Will live again in my head.

For it is now or not

As old age silts the stream,

To shove away the clutter,

To untie every knot,

To take the time to dream,

To come back to still water.