I had a new recruit today, but not in the war between Freedonia and Sylvania.
Okay, not so much a recruit, per se, but a friend who'd been trying to schedule a walk with me for months, maybe even over a year by now. Problem was she broke her foot and that took a while to mend and then the fellowship that spawned a video filmed at the Bay of Fundy opened at the ICA and then another film project debuted at the Depot...you get the picture.
It was beginning to feel like it was never going to happen and then she reached out and we had compatible mornings free and we finally walked together. And on a gloriously cool June morning, too.
Naturally, I led her right down to the river, knowing full well that our chances of getting on the pipeline were nil. Two days ago, the only way I'd been able to get on it from the Brown's Island side had been by scrambling over a boulder and then propelling myself forward onto the pipeline and we'd had even more rain since then. It was much worse today with the entire western end under rushing water, but I wanted her to see it anyway.
We compensated by backtracking, taking the canal walk and picking up the pipeline walkway from the eastern end. I knew she "got" it when she marveled, "It's like walking on water."
Yes, indeed, that's exactly what it's like.
Since she'd already taken a yoga class before she met me, by the time we came off the pipeline, she admitted that her legs were feeling the walk. I've no doubt they felt it even more on the next part, which is a series of hills back up to Broad Street. Rest assured, since this was our first shared walk, I made sure to point out interesting things urban, historical, artistic and natural (she was thrilled that we saw two great blue herons) along the way as a distraction.
"You're part trainer, part field guide," she marveled. I'd call that one of my more unique compliments.
And if I was cheating on Mac walking with another woman, I made it up by meeting her at the Byrd to watch four Jews trying to get a laugh. And lest you think I said that, I can assure you that was Groucho Marx's response to those who questioned the political significance of "Duck Soup."
And while he denied it, Mussolini banned the film from showing in Italy because he thought it was an attack on him. I have to say, the anti-Fascist message came across as pretty timely in 2019 as well. Sadly.
Waiting outside for Mac to arrive, I saw guy after guy approach the box office to get a single ticket. One guy cracked wise, requesting, "One for the soup du jour, please." Clearly the Marx Brothers are big with the Y-chromosome set.
Mac and I had barely settled into our seats when a very tall man sat down in front of us, scrunched waaay down in his eat and turned to ask us if he was blocking our views. We politely said no, all the while wondering why he didn't sit somewhere he didn't have to scrunch. I mean, his legs were almost under his chin. When Mac returned with popcorn and Milk Duds, he began making crazy motions with his hand, then got up and left, never to be seen again.
You can always count on a little weirdness at the Byrd.
Manager Todd began the evening by asking if seeing "Duck Soup" tonight would be anyone's first Marx Brothers movie and, amazingly, about a dozen people raised their hands. When he asked who was a Marx Brothers fan, easily half the large crowd roared back in affirmation.
One fun fact he shared was that "duck soup" used to be slang for something easy to do, news to me.
The movie began with a screen reading, "NRA Member. We do our part," followed by the Paramount logo. Kind of disturbing, but maybe not so much in 1933.
I've got no idea when I last saw "Duck Soup" but my best guess would be in college. Back then, my boyfriend and I were very into Woody Allen and it was common knowledge what a huge Marx Brothers fan he was. So I had no memory of what the film was about, although it came back to me as the film progressed.
Interestingly, one of the seminal scenes, which Todd had mentioned, was the mirror scene where Groucho and Harpo mime each other as if they're looking in a mirror. Long before I ever saw "Duck Soup," I'd seen the "I Love Lucy" episode where Lucy does the same thing with Harpo even though it took until college to understand the reference.
Okay, so Lucy and Harpo weren't the first to do it.
One of the most charming parts of watching the movie unfold was the reaction of the children in the audience, who laughed uproariously at so much of it. The scenes of Chico and Harpo taunting the lemonade stand guy - setting his hats on fire, putting their feet in his vat of lemonade - sent them into fits of giggles you could hear throughout the theater.
As a trainer and field guide, it was the puns and word nerd humor that set me off.
Mrs. T: Notables from every country are gathered here in your honor. This is a gala day for you.
Groucho: Well, a gal a day is enough for me. I don't think I could handle any more.
Let's face it, laughing at the Marx Brothers is duck soup.
Showing posts with label pipeline walkway. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pipeline walkway. Show all posts
Thursday, June 13, 2019
Sunday, June 3, 2018
Walk Away, James
I was so ready for a good walk on a beautiful day.
To start, I began by giving myself permission to skip Broad Appetit this year.
Which means when I finally set out to walk around 11:00, the festival was just getting going, necessitating me navigating past all things Broad Appetit. It didn't, however, stop me from giving props to a volunteer at Jefferson Street who'd come prepared with chair, boom box tuned to vintage soul, large thermos and lunch box. Clearly not his first Broad Appetit rodeo.
Downtown was deserted, making for an easy walk cutting diagonally through empty parking lots as I came down the hill to the still muddy brown river. The downside of walking the canal walk was hearing a pipsqueak of a tour guide explain to his group that the Street Art Festival murals they were standing in front came about as a way to deal with what he called "blighted properties." I almost interrupted his patter to suggest "neglected properties" was a far more apt term.
Tell me about the blight, son, because I recall zero blight. Know what you're talking about before you go spouting off. But who am I to stop some twit from foisting his misconceptions on visitors?
I'm just a walker who hasn't been on the pipeline walkway in weeks and was determined to correct that today. That the weather was perfect for being outside - overcast, 72 degrees and breezy, especially at the river - only validated what I'd known when I set out: that this was going to be a good walk. Even finding a "trail closed" sign at the end of the pipeline walkway didn't dismay me (though I did re-attach one side of the sign to ensure the closed message was clear) because looking at the pipeline surrounded by raging river ahead, I knew people didn't belong on it.
But walking into the wind, against the direction of the water flowing, is not my usual direction, so I especially enjoyed the fierceness of the river's energy walking west. Strangely, returning in my usual direction was anti-climatic after that.
Capital Square was shady and quiet, but things got livelier once I hit the bustle of Broad Street. Fellow walker and Valentine director Bill Martin paused long enough on his way back up Church Hill to entreat me to go to Broad Appetit, though he wouldn't tell me what he'd eaten.
"Do you have a husband?" a smiling man joked to me further on. "Because I'd like to discuss that with you." Crossing First Street, a guy smiled politely and leaned toward me. "If you keep walking like that down there (gestures with head toward Broad Appetit), you're going to cause a traffic jam." I don't care if he was making it up as he went along, I thanked him with a smile.
And thought to myself, ah, yes, the Broad Appetit crowd has arrived. My presence here is no longer required.
Pardon me while I get ready for the rest of my Sunday and the reason for my comment-worthy happy mood. Lucky me, I finally have my own compliment source.
To start, I began by giving myself permission to skip Broad Appetit this year.
Which means when I finally set out to walk around 11:00, the festival was just getting going, necessitating me navigating past all things Broad Appetit. It didn't, however, stop me from giving props to a volunteer at Jefferson Street who'd come prepared with chair, boom box tuned to vintage soul, large thermos and lunch box. Clearly not his first Broad Appetit rodeo.
Downtown was deserted, making for an easy walk cutting diagonally through empty parking lots as I came down the hill to the still muddy brown river. The downside of walking the canal walk was hearing a pipsqueak of a tour guide explain to his group that the Street Art Festival murals they were standing in front came about as a way to deal with what he called "blighted properties." I almost interrupted his patter to suggest "neglected properties" was a far more apt term.
Tell me about the blight, son, because I recall zero blight. Know what you're talking about before you go spouting off. But who am I to stop some twit from foisting his misconceptions on visitors?
I'm just a walker who hasn't been on the pipeline walkway in weeks and was determined to correct that today. That the weather was perfect for being outside - overcast, 72 degrees and breezy, especially at the river - only validated what I'd known when I set out: that this was going to be a good walk. Even finding a "trail closed" sign at the end of the pipeline walkway didn't dismay me (though I did re-attach one side of the sign to ensure the closed message was clear) because looking at the pipeline surrounded by raging river ahead, I knew people didn't belong on it.
But walking into the wind, against the direction of the water flowing, is not my usual direction, so I especially enjoyed the fierceness of the river's energy walking west. Strangely, returning in my usual direction was anti-climatic after that.
Capital Square was shady and quiet, but things got livelier once I hit the bustle of Broad Street. Fellow walker and Valentine director Bill Martin paused long enough on his way back up Church Hill to entreat me to go to Broad Appetit, though he wouldn't tell me what he'd eaten.
"Do you have a husband?" a smiling man joked to me further on. "Because I'd like to discuss that with you." Crossing First Street, a guy smiled politely and leaned toward me. "If you keep walking like that down there (gestures with head toward Broad Appetit), you're going to cause a traffic jam." I don't care if he was making it up as he went along, I thanked him with a smile.
And thought to myself, ah, yes, the Broad Appetit crowd has arrived. My presence here is no longer required.
Pardon me while I get ready for the rest of my Sunday and the reason for my comment-worthy happy mood. Lucky me, I finally have my own compliment source.
Thursday, September 14, 2017
The One That Got Away
Another morning with James, or what I did for friendship.
My planned walking companion pulled the weather wimp card when the sky began spitting, so I replaced him in the blink of an eye with fleet-footed Mac. She'd spilled coffee on her white shirt just before coming over and elected not to bother changing because she knew I wouldn't care.
Pshaw, as long as my companion's feet and conversational skills can keep up with me, I care not what state their attire is in.
As always happens when we first get on the pipeline, she expressed her joy in being there, saying she never wanted to lose an appreciation for such a treasure. Is it any reason I love her?
Just as we got to the first major fall, we spotted a loon taking the rapidly moving water like a champ and then craning its neck to look back at what it had just conquered before moving on to the next rapid. I've seen kayakers do the same thing.
We passed a man bathing in the river, rinsing out his clothes and hanging them on nearby branches to dry. Any day is apparently laundry day when you live at the river.
A little further on, we spotted a blue heron through the trees perched on one leg atop a branch, its head tucked so far down it appeared neck-less. "I'm going to try to get a picture," Mac said, unzipping her pants pocket to retrieve her cell phone.
Cue dramatic music in the background.
Also in that pocket was her car key, her only car key, which inadvertently followed the phone out before dropping into the shallow river bed below. Surprisingly, given the proliferation of marsh grasses and rocks, we could see exactly where the key had landed.
Now getting to it, that was an entirely different matter.
The area just under us was shallow, but there were much deeper waters between us and the key, while the closest ladder to dismount the pipeline was one of those small series of curved rungs with virtually no toe room attached to the pipeline itself.
I headed toward it, with Mac saying how glad she was this had happened with an easygoing friend like me and not someone who wouldn't have seen it for the adventure it was.
The most challenging part of making our way across the water to the other side - which we had to do to avoid the deep areas - was finding footing in an ever-changing river bottom. The silt-y sand wasn't so bad but plenty of rocks (and rusted out beer cans) made themselves known as we attempted to mount them or find a path between them.
It was slow going but also beautiful in that we were getting a view of the river and pipeline few do as we waded through schools of tiny fish and underwater jungles of fallen branches.
The visuals alone were worth the adventure. Heading westward, the river took a bend, providing a view of the water between overhanging branches that appeared to lead to some sort of fairyland or enchanted cove where small scallops of whitewater broke up the surface.
Moments after the key was retrieved, a man walking on the pipeline above spotted us, waved and called down, "I used to do that kind of thing when I was young!"
Rather than let him think we were Dora the Explorer, we stood there thigh deep in the river explaining what had happened and how we'd addressed it. Mac kept patting her zippered pocket to make sure the key was safely there.
"You're my heroes!" he called before continuing his walk while we tried to navigate slippery rocks and slog our way back to put on our shoes and maneuver the curved ladder that was far more difficult to climb up than down.
Righting ourselves once we reached the pipeline, we felt energized and not a little like conquering heroes.
When it comes to friendship and the river James, whiners and the unadventurous need not apply.
My planned walking companion pulled the weather wimp card when the sky began spitting, so I replaced him in the blink of an eye with fleet-footed Mac. She'd spilled coffee on her white shirt just before coming over and elected not to bother changing because she knew I wouldn't care.
Pshaw, as long as my companion's feet and conversational skills can keep up with me, I care not what state their attire is in.
As always happens when we first get on the pipeline, she expressed her joy in being there, saying she never wanted to lose an appreciation for such a treasure. Is it any reason I love her?
Just as we got to the first major fall, we spotted a loon taking the rapidly moving water like a champ and then craning its neck to look back at what it had just conquered before moving on to the next rapid. I've seen kayakers do the same thing.
We passed a man bathing in the river, rinsing out his clothes and hanging them on nearby branches to dry. Any day is apparently laundry day when you live at the river.
A little further on, we spotted a blue heron through the trees perched on one leg atop a branch, its head tucked so far down it appeared neck-less. "I'm going to try to get a picture," Mac said, unzipping her pants pocket to retrieve her cell phone.
Cue dramatic music in the background.
Also in that pocket was her car key, her only car key, which inadvertently followed the phone out before dropping into the shallow river bed below. Surprisingly, given the proliferation of marsh grasses and rocks, we could see exactly where the key had landed.
Now getting to it, that was an entirely different matter.
The area just under us was shallow, but there were much deeper waters between us and the key, while the closest ladder to dismount the pipeline was one of those small series of curved rungs with virtually no toe room attached to the pipeline itself.
I headed toward it, with Mac saying how glad she was this had happened with an easygoing friend like me and not someone who wouldn't have seen it for the adventure it was.
The most challenging part of making our way across the water to the other side - which we had to do to avoid the deep areas - was finding footing in an ever-changing river bottom. The silt-y sand wasn't so bad but plenty of rocks (and rusted out beer cans) made themselves known as we attempted to mount them or find a path between them.
It was slow going but also beautiful in that we were getting a view of the river and pipeline few do as we waded through schools of tiny fish and underwater jungles of fallen branches.
The visuals alone were worth the adventure. Heading westward, the river took a bend, providing a view of the water between overhanging branches that appeared to lead to some sort of fairyland or enchanted cove where small scallops of whitewater broke up the surface.
Moments after the key was retrieved, a man walking on the pipeline above spotted us, waved and called down, "I used to do that kind of thing when I was young!"
Rather than let him think we were Dora the Explorer, we stood there thigh deep in the river explaining what had happened and how we'd addressed it. Mac kept patting her zippered pocket to make sure the key was safely there.
"You're my heroes!" he called before continuing his walk while we tried to navigate slippery rocks and slog our way back to put on our shoes and maneuver the curved ladder that was far more difficult to climb up than down.
Righting ourselves once we reached the pipeline, we felt energized and not a little like conquering heroes.
When it comes to friendship and the river James, whiners and the unadventurous need not apply.
Sunday, August 13, 2017
Hard to Handle
How do you blog about your innocuous Saturday when white supremacist terrorists are mowing down peaceful protesters an hour away?
The same way a person deals with any of the unpleasantness of life - heartbreak, sickness and death of a loved one, natural disaster - I would guess, so any way you can.
When I left for my walk, I knew several friends were in Charlottesville as part of the resistance to the rally, but other than observations that some brawling had been happening, they seemed to think things were going well.
Walking down Fifth Street, I passed two motorcycle guys in leather vests dragging a cooler up the hill. When I commented that surely the load was lighter coming up than it had been going down, the one with the vest marked "chaplain" offered me (and a family exiting their SUV) bottles of cold water from his cooler (thereby proving that even heathens can benefit from a chaplain's ministrations).
Friday night's rain meant that some of the more elaborate spiderwebs on Brown's Island were dotted with raindrops, looking luminescent and lacy in the partly cloudy light.
I wasn't surprised to see how un-populated the pipeline was with just one guy fairly far ahead of me. What did surprise me was when he stopped, turned and began shooting photos of the pipeline where yours truly just happened to be walking.
For a nanosecond, I thought I was being smart by passing him, but now I'm not so sure.
Under a massive rock stood two men off to the side and submerged far enough that they looked to be naked, with the nearby rapids splashing water on their bodies. Ever the art historian, it looked to me like a study for Frederick Bazille's "Summer Scene."
Climbing out on to the rocks to put my feet in the water, the scent of men's cologne wafted toward me, although I couldn't see another person around. But it persisted and a while later, I saw a quartet of kayakers paddling downstream. One even waved at me.
As I was waving back, I couldn't help but wonder if one of these guys had decided to bathe in cologne before shooting the rapids this morning. Maybe what I'd been smelling had been traveling across river and not island.
Walking home along Broad Street, I overheard a young woman tell another that a state of emergency had been declared and her friend, busy texting, asked, "Why?" in a completely uninterested way. Clearly more had happened in Charlottesville since I'd left.
As I breezed through Jackson Ward, I spotted a family standing on a corner, clearly looking for help, so I offered my services. All the nice Australian tourists wanted was a lunch suggestion and preferably someplace their three young sons would be happy and I delivered three options.
They voiced their gratitude but offered me no "G'day, mate" as I walked on.
Facebook gave me all the unpleasant updates, although when people began posting video of the neo-Nazi driving into the crowd of counter protesters, I had no stomach for watching such a thing. Seeing photographs of people flying in the air as the car hit them was horrific enough for me.
I was most interested in reading the accounts of people I knew who were there, but just as compelling was the online commentary by my friends of color. I don't think there's any doubt that if a black group had organized this rally, the police presence would have been far larger and more proactive.
Sadly. At least none of my friends had been hurt.
I wasn't sorry to turn off my computer and go eat in service of my hired mouth while discussing the day's mayhem with a like-minded sane person. It seems forever ago that dinner dates didn't have to involve a rehash of whatever the latest can-you-believe-it-scenario-of-the-day is.
We decided to drown our sorrows on the patio at Saison where we acted as the clean up crew, finishing off bottles by having the last two glasses of a Jura bubbly before doing the same with a Willamette Valley Rose.
"Well, if we didn't, who would?" my date inquired, tongue firmly in cheek. Isn't that the staff's job?
Next to us was a guy with his adoring dog Jada Boo (who wasn't above snapping at a stranger) and on the other end, a trio of tattooed young women discussing all the things the men they've gone out with don't know.
The night isn't long enough for that subject to be exhausted, ladies.
Because today had been a difficult one in terms of where our country seems to be, it only made sense to spend the last of it laughing, so we rounded the corner from Saison and went to Comedy Coalition's late show.
If long form improv by the most senior members of the comedy troupe can't distract you for a while, you may as well call it a day. But it did and before long we were laughing at all of it and, for one bit where the guys slipped into a pretend language, so were the comedians.So hard they couldn't talk.
The bit was funny but their reactions were funnier.
It was a good thing, too, because I arrived home to read that people had died yesterday because of the rally over white supremacy. That was sobering news to learn.
It's difficult to process everything that happened in Charlottesville, but personally, today changed my mind. Up until now, I still thought that context could allow the statues on Monument Avenue to stand, probably because no art geek wants to lose public sculpture.
Wrong, so, so wrong. Those statues need to be relocated to someplace where only people who choose to view them can do so. They have no place on any street in our city.
If calling a statue-less street Monument Avenue bothers you, then let's replace the losing white men sculptures with some celebrating our non-white past (say, Gabriel Prosser, John Lewis or John Jasper and for heaven's sake, some women) and begin to unite as a city.
Before going to bed, I sat on the balcony and admired my lone moonflower in the near-darkness. It feels impossible to take anything for granted anymore when normal changes so often.
Only resistance remains a constant now.
The same way a person deals with any of the unpleasantness of life - heartbreak, sickness and death of a loved one, natural disaster - I would guess, so any way you can.
When I left for my walk, I knew several friends were in Charlottesville as part of the resistance to the rally, but other than observations that some brawling had been happening, they seemed to think things were going well.
Walking down Fifth Street, I passed two motorcycle guys in leather vests dragging a cooler up the hill. When I commented that surely the load was lighter coming up than it had been going down, the one with the vest marked "chaplain" offered me (and a family exiting their SUV) bottles of cold water from his cooler (thereby proving that even heathens can benefit from a chaplain's ministrations).
Friday night's rain meant that some of the more elaborate spiderwebs on Brown's Island were dotted with raindrops, looking luminescent and lacy in the partly cloudy light.
I wasn't surprised to see how un-populated the pipeline was with just one guy fairly far ahead of me. What did surprise me was when he stopped, turned and began shooting photos of the pipeline where yours truly just happened to be walking.
For a nanosecond, I thought I was being smart by passing him, but now I'm not so sure.
Under a massive rock stood two men off to the side and submerged far enough that they looked to be naked, with the nearby rapids splashing water on their bodies. Ever the art historian, it looked to me like a study for Frederick Bazille's "Summer Scene."
Climbing out on to the rocks to put my feet in the water, the scent of men's cologne wafted toward me, although I couldn't see another person around. But it persisted and a while later, I saw a quartet of kayakers paddling downstream. One even waved at me.
As I was waving back, I couldn't help but wonder if one of these guys had decided to bathe in cologne before shooting the rapids this morning. Maybe what I'd been smelling had been traveling across river and not island.
Walking home along Broad Street, I overheard a young woman tell another that a state of emergency had been declared and her friend, busy texting, asked, "Why?" in a completely uninterested way. Clearly more had happened in Charlottesville since I'd left.
As I breezed through Jackson Ward, I spotted a family standing on a corner, clearly looking for help, so I offered my services. All the nice Australian tourists wanted was a lunch suggestion and preferably someplace their three young sons would be happy and I delivered three options.
They voiced their gratitude but offered me no "G'day, mate" as I walked on.
Facebook gave me all the unpleasant updates, although when people began posting video of the neo-Nazi driving into the crowd of counter protesters, I had no stomach for watching such a thing. Seeing photographs of people flying in the air as the car hit them was horrific enough for me.
I was most interested in reading the accounts of people I knew who were there, but just as compelling was the online commentary by my friends of color. I don't think there's any doubt that if a black group had organized this rally, the police presence would have been far larger and more proactive.
Sadly. At least none of my friends had been hurt.
I wasn't sorry to turn off my computer and go eat in service of my hired mouth while discussing the day's mayhem with a like-minded sane person. It seems forever ago that dinner dates didn't have to involve a rehash of whatever the latest can-you-believe-it-scenario-of-the-day is.
We decided to drown our sorrows on the patio at Saison where we acted as the clean up crew, finishing off bottles by having the last two glasses of a Jura bubbly before doing the same with a Willamette Valley Rose.
"Well, if we didn't, who would?" my date inquired, tongue firmly in cheek. Isn't that the staff's job?
Next to us was a guy with his adoring dog Jada Boo (who wasn't above snapping at a stranger) and on the other end, a trio of tattooed young women discussing all the things the men they've gone out with don't know.
The night isn't long enough for that subject to be exhausted, ladies.
Because today had been a difficult one in terms of where our country seems to be, it only made sense to spend the last of it laughing, so we rounded the corner from Saison and went to Comedy Coalition's late show.
If long form improv by the most senior members of the comedy troupe can't distract you for a while, you may as well call it a day. But it did and before long we were laughing at all of it and, for one bit where the guys slipped into a pretend language, so were the comedians.So hard they couldn't talk.
The bit was funny but their reactions were funnier.
It was a good thing, too, because I arrived home to read that people had died yesterday because of the rally over white supremacy. That was sobering news to learn.
It's difficult to process everything that happened in Charlottesville, but personally, today changed my mind. Up until now, I still thought that context could allow the statues on Monument Avenue to stand, probably because no art geek wants to lose public sculpture.
Wrong, so, so wrong. Those statues need to be relocated to someplace where only people who choose to view them can do so. They have no place on any street in our city.
If calling a statue-less street Monument Avenue bothers you, then let's replace the losing white men sculptures with some celebrating our non-white past (say, Gabriel Prosser, John Lewis or John Jasper and for heaven's sake, some women) and begin to unite as a city.
Before going to bed, I sat on the balcony and admired my lone moonflower in the near-darkness. It feels impossible to take anything for granted anymore when normal changes so often.
Only resistance remains a constant now.
Monday, July 31, 2017
Up the Ladder to the Treehouse
Turned out this was a two pop-up kind of day.
So let me tell you about self-restraint. Self restraint is going to a Nate's Bagels pop-up right here in the neighborhood at Charm School (an ice cream shop, not what you might expect from the name) and then walking to the river before I opened it to eat it waterside.
That's almost 25 minutes in possession of a Nate's everything bagel with a schmear of scallion cream cheese without so much as letting it cross my lips. For that pleasure, I made it down to Brown's Island, headed toward the pipeline and took a seat on a stump at the water's edge to gorge on my breakfast while watching a convoy of red rafts navigate a rapid, some better than others.
In fact, once the bagel was history (after I'd packed up my debris as well as an assortment of beer bottles, cans and liquor flasks into my bag) and I was walking the pipeline, I saw one of those rafts caught on a bigger rapid, causing three of the rafters to abandon their paddles and lean dangerously forward at the front of the raft in an attempt to loosen it.
Eventually they were successful, all except for the moment where two of them flipped out of the raft and had to be thrown a yellow rope attached to a flotation device to pull themselves out of the fast moving water.
It was a bit of post-breakfast excitement.
Walking back along Broad Street, I ran into Special K, a regular in J-Ward, who greeted me with "Good morning, beautiful!" and asked for a high five. Giving it to him was apparently enough for him to propose.
"If I could, I'd marry you! Then I'd buy you a Corvette! And I'd love you every single day, really I would!" I figured a peace sign was the appropriate response to such an offer and kept moving.
A couple blocks down, two firetrucks came screaming down Broad Street, one on the wrong side of the road before making a last-minute U-turn at the Quirk Hotel where there was a 2-alarm fire on the rooftop bar.
I wouldn't want this to get around, but I'm feeling like a bit of a disaster voyeur. That or a jinx.
Why? I've been at the scene of all four of the restaurant fires that have happened over the past month: Don't Look Back, Tobacco Company, Peking and now Quirk. Only DLB was intentional - the others I just happened to be walking by at exactly the right (wrong?) moment - but I was also at the scene of the shooting in front of the VCU police station and a block from where the cops shot the guy in a kilt with an ax and knife last week.
If they police are compiling a dossier of suspects, it doesn't look good for me. Does walking count as an alibi?
Not to go all Scarlet O'Hara on the subject, but I'll think about that tomorrow.
Tonight I was at another pop-up, this one from Southbound chef Bobo Catoe, held at the Roosevelt and dubbed the Taqueria el Tigre.
Just like this morning, there was a wait, but not a terribly long one before my date and I were shown to a table and asked what we wanted to drink from bartender extraordinaire T's pop-up cocktail menu.
My companion went for an Oaxacan old fashioned (Reposado tequila, mezcal, agave and chocolate bitters), while I couldn't resist the Iterremoto!, a magic elixir of Pipeno wine (a young Chilean wine), Italian bitter liqueur and pineapple sherbet.
He had me at sherbet.
It reminded both of us of a punch and was so appealing my date threw back his drink so he could order his own Iterremoto!, which apparently means earthquake and needs an exclamation point.
Eager to dive into something besides alcohol, we ordered six of seven things on the menu: prickly pear salad with tomatoes, pine nuts and coffee, roasted beets over avocado puree, Autumn Olive Farms pork tacos (with ranchero sauce and chicharrones), crispy catfish tacos (with peanut salsa, pickled peppers and red cabbage), braised chicken tacos (with killer peach mole, pickled peaches and crispy skin) and ceviche with shrimp, lime, jalapeno, cucumber and herbs.
There wasn't a bummer in the bunch.
Additional Iterremotos were also in order as he regaled me with the details of the outside shower he's currently building at his house and I told him in a low voice about my growing police dossier. Turns out he had a couple of good fire and shooting stories of his own in his past, so he didn't judge me, either.
We took our time about eating, while tables around us emptied and filled again. I fell in love with the food runner's shade of lipstick, a vibrant fuchsia she'd chosen to match the flowers on her tropical shirt. That's my kind of coordination.
A baby at the table behind us saw me smiling at my date and thought it was directed at him and from then on, kept looking at me to play the "who smiles first?" game. His Mom finally turned around to see who was amusing her baby so well. Guilty as charged.
When we left there, it was to go admire the outdoor shower in progress and then on to Flora for Small Talk, a new jazz improv series hosted by guitarist Scott Burton.
It went something like this: 2 musicians improvise together for 30 minutes, then two others improvise together, then all four improvise together. First it was guitar and sax, then electronics/voice and drums, then guitar, drums, electronics/voice and bass/sax.
We found a booth facing the stage and sat back to listen, the advantage being I had a musician for a date, so I got all kinds of informed commentary well beyond my musical vocabulary. But even without him saying it, I could tell what a wonderfully musical drummer Lance of No BS Brass Band is and how much his drumming brought to the overall sound.
Just like I know what two pop-ups, climbing up a ladder to a treehouse and a proposal brought to my Sunday.
But, me in a Corvette? Preposterous!
So let me tell you about self-restraint. Self restraint is going to a Nate's Bagels pop-up right here in the neighborhood at Charm School (an ice cream shop, not what you might expect from the name) and then walking to the river before I opened it to eat it waterside.
That's almost 25 minutes in possession of a Nate's everything bagel with a schmear of scallion cream cheese without so much as letting it cross my lips. For that pleasure, I made it down to Brown's Island, headed toward the pipeline and took a seat on a stump at the water's edge to gorge on my breakfast while watching a convoy of red rafts navigate a rapid, some better than others.
In fact, once the bagel was history (after I'd packed up my debris as well as an assortment of beer bottles, cans and liquor flasks into my bag) and I was walking the pipeline, I saw one of those rafts caught on a bigger rapid, causing three of the rafters to abandon their paddles and lean dangerously forward at the front of the raft in an attempt to loosen it.
Eventually they were successful, all except for the moment where two of them flipped out of the raft and had to be thrown a yellow rope attached to a flotation device to pull themselves out of the fast moving water.
It was a bit of post-breakfast excitement.
Walking back along Broad Street, I ran into Special K, a regular in J-Ward, who greeted me with "Good morning, beautiful!" and asked for a high five. Giving it to him was apparently enough for him to propose.
"If I could, I'd marry you! Then I'd buy you a Corvette! And I'd love you every single day, really I would!" I figured a peace sign was the appropriate response to such an offer and kept moving.
A couple blocks down, two firetrucks came screaming down Broad Street, one on the wrong side of the road before making a last-minute U-turn at the Quirk Hotel where there was a 2-alarm fire on the rooftop bar.
I wouldn't want this to get around, but I'm feeling like a bit of a disaster voyeur. That or a jinx.
Why? I've been at the scene of all four of the restaurant fires that have happened over the past month: Don't Look Back, Tobacco Company, Peking and now Quirk. Only DLB was intentional - the others I just happened to be walking by at exactly the right (wrong?) moment - but I was also at the scene of the shooting in front of the VCU police station and a block from where the cops shot the guy in a kilt with an ax and knife last week.
If they police are compiling a dossier of suspects, it doesn't look good for me. Does walking count as an alibi?
Not to go all Scarlet O'Hara on the subject, but I'll think about that tomorrow.
Tonight I was at another pop-up, this one from Southbound chef Bobo Catoe, held at the Roosevelt and dubbed the Taqueria el Tigre.
Just like this morning, there was a wait, but not a terribly long one before my date and I were shown to a table and asked what we wanted to drink from bartender extraordinaire T's pop-up cocktail menu.
My companion went for an Oaxacan old fashioned (Reposado tequila, mezcal, agave and chocolate bitters), while I couldn't resist the Iterremoto!, a magic elixir of Pipeno wine (a young Chilean wine), Italian bitter liqueur and pineapple sherbet.
He had me at sherbet.
It reminded both of us of a punch and was so appealing my date threw back his drink so he could order his own Iterremoto!, which apparently means earthquake and needs an exclamation point.
Eager to dive into something besides alcohol, we ordered six of seven things on the menu: prickly pear salad with tomatoes, pine nuts and coffee, roasted beets over avocado puree, Autumn Olive Farms pork tacos (with ranchero sauce and chicharrones), crispy catfish tacos (with peanut salsa, pickled peppers and red cabbage), braised chicken tacos (with killer peach mole, pickled peaches and crispy skin) and ceviche with shrimp, lime, jalapeno, cucumber and herbs.
There wasn't a bummer in the bunch.
Additional Iterremotos were also in order as he regaled me with the details of the outside shower he's currently building at his house and I told him in a low voice about my growing police dossier. Turns out he had a couple of good fire and shooting stories of his own in his past, so he didn't judge me, either.
We took our time about eating, while tables around us emptied and filled again. I fell in love with the food runner's shade of lipstick, a vibrant fuchsia she'd chosen to match the flowers on her tropical shirt. That's my kind of coordination.
A baby at the table behind us saw me smiling at my date and thought it was directed at him and from then on, kept looking at me to play the "who smiles first?" game. His Mom finally turned around to see who was amusing her baby so well. Guilty as charged.
When we left there, it was to go admire the outdoor shower in progress and then on to Flora for Small Talk, a new jazz improv series hosted by guitarist Scott Burton.
It went something like this: 2 musicians improvise together for 30 minutes, then two others improvise together, then all four improvise together. First it was guitar and sax, then electronics/voice and drums, then guitar, drums, electronics/voice and bass/sax.
We found a booth facing the stage and sat back to listen, the advantage being I had a musician for a date, so I got all kinds of informed commentary well beyond my musical vocabulary. But even without him saying it, I could tell what a wonderfully musical drummer Lance of No BS Brass Band is and how much his drumming brought to the overall sound.
Just like I know what two pop-ups, climbing up a ladder to a treehouse and a proposal brought to my Sunday.
But, me in a Corvette? Preposterous!
Thursday, June 15, 2017
Ogle 'Em If You See 'Em
After yesterday's thunderstorms, today's air felt scrubbed clean.
Mac and I set out for a walk of fairly epic proportions - 6.82 miles, as it turned out - and returned sweaty, smelly and satisfied. How much more can a woman ask of a friend first thing in the morning?
Heading directly to Brown's Island, I had the brilliant idea that we should begin by walking Belle Isle to see what the lower river levels looked like after the recent flood stage levels.
Now that the water has receded, it's clear just how much of the island's edge the swollen water "ate" away during those torrential days and how uncomfortably close the path around the island is to a precarious drop-off now.
Over near the quarry pond, we chatted with a shirtless guy ("Easy on the eyes," was how Mac described him) who works for one of the outdoor companies who host activities on the island. My question to him was when the floating dock was going to be rebuilt on the pond.
Two years ago when the deck came down, a park employee assured me it would be rebuilt during the off season. Two off seasons later, still no dock. The large, square space was ideal for fishing, for watching the climbers on the rock wall opposite and for education, since a sign explained the quarry's original uses.
It seems to me that if the city can't find the funds, surely a Kickstarter by the Friends of the James River Park could raise enough to build a simple floating dock. The guy was a font of information, sharing with us that a canal runs under the island and river water feeds the pond, which actually holds cleaner water than the river despite its constant movement.
He also shared that during their summer activities in the past, they always had the kids jump off the dock into the pond to start their adventure. Apparently the lack of a dock now denies Richmond youth the distinctive pleasure of hurtling into a quarry pond.
We were able to easily get out on rocks near a rushing stream of water and abandon our shoes and socks for a whirlpool foot bath and a fine view of the skyline. After sitting there a minute or so and taking it all in - the sunshine, the cool water, the view of Hollywood cemetery - Mac said softly, "I love my city."
Ditto, girlfriend. What neither of us could comprehend was the young woman sitting nearby, her ears encased in headphones that surely blocked out the life-affirming sound of rushing water.
Crossing back over Brown's Island, we headed directly for the pipeline walkway, where yesterday I'd seen kayakers hot-dogging in the rapids, rolling underwater and back over, and a clutch of young Mennonite-looking women in long dresses and head coverings who asked me to take a picture of their inaugural pipeline adventure.
Today's interaction was with a trio of fishermen - one missing a lot of teeth, but this is the South - who were pulling up a fishing line heavy with 4 or 5 one and two-foot fish, according to them, catfish, bluegills and something else that got swallowed in translation.
Their dilemma was how to get this bounty of fresh-caught fish up the ladder that wraps the pipeline, with one angler asking if we knew where they could get a mini-crane to aid the cause. Corny, yes, but I cut him slack since pride and male hunting and gathering were involved.
Further along the pipeline, we got more eye candy when a young guy in slacks and a button down white shirt stripped to the waist, draped his shirt on a tree branch, pulled out a fishing rod and went from businessman to fisherman right before our eyes.
"Ooh, plaid boxers!" Mac observed, ogling again as we walked by him on our return leg across the pipeline. Plaid, we decided, is a deal-breaker for neither of us.
Everywhere we went, enormous magnolia trees were full of blossoms fresh and fading and Queen Anne's Lace bloomed in profusion, providing a classic Southern summer tableau.
Just not quite as titillating as half-clad guys.
Mac and I set out for a walk of fairly epic proportions - 6.82 miles, as it turned out - and returned sweaty, smelly and satisfied. How much more can a woman ask of a friend first thing in the morning?
Heading directly to Brown's Island, I had the brilliant idea that we should begin by walking Belle Isle to see what the lower river levels looked like after the recent flood stage levels.
Now that the water has receded, it's clear just how much of the island's edge the swollen water "ate" away during those torrential days and how uncomfortably close the path around the island is to a precarious drop-off now.
Over near the quarry pond, we chatted with a shirtless guy ("Easy on the eyes," was how Mac described him) who works for one of the outdoor companies who host activities on the island. My question to him was when the floating dock was going to be rebuilt on the pond.
Two years ago when the deck came down, a park employee assured me it would be rebuilt during the off season. Two off seasons later, still no dock. The large, square space was ideal for fishing, for watching the climbers on the rock wall opposite and for education, since a sign explained the quarry's original uses.
It seems to me that if the city can't find the funds, surely a Kickstarter by the Friends of the James River Park could raise enough to build a simple floating dock. The guy was a font of information, sharing with us that a canal runs under the island and river water feeds the pond, which actually holds cleaner water than the river despite its constant movement.
He also shared that during their summer activities in the past, they always had the kids jump off the dock into the pond to start their adventure. Apparently the lack of a dock now denies Richmond youth the distinctive pleasure of hurtling into a quarry pond.
We were able to easily get out on rocks near a rushing stream of water and abandon our shoes and socks for a whirlpool foot bath and a fine view of the skyline. After sitting there a minute or so and taking it all in - the sunshine, the cool water, the view of Hollywood cemetery - Mac said softly, "I love my city."
Ditto, girlfriend. What neither of us could comprehend was the young woman sitting nearby, her ears encased in headphones that surely blocked out the life-affirming sound of rushing water.
Crossing back over Brown's Island, we headed directly for the pipeline walkway, where yesterday I'd seen kayakers hot-dogging in the rapids, rolling underwater and back over, and a clutch of young Mennonite-looking women in long dresses and head coverings who asked me to take a picture of their inaugural pipeline adventure.
Today's interaction was with a trio of fishermen - one missing a lot of teeth, but this is the South - who were pulling up a fishing line heavy with 4 or 5 one and two-foot fish, according to them, catfish, bluegills and something else that got swallowed in translation.
Their dilemma was how to get this bounty of fresh-caught fish up the ladder that wraps the pipeline, with one angler asking if we knew where they could get a mini-crane to aid the cause. Corny, yes, but I cut him slack since pride and male hunting and gathering were involved.
Further along the pipeline, we got more eye candy when a young guy in slacks and a button down white shirt stripped to the waist, draped his shirt on a tree branch, pulled out a fishing rod and went from businessman to fisherman right before our eyes.
"Ooh, plaid boxers!" Mac observed, ogling again as we walked by him on our return leg across the pipeline. Plaid, we decided, is a deal-breaker for neither of us.
Everywhere we went, enormous magnolia trees were full of blossoms fresh and fading and Queen Anne's Lace bloomed in profusion, providing a classic Southern summer tableau.
Just not quite as titillating as half-clad guys.
Saturday, May 27, 2017
Take Me to the River
James, is that you I hear?
When I headed down to the river today, it was with the expectation that the river would be high, brown and fast-moving, just like it was yesterday on the T Pot Bridge when I'd watched enormous tree trunks, branches akimbo, bobbing along like toothpicks.
That was child's play compared to what I found once I got down to the pipeline walkway today.
When you descend the metal ladder to access the pipeline, the water all around tends to be shallow, nearly still and many feet below. It's a popular place for ducks to paddle around and bob for food.
Not today. I was gobsmacked to find that the raging James is already swirling maybe barely 18" below the walkway. Completely under several feet of water were my favorite beach as well as the bikini beach and the fisherman's beach.
It was completely disorienting to have all the signs of land missing with only treetops breaking the surface of the water.
The first set of rapids you usually see when walking west are so far underwater that they're no longer recognizable as rapids. Pshaw, it's just another maelstrom in a fiercely fast river. The second set, a favorite of kayakers whom I've seen careen over it and then intentionally flip themselves 360 degrees, looks downright terrifying in James' new state.
Powerful brown waves crash and circle a vortex of some sort, a huge and unnatural-looking hole in the water where rapids should be.
It was impossible even to get to the end of the walkway without waves hitting the pipeline with such force (and a mere foot below walking level) that my legs and shoes kept getting wet. The river itself was completely over top of the pipeline beyond the walkway, and not just covered in water, but with waves rolling along it.
Herons perched on old bridge supports and tucked themselves into the northern shoreline, one nabbing a fish from the river while a group of us watched. A woman with a telephoto lens captured arresting pictures of the herons going about their business on a day on the river where it was anything but business as usual.
I paused to speak to a couple who'd come down to walk and then have a picnic lunch. Holding up the little cooler that housed their food, the wife said, "I don't know where we're going to picnic now!"
My suggestion was Libby Hill Park for a completely different kind of view of the James in action. Surely that historical glimpse of the famous bend must be breathtaking now from so high up. They loved the idea, saying they'd never have thought of it.
What they'll lose from up there, unfortunately, is my favorite part: the roar of the James and today its volume and dynamism rival that of an ocean, a roar made up of fast-moving water and waves crashing in every direction.
Intellectually, I know such force is the sound of danger, but emotionally, the sound of water translates to a relaxed, almost meditative state for me. I attribute it to my parents first taking me to the beach when I was 14 days old.
I could stand here all day listening to you rage, James. And honestly, I don't mind getting a little wet to do it.
When I headed down to the river today, it was with the expectation that the river would be high, brown and fast-moving, just like it was yesterday on the T Pot Bridge when I'd watched enormous tree trunks, branches akimbo, bobbing along like toothpicks.
That was child's play compared to what I found once I got down to the pipeline walkway today.
When you descend the metal ladder to access the pipeline, the water all around tends to be shallow, nearly still and many feet below. It's a popular place for ducks to paddle around and bob for food.
Not today. I was gobsmacked to find that the raging James is already swirling maybe barely 18" below the walkway. Completely under several feet of water were my favorite beach as well as the bikini beach and the fisherman's beach.
It was completely disorienting to have all the signs of land missing with only treetops breaking the surface of the water.
The first set of rapids you usually see when walking west are so far underwater that they're no longer recognizable as rapids. Pshaw, it's just another maelstrom in a fiercely fast river. The second set, a favorite of kayakers whom I've seen careen over it and then intentionally flip themselves 360 degrees, looks downright terrifying in James' new state.
Powerful brown waves crash and circle a vortex of some sort, a huge and unnatural-looking hole in the water where rapids should be.
It was impossible even to get to the end of the walkway without waves hitting the pipeline with such force (and a mere foot below walking level) that my legs and shoes kept getting wet. The river itself was completely over top of the pipeline beyond the walkway, and not just covered in water, but with waves rolling along it.
Herons perched on old bridge supports and tucked themselves into the northern shoreline, one nabbing a fish from the river while a group of us watched. A woman with a telephoto lens captured arresting pictures of the herons going about their business on a day on the river where it was anything but business as usual.
I paused to speak to a couple who'd come down to walk and then have a picnic lunch. Holding up the little cooler that housed their food, the wife said, "I don't know where we're going to picnic now!"
My suggestion was Libby Hill Park for a completely different kind of view of the James in action. Surely that historical glimpse of the famous bend must be breathtaking now from so high up. They loved the idea, saying they'd never have thought of it.
What they'll lose from up there, unfortunately, is my favorite part: the roar of the James and today its volume and dynamism rival that of an ocean, a roar made up of fast-moving water and waves crashing in every direction.
Intellectually, I know such force is the sound of danger, but emotionally, the sound of water translates to a relaxed, almost meditative state for me. I attribute it to my parents first taking me to the beach when I was 14 days old.
I could stand here all day listening to you rage, James. And honestly, I don't mind getting a little wet to do it.
Saturday, May 20, 2017
Midnight Love and Cheap Cigarettes
And other tales from 36 hours with a Kiwi.
One minute I'm at a wine dinner with "my" people and next thing I know, I'm having breakfast for the second day in a row with someone I didn't know a day and a half ago.
Camden's wine dinner Thursday night featured the bounty of Hawke's Bay, New Zealand courtesy of Supernatural Wines and the invitation carried a clear warning, "These are pricey, high acid wines with as much character as the man who runs the company (the ladies will love him! the men will envy him!)."
It didn't take much to round up four wine-lovingsots friends to join me for the wine and wisdom of a stylish and soft spoken Kiwi.
His small production wines made for wonderful pairings from a chef who excels at playing food and wine matchmaker.
The "Supernatural" organic and bio-dynamic Sauvignion Blanc sang with oysters and pear slaw, "Spook Light, a skin-fermented Pinot Gris, made for a killer pairing with housemade Merguez, Kielbasa, Point Reye's Bleu and Manchego and finally, "Green Glow" skin-fermented Sauvignon Blanc was swoon-worthy with grilled swordfish over red wheatberry salad with dill butter sauce.
By the time the dinner was finished, I'd learned that our visitor had spent the day being ferried around by wine reps and was hoping to experience Richmond a tad more fully. Enter yours truly, with offers to show him some of the good stuff in his free time.
Turns out the appeal of a sunny tour guide negates any loose plans he might have been entertaining about getting right to work in the morning. For me, here's my chance to make a visitor love Richmond in record time.
My main challenge is that New Zealanders are unaccustomed to humidity and soon every square inch of his face and arms are covered in beads of sweat. I assure him he'll adjust but the crescent shaped sweat stains on the front of his shirt reappear periodically.
Two topics dominate our walk: architecture and trees. He's agog at the former because so much of New Zealand's is modern and not architect-designed and charmed by the second's lush feel.
We start at Perly's - but not too early because of how late the post-wine dinner salon had gone - because I sense he'll need a sturdy breakfast to overcome last night and stand up to what I have planned.
He immediately orders the Schnorrer, a platter laden with poached eggs, roast beef, his first potato latkes and rye toast, which I suggested he order since we were in a Jewish deli. I don't think I'm exaggerating to say he found the meal life-giving.
From there we walked to a nearby market so he could score cigarettes at which point, sated and with nicotine coursing through his veins, he decided to blow off work entirely. I led him directly to Steady Sounds where we both found some gems in a batch of used records recently arrived while he also picked up the new "Twin Peaks" soundtrack.
It was when I took my records to the counter to pay that I saw the familiar face of the owner as he was busy pricing even more fresh used arrivals. Glancing at my purchases - Janet Jackson, The Persuasions, Marvin Gaye - he inquires, "Karen, need any "Midnight Love?"
If my mind didn't live in the gutter, I might have responded with anything other than "always," but what he meant was Marvin's final studio album from 1982 and, yes, I needed it for $4.
By this point, the visitor had proven his mettle and quite happily accompanied me all over town.
After dropping off our purchases, I led him to the river through the gauntlet of RiverRock preparations, so he could experience the pipeline walkway, to the point that he was even game when I suggested we remove our shoes and wade through the last stretch still underwater.
Don't try this yourselves, kids, I am a pro.
Because other, lesser guides (aka wine reps) had raved about the T Pot Bridge to him, we lapped that, too, but I didn't sense he liked it better than the pipeline. Who would?
By the time I'd walked his Kiwi butt off, he was crying uncle for a seat inside and a glass of wine. I ensured both by landing at Saison Market where we indulged in New Zealand wine, (albeit not his, which was being stocked on the shelf as we watched), sipping glasses of Cambridge Road Vineyard's orange wine, the appealingly funky Cloud Walker.
And speaking of, the sky suddenly darkened and rain poured down on the hot streets out front for exactly two minutes while we drank, and then it was back to being a sunny day.
We slurped Wicomico oysters and a cheese plate at Camden's while discoursing on literature and indie book stores with the she-woman happy hour chef fan club. Then it was on to music and cocktails at Savory Grain, where Mikrowaves' horn section kept the vibe soulful and lead singer Eddie welcomed all the visitors from other countries in the audience (I may have mentioned my companion's provenance to him) with a smirk.
Of course there had to be another late night cigarette run, then GWARbar, which was his idea because he'd been taken there Wednesday night at 1:57 a.m. and wanted a fuller experience.
Leave it to me to make sure he had it with Espolon and warm pork rinds.
To the delight of both of us, one of the kitchen guys decided there had been quite enough metal playing at GWARbar for one Saturday evening and proceeded to go pop on us and I mean pop: Whitney Houston, Cyndi Lauper, Starship, Toto.
Kiwi even requested a classic - America's "Horse With No Name" - and was obliged within three songs. Claims he likes the beat, surely a rare compliment for such a mellow '70s band.
Naturally a former denizen of London is a fan of electronica and dance music.
Eating breakfast at the counter of 821 Cafe this morning to thrash music ("Not exactly your normal cafe music, hmm?" he observes drolly), I pointed out that we'd eaten an awful lot of meals together lately for people who'd been complete strangers as recently as Thursday afternoon.
"When are you coming to visit New Zealand?" he asks in between sips of a Bloody Mary made with Texas Beach Bloody mix, a reference I have to explain since I hadn't included Texas Beach on our stroll. Instagram photos naturally ensued.
Like the rye toast yesterday, the biscuit on his plate was completely my idea since he was unfamiliar with them and needed a lesson on southern eating. "It's kind of big, isn't it?" he wonders before I suggest adding butter.
A tour guide's work is never finished.
At least it doesn't end officially until you've walked your guest to get cigarettes yet again ("They're so cheap!" he marvels, always followed by an earnest, "I'm going to quit very soon")) and waited with him for his train to arrive - mind you, over an hour late - enjoying possibly the last conversation you may have with this person.
Neither love nor envy were on the table, but the 11th hour dynamic certainly made for compelling trackside diversion. How unlikely and ultimately enjoyable to spend such focused time with someone you're unlikely to see again.
It was a pleasure, in other words.
Let's just call it a fabulously accented kick-off to my impending birthday. Character reigned supreme.
One minute I'm at a wine dinner with "my" people and next thing I know, I'm having breakfast for the second day in a row with someone I didn't know a day and a half ago.
Camden's wine dinner Thursday night featured the bounty of Hawke's Bay, New Zealand courtesy of Supernatural Wines and the invitation carried a clear warning, "These are pricey, high acid wines with as much character as the man who runs the company (the ladies will love him! the men will envy him!)."
It didn't take much to round up four wine-loving
His small production wines made for wonderful pairings from a chef who excels at playing food and wine matchmaker.
The "Supernatural" organic and bio-dynamic Sauvignion Blanc sang with oysters and pear slaw, "Spook Light, a skin-fermented Pinot Gris, made for a killer pairing with housemade Merguez, Kielbasa, Point Reye's Bleu and Manchego and finally, "Green Glow" skin-fermented Sauvignon Blanc was swoon-worthy with grilled swordfish over red wheatberry salad with dill butter sauce.
By the time the dinner was finished, I'd learned that our visitor had spent the day being ferried around by wine reps and was hoping to experience Richmond a tad more fully. Enter yours truly, with offers to show him some of the good stuff in his free time.
Turns out the appeal of a sunny tour guide negates any loose plans he might have been entertaining about getting right to work in the morning. For me, here's my chance to make a visitor love Richmond in record time.
My main challenge is that New Zealanders are unaccustomed to humidity and soon every square inch of his face and arms are covered in beads of sweat. I assure him he'll adjust but the crescent shaped sweat stains on the front of his shirt reappear periodically.
Two topics dominate our walk: architecture and trees. He's agog at the former because so much of New Zealand's is modern and not architect-designed and charmed by the second's lush feel.
We start at Perly's - but not too early because of how late the post-wine dinner salon had gone - because I sense he'll need a sturdy breakfast to overcome last night and stand up to what I have planned.
He immediately orders the Schnorrer, a platter laden with poached eggs, roast beef, his first potato latkes and rye toast, which I suggested he order since we were in a Jewish deli. I don't think I'm exaggerating to say he found the meal life-giving.
From there we walked to a nearby market so he could score cigarettes at which point, sated and with nicotine coursing through his veins, he decided to blow off work entirely. I led him directly to Steady Sounds where we both found some gems in a batch of used records recently arrived while he also picked up the new "Twin Peaks" soundtrack.
It was when I took my records to the counter to pay that I saw the familiar face of the owner as he was busy pricing even more fresh used arrivals. Glancing at my purchases - Janet Jackson, The Persuasions, Marvin Gaye - he inquires, "Karen, need any "Midnight Love?"
If my mind didn't live in the gutter, I might have responded with anything other than "always," but what he meant was Marvin's final studio album from 1982 and, yes, I needed it for $4.
By this point, the visitor had proven his mettle and quite happily accompanied me all over town.
After dropping off our purchases, I led him to the river through the gauntlet of RiverRock preparations, so he could experience the pipeline walkway, to the point that he was even game when I suggested we remove our shoes and wade through the last stretch still underwater.
Don't try this yourselves, kids, I am a pro.
Because other, lesser guides (aka wine reps) had raved about the T Pot Bridge to him, we lapped that, too, but I didn't sense he liked it better than the pipeline. Who would?
By the time I'd walked his Kiwi butt off, he was crying uncle for a seat inside and a glass of wine. I ensured both by landing at Saison Market where we indulged in New Zealand wine, (albeit not his, which was being stocked on the shelf as we watched), sipping glasses of Cambridge Road Vineyard's orange wine, the appealingly funky Cloud Walker.
And speaking of, the sky suddenly darkened and rain poured down on the hot streets out front for exactly two minutes while we drank, and then it was back to being a sunny day.
We slurped Wicomico oysters and a cheese plate at Camden's while discoursing on literature and indie book stores with the she-woman happy hour chef fan club. Then it was on to music and cocktails at Savory Grain, where Mikrowaves' horn section kept the vibe soulful and lead singer Eddie welcomed all the visitors from other countries in the audience (I may have mentioned my companion's provenance to him) with a smirk.
Of course there had to be another late night cigarette run, then GWARbar, which was his idea because he'd been taken there Wednesday night at 1:57 a.m. and wanted a fuller experience.
Leave it to me to make sure he had it with Espolon and warm pork rinds.
To the delight of both of us, one of the kitchen guys decided there had been quite enough metal playing at GWARbar for one Saturday evening and proceeded to go pop on us and I mean pop: Whitney Houston, Cyndi Lauper, Starship, Toto.
Kiwi even requested a classic - America's "Horse With No Name" - and was obliged within three songs. Claims he likes the beat, surely a rare compliment for such a mellow '70s band.
Naturally a former denizen of London is a fan of electronica and dance music.
Eating breakfast at the counter of 821 Cafe this morning to thrash music ("Not exactly your normal cafe music, hmm?" he observes drolly), I pointed out that we'd eaten an awful lot of meals together lately for people who'd been complete strangers as recently as Thursday afternoon.
"When are you coming to visit New Zealand?" he asks in between sips of a Bloody Mary made with Texas Beach Bloody mix, a reference I have to explain since I hadn't included Texas Beach on our stroll. Instagram photos naturally ensued.
Like the rye toast yesterday, the biscuit on his plate was completely my idea since he was unfamiliar with them and needed a lesson on southern eating. "It's kind of big, isn't it?" he wonders before I suggest adding butter.
A tour guide's work is never finished.
At least it doesn't end officially until you've walked your guest to get cigarettes yet again ("They're so cheap!" he marvels, always followed by an earnest, "I'm going to quit very soon")) and waited with him for his train to arrive - mind you, over an hour late - enjoying possibly the last conversation you may have with this person.
Neither love nor envy were on the table, but the 11th hour dynamic certainly made for compelling trackside diversion. How unlikely and ultimately enjoyable to spend such focused time with someone you're unlikely to see again.
It was a pleasure, in other words.
Let's just call it a fabulously accented kick-off to my impending birthday. Character reigned supreme.
Tuesday, May 16, 2017
Whence This Perfume Floating Ev'rywhere
If the poetry that is May in Richmond can be conveyed in one breath, it's the headiness of honeysuckle.
Separating the manicured grounds of Ethyl Corp. from the historic sprawl of Tredegar Iron Works or weaving a dense hedge with brambly pink-flowered blackberries along the Manchester canal, the head-filling aroma provides an olfactory soundtrack to a walkabout.
It's on a May day like this one that Mac and I will see at least a dozen great blue herons who've set up sentinel posts along both sides of the river. Those standing on the north side are tucked into shady nooks near the pipeline, while those roosting on the southern shores seem content to perch on rocks and observe nearby fishermen.
Or...? If you were to ask me, I'd guess that they're all on the prowl for mates. It's the lusty month of May, after all.
Even the crabbiest weather wimps are going on record as being enamored of this particular May weather paradigm - sunny, '70s, cooler nights, low humidity - but, truth be told, I'd like a bit more humidity in the air. The air is softer with extra moisture caught up in it and May cries out for softer days and nights before the serious biz of Summer arrives.
May means that outdoor music is ramping up in earnest and a chance subterranean encounter last evening reminded me that there are times when I would want to make my way to a park at sunset.
The enveloping pleasures of listening to the Marcus Tenney Trio - complete with drum kit (!!), trumpet and upright bass - in a tiny park, under slowly deepening skies that draw out blinking fireflies is a well-composed example of what lies just barely beneath the surface of this offbeat charmer of a town I call home.
It's like that time I went to the Byrd Theater because I needed to laugh, only to well up instead when Bob Gulledge began playing "What a Wonderful World" on the mighty Wurlitzer before the movie.
Richmond, you may not be subtle but you're nothing if not relentless.
After my review of a Richmond institution hits the stands today, I heard from a friend and food writer, who opines, "Hi, I loved your Sally Bell's review today. You nailed it - vibe, food, history. Thank you."
I'm not entirely certain what the appreciation being proffered is about, but I have a guess.
A food establishment that's been around for 91 years deserves a little respect, not to mention context. My review had looked at the restaurant's cult of personality and explained it to those unfamiliar with it in a manner that could only have been done by someone who'd been in Richmond for at least 1/3 of the restaurant's life.
Someone newer to Richmond or even just less familiar with mid-Atlantic culinary cultural history, might have tried to compare it to or look for its place among the artisan and quirky food businesses that have sprouted like fungi after a rainy spell in trendy and trending neighborhoods.
Not this long-timer.
I took it back to my own prehistoric memories and a time of gentler social mores. While not exactly standing on the lawn and shaking my fist, my words were a reminder to more recent come-heres of a world where white cardboard boxed lunches were tied with string and included something as civilized as a cheese wafer.
It's living in a town where someone reads your words and bothers to extend appreciation. It's being able to walk for miles over or alongside the water before rejoining the urban world. It's music in a park in the approaching dark. It's tangles of overgrown honeysuckle that smell like what youthful me thought summer romance should.
It's living in Richmond. It's May, the month of "yes, you may."
Best I get on with it, everyone hints and hopes. Doing my best.
Separating the manicured grounds of Ethyl Corp. from the historic sprawl of Tredegar Iron Works or weaving a dense hedge with brambly pink-flowered blackberries along the Manchester canal, the head-filling aroma provides an olfactory soundtrack to a walkabout.
It's on a May day like this one that Mac and I will see at least a dozen great blue herons who've set up sentinel posts along both sides of the river. Those standing on the north side are tucked into shady nooks near the pipeline, while those roosting on the southern shores seem content to perch on rocks and observe nearby fishermen.
Or...? If you were to ask me, I'd guess that they're all on the prowl for mates. It's the lusty month of May, after all.
Even the crabbiest weather wimps are going on record as being enamored of this particular May weather paradigm - sunny, '70s, cooler nights, low humidity - but, truth be told, I'd like a bit more humidity in the air. The air is softer with extra moisture caught up in it and May cries out for softer days and nights before the serious biz of Summer arrives.
May means that outdoor music is ramping up in earnest and a chance subterranean encounter last evening reminded me that there are times when I would want to make my way to a park at sunset.
The enveloping pleasures of listening to the Marcus Tenney Trio - complete with drum kit (!!), trumpet and upright bass - in a tiny park, under slowly deepening skies that draw out blinking fireflies is a well-composed example of what lies just barely beneath the surface of this offbeat charmer of a town I call home.
It's like that time I went to the Byrd Theater because I needed to laugh, only to well up instead when Bob Gulledge began playing "What a Wonderful World" on the mighty Wurlitzer before the movie.
Richmond, you may not be subtle but you're nothing if not relentless.
After my review of a Richmond institution hits the stands today, I heard from a friend and food writer, who opines, "Hi, I loved your Sally Bell's review today. You nailed it - vibe, food, history. Thank you."
I'm not entirely certain what the appreciation being proffered is about, but I have a guess.
A food establishment that's been around for 91 years deserves a little respect, not to mention context. My review had looked at the restaurant's cult of personality and explained it to those unfamiliar with it in a manner that could only have been done by someone who'd been in Richmond for at least 1/3 of the restaurant's life.
Someone newer to Richmond or even just less familiar with mid-Atlantic culinary cultural history, might have tried to compare it to or look for its place among the artisan and quirky food businesses that have sprouted like fungi after a rainy spell in trendy and trending neighborhoods.
Not this long-timer.
I took it back to my own prehistoric memories and a time of gentler social mores. While not exactly standing on the lawn and shaking my fist, my words were a reminder to more recent come-heres of a world where white cardboard boxed lunches were tied with string and included something as civilized as a cheese wafer.
It's living in a town where someone reads your words and bothers to extend appreciation. It's being able to walk for miles over or alongside the water before rejoining the urban world. It's music in a park in the approaching dark. It's tangles of overgrown honeysuckle that smell like what youthful me thought summer romance should.
It's living in Richmond. It's May, the month of "yes, you may."
Best I get on with it, everyone hints and hopes. Doing my best.
Saturday, March 11, 2017
Praise the Walk, Man, Praise the Walk
'Tis a day for avoiding the green.
Setting out on my walk, I couldn't do my westward circuit because of Shamrock the Boulevard and I wasn't going anywhere near Shockoe Slip due to the Sine Irish Pub Festival. The low line and Chapel Island were definitely out because of the vomit-inducing Blarney Bash in the Bottom, which left me bound for the river.
Walking down Fifth Street just before noon took on shades of Bourbon Street when I spotted a middle-aged foursome walking along while sipping on wine from glasses hung from embarrassing neck strap wine holders. That was my reminder that this was the weekend of the Virginia Wine Expo at the Convention Center, but a better point might be, how the hell did they get out of the building with wine in their glasses?
With a little weaving going on and a whole lot of loud talking, it was obvious that since it was only 12:30, they must have been at the Expo the moment it opened. Passing them, I overheard that they were in search of food and slowed down to investigate.
When they told me they were on their way to Penny Lane Pub, I couldn't help but ask why.
"Where should we go?" they asked, as if there were just one answer to that. My question was what they were looking for: filling (probably a good idea given their blood alcohol levels already), healthy ("Do we look like we eat healthy?" the largest guy asked rhetorically), ethnic (no response), within walking distance (absolutely).
My suggestion was Greenleaf's a block away and I backed that up with reasons: the fun and funky vibe that includes an upscale pool hall, the creative and delicious food (that bar toast!), the brightly-colored Mexican artisan-painted portraits of famous pool and billiard players, shoot, I even mentioned how cool the black and white photographs of female pool players from the '50s and '60s hanging in the ladies' room were.
Let's just say they were profuse in their gratitude for steering them someplace they'd never have found on their own. Wishing them bon appetit and continuing down the hill to the river, the large guy called out his thanks again, adding, "Walk a mile or two for me, wouldja?"
A mile or two? Sir, you clearly have a magic mirror at home if you think that's all you need.
When I got near the bottom of the hill, I spotted the female members of a wedding party clustered around the bridge to Brown's Island, the bride wearing a short-sleeved fur jacket while the lavender dresses of her six bridesmaids were partly covered by white shawls.
All of them appeared to be shivering.
As I passed them, the one woman in street clothes looked up from her phone and announced, "They're leaving the limo now," like she was the secret service or something. Presumably, she was talking about the male portion of the bridal party, but the bride didn't look any too pleased at further waiting.
Not the most auspicious start for marital bliss.
Brown's Island wasn't particularly hopping today, although one guy made my day by stopping to ask if he could tell me something. "You're gorgeous," he said apropos of nothing and then moved on. Maybe he'd already been to the Wine Expo, too, though there was no tell-tale glass hanging round his neck so I couldn't be sure.
Near the lip of Brown's Island, not far from where the pipeline begins, I saw movement out of the corner of my eye and realized that two green hammocks were now strung on top of each other between two trees. The occupants looked to be 14 or 15 year old boys and both were staring at their laps.
I couldn't resist.
Are you guys really laying in hammocks by the river in the sunshine looking at phones? Slowly, the top hammock brought his hands up, "I'm carving wood," he explained, holding up a knife and stick. I rained down praise on him, apologizing for my presumption.
From down below, the other boy peered around the side of his hammock. "Guilty as charged," he said sheepishly. "But I'm putting it away now."
My work here was finished.
On the pipeline, I followed behind a couple who, I would wager, were making their maiden foray on the curved and uneven surface, at least judging by their tentative and turtle-like pace. Coming up behind the man, he whispered to his wife and they paused awkwardly so I could pass.
As I was going around the terrified-looking woman trying to perch near the edge so I could pass, she smiled at me brightly and asked, "How are you doing today?" It seemed an odd moment to strike up a conversation but I stopped and answered.
By the time I got to the walkway, they were mere specks in the distance. Like I said, real slow movers.
After climbing the ladder off the pipeline, I heard the thundering bass and drums of a live band nearby the moment I stepped on land again, alerting me to the proximity of green beer and drunken revelers. Turning away from it, I headed across Mayo's Bridge.
Near the end, a man on a bike came toward me smiling and calling out, "Praise the lord, woman, praise the lord!" so I answered in kind and somehow lightening didn't strike me dead.
Instead, the insect world attacked. Just like earlier this week when Mac and I'd walked it, black gnats still swarmed along parts of the floodwall, a tad surprising given temperatures in the 30s today.
Walking toward me along the path under the Manchester bridge were parents with a young son on his training wheel bike and while the kid was clearly struggling with navigating on the gravel-strewn dirt, Mom was cutting him no slack.
"You have to learn to ride on rocks or regular," she told him firmly as he wobbled side to side on the pitted terrain. Feeling a little sorry for the budding cyclist, I reminded Mom that riding on gravel is hard and she gave me that "life is hard" look and kept walking.
Crossing the T Pot bridge, I was a little surprised to see 5 kayakers resting on some rocks near the bridge and another 4 or 5 making their way downriver toward them, while behind them were four tubing groups, easily the first of either activity I've seen on the water since before Christmas.
I'd have been less surprised had I seen them on one of the recent 70-degree days and not a chilly, windy one like today, but what do I know about such things?
It's enough just knowing which parts of the city are safe from the green-swilling mob today. As for the sweet-talking wine-swilling hordes, I can handle them any day.
Setting out on my walk, I couldn't do my westward circuit because of Shamrock the Boulevard and I wasn't going anywhere near Shockoe Slip due to the Sine Irish Pub Festival. The low line and Chapel Island were definitely out because of the vomit-inducing Blarney Bash in the Bottom, which left me bound for the river.
Walking down Fifth Street just before noon took on shades of Bourbon Street when I spotted a middle-aged foursome walking along while sipping on wine from glasses hung from embarrassing neck strap wine holders. That was my reminder that this was the weekend of the Virginia Wine Expo at the Convention Center, but a better point might be, how the hell did they get out of the building with wine in their glasses?
With a little weaving going on and a whole lot of loud talking, it was obvious that since it was only 12:30, they must have been at the Expo the moment it opened. Passing them, I overheard that they were in search of food and slowed down to investigate.
When they told me they were on their way to Penny Lane Pub, I couldn't help but ask why.
"Where should we go?" they asked, as if there were just one answer to that. My question was what they were looking for: filling (probably a good idea given their blood alcohol levels already), healthy ("Do we look like we eat healthy?" the largest guy asked rhetorically), ethnic (no response), within walking distance (absolutely).
My suggestion was Greenleaf's a block away and I backed that up with reasons: the fun and funky vibe that includes an upscale pool hall, the creative and delicious food (that bar toast!), the brightly-colored Mexican artisan-painted portraits of famous pool and billiard players, shoot, I even mentioned how cool the black and white photographs of female pool players from the '50s and '60s hanging in the ladies' room were.
Let's just say they were profuse in their gratitude for steering them someplace they'd never have found on their own. Wishing them bon appetit and continuing down the hill to the river, the large guy called out his thanks again, adding, "Walk a mile or two for me, wouldja?"
A mile or two? Sir, you clearly have a magic mirror at home if you think that's all you need.
When I got near the bottom of the hill, I spotted the female members of a wedding party clustered around the bridge to Brown's Island, the bride wearing a short-sleeved fur jacket while the lavender dresses of her six bridesmaids were partly covered by white shawls.
All of them appeared to be shivering.
As I passed them, the one woman in street clothes looked up from her phone and announced, "They're leaving the limo now," like she was the secret service or something. Presumably, she was talking about the male portion of the bridal party, but the bride didn't look any too pleased at further waiting.
Not the most auspicious start for marital bliss.
Brown's Island wasn't particularly hopping today, although one guy made my day by stopping to ask if he could tell me something. "You're gorgeous," he said apropos of nothing and then moved on. Maybe he'd already been to the Wine Expo, too, though there was no tell-tale glass hanging round his neck so I couldn't be sure.
Near the lip of Brown's Island, not far from where the pipeline begins, I saw movement out of the corner of my eye and realized that two green hammocks were now strung on top of each other between two trees. The occupants looked to be 14 or 15 year old boys and both were staring at their laps.
I couldn't resist.
Are you guys really laying in hammocks by the river in the sunshine looking at phones? Slowly, the top hammock brought his hands up, "I'm carving wood," he explained, holding up a knife and stick. I rained down praise on him, apologizing for my presumption.
From down below, the other boy peered around the side of his hammock. "Guilty as charged," he said sheepishly. "But I'm putting it away now."
My work here was finished.
On the pipeline, I followed behind a couple who, I would wager, were making their maiden foray on the curved and uneven surface, at least judging by their tentative and turtle-like pace. Coming up behind the man, he whispered to his wife and they paused awkwardly so I could pass.
As I was going around the terrified-looking woman trying to perch near the edge so I could pass, she smiled at me brightly and asked, "How are you doing today?" It seemed an odd moment to strike up a conversation but I stopped and answered.
By the time I got to the walkway, they were mere specks in the distance. Like I said, real slow movers.
After climbing the ladder off the pipeline, I heard the thundering bass and drums of a live band nearby the moment I stepped on land again, alerting me to the proximity of green beer and drunken revelers. Turning away from it, I headed across Mayo's Bridge.
Near the end, a man on a bike came toward me smiling and calling out, "Praise the lord, woman, praise the lord!" so I answered in kind and somehow lightening didn't strike me dead.
Instead, the insect world attacked. Just like earlier this week when Mac and I'd walked it, black gnats still swarmed along parts of the floodwall, a tad surprising given temperatures in the 30s today.
Walking toward me along the path under the Manchester bridge were parents with a young son on his training wheel bike and while the kid was clearly struggling with navigating on the gravel-strewn dirt, Mom was cutting him no slack.
"You have to learn to ride on rocks or regular," she told him firmly as he wobbled side to side on the pitted terrain. Feeling a little sorry for the budding cyclist, I reminded Mom that riding on gravel is hard and she gave me that "life is hard" look and kept walking.
Crossing the T Pot bridge, I was a little surprised to see 5 kayakers resting on some rocks near the bridge and another 4 or 5 making their way downriver toward them, while behind them were four tubing groups, easily the first of either activity I've seen on the water since before Christmas.
I'd have been less surprised had I seen them on one of the recent 70-degree days and not a chilly, windy one like today, but what do I know about such things?
It's enough just knowing which parts of the city are safe from the green-swilling mob today. As for the sweet-talking wine-swilling hordes, I can handle them any day.
Saturday, January 7, 2017
Scarf-less and Stubborn
When I no longer thrill to the first snow of the season, I'll know I'm growing old. ~ Lady Bird Johnson
Amen, Lady Bird, nowhere near there yet.
Just last evening, Mac and I had agreed that there's nothing quite like a snow forecast that brings on the sleepy excitement of waking up in the middle of the night to peer outside and see the white stuff coming down steadily, knowing you'll wake up to a winter wonderland.
Taking my anticipation to heart, I woke up twice during the night and went directly to the living room window - the one that overlooks a street light, the better to gauge how thickly the snow was falling - before padding back to bed for an 11-hour night.
What? Snow is also the ideal time to catch up on sleep.
Good morning. It's beautiful outside and the conditions are challenging, but I'm up for a walk if you'd like to get out.
Would I! After yesterday's paltry two miles, I'd have certainly gotten out by myself, but here was conversational company offered up by the weather gods. Count me in.
First, though, I had to call Mr. Cosby with whom I'd scheduled an interview at his house today for a story. He sounded relieved when I canceled.
"Ever since they started talking about this snow, I was worried about you driving over here," the elderly man said. "They're telling people to stay in and don't drive, young lady!"
Well, that was easy.
Walking along Broad Street, I got behind a woman walking a massive St. Bernard and the words came out of my mouth before I could stop them. "Shouldn't that dog have a wooden cask around his neck in this weather?"
When she turned around laughing, we realized we knew each other. Turns out she is fostering the 160-pound dog whose owner moved away and couldn't take him. "He loves this weather," she gushed. "He's going to want to stay out all day in this!"
Which, I would think, is exactly the reason that she should consider having a cask - we discussed whether it should be bourbon or brandy, although we know each other from a wine bar - so that she's got motivation to stay out as long as the well-insulated dog wants to.
Or maybe that's just me.
Going down the hill on Fifth Street toward the river, I asked of the sole walker coming up how difficult the incline had been to navigate. "I'm not gonna lie, it was hard!" he tells me and the color of his face attests to it.
Even going down had its challenges since the angle encouraged a far faster rate of movement than the slick and uneven surface warranted.
Still, I like to think that I am somewhat of a walking pro, or, at the very least, I've had enough experience to be out when the talking heads are warning humankind to hunker down and stay in. The best part was I had a willing partner in crime to do it with, so we set out from Brown's Island to explore.
Using my experience rationale (and knowing we couldn't access it from Brown's Island because the river was so high), I led him down the canal walk with the explicit intention of introducing him to the pipeline walkway.
On the snow-covered sign explaining the pipeline, someone had drawn a smiley face to greet us. It was obvious that others had preceded us earlier on the steps down, but sufficiently long ago that the footprints had already been covered over.
Still, it was pioneer enough for me.
As many times as I've walked the pipeline in every season and every weather condition, I'd never seen it look quite as charming. Lines of snow at each seam in the walkway made it look like a white railroad track going off into the horizon, while drifts covered all the little islands and land masses on either side.
I'd just been on the pipeline Thursday, but the river was even fiercer today, rushing especially high on either side as we navigated the normally uneven and now snow-covered and uneven pipeline itself. I already knew we wouldn't be able to make it to the end, but even so I was taken by how far along the pipeline the river had risen since Thursday - probably another six or eight feet.
It wasn't the first time I walked the pipeline only to turn around and retrace my steps and I doubt it'll be the last, but for the pipeline virgin, he really couldn't have asked for a more splendid introduction to my favorite walk.
From there, we meandered towards the Low Line before making a U-turn and heading west on Cary Street with a clear goal: interior warmth. Someone (I'm not going to mention any names) had neglected to wear a scarf and his face was freezing off.
Meanwhile, Little Miss 2 tanks tops, 2 long sleeved shirts, wool pullover, fleece tights and jeans, 2 scarves and gloves was just fine for a change.
Trudging uphill, he commented on the incongruity of footprint-covered sidewalks despite infrequent sightings of other walkers. By far, the highest concentration was a clutch coming out of Triple Crossing Brewing en masse, although for all we know, it was because they were closing early.
Dramatic enough to spark discussion, every detail of the landscape had a beauty worth noting (and completely photograph-worthy), whether it was polka dots of snow captured at the base of a fluted black column or snow-covered branches set against brick walls.
Walking into horizontally-blowing snow, we both knew we could get to 821 Cafe only to find it closed, so we kept Lift in mind for a fallback since they'd been open when I walked by earlier. I'll admit I was thrilled when we got to 821 to find them not only open but almost completely full.
But not for long, so we'd inadvertently managed to time it perfectly. I was even enamored by today's musical bag, which skewed heavily '70s - dare I say disco-like?- instead of the usual harder-edged thrash.
In the spirit of a snow day, they were going through a lot of Texas Beach Bloody Mary mix today.
My favorite long-time server came over to greet us and I couldn't resist asking if she hated people like us who felt the need to venture out in a blizzard, thus ensuring she had to work in this mess.
"A little bit, yea," she said wincing, but grinning. "No, no, you're fine, but we're closing the kitchen in an hour. Besides, I already know your order." Half order, black bean nachos, Boom.
Some would feel shame about being so predictable, but I'm not one of them. The problem was, my friend was new to 821 and hadn't a clue what he wanted off the large, laminated menu.
To buy time, I asked for Espolon on ice, causing her to smile ruefully and share some of her own memories from the old Sprout days that involved drinking Espolon from the bottle in the back room while playing baseball with a band's new record that she and her fellow workers deemed dreadful.
As many times as I ate or heard music at Sprout, I can't say I saw any ball games there. But the funny part was when she asked about my friend's drink order, inquiring if he was "going down the same path" as me. Oh, the innuendo.
Negative. His need was for hot tea, the better to compensate for his scarf-less state and resulting frigid hands. I can honestly say that for the first time in memory, my hands registered as warmer than my companion's and I'm talking male or female.
It was a mighty proud moment for me.
Things warmed up when he said that he was happy to share a full order of nachos with me, 'though when she dropped them off, he observed dryly, "We probably could have shared the half order."
We tucked into them as the dining room began to empty out and the kitchen started closing down. Wiping down a table nearby, our server looked over and nodded approvingly, saying, "It's really nice you finally found a nachos partner."
Tell me about it. Black bean nacho-eating conversational walkers aren't exactly a dime a dozen, you know.
Needles to say, we polished off every last bean of that full order (puh-leeze!) while he battled with himself about whether to drive in this weather to keep his plans tonight or whether to cancel and hunker down to enjoy the snow from a cozy perch at home.
Unlike me, he didn't have a Mr. Cosby to wag a metaphorical finger at him and tell him not to drive.
Only once we were the sole occupants of 821 did we suit up and head out into the horizontal blizzard, or at least for a half a mile or so before we parted ways so he could go his way and I could go mine.
I know, I know, that sounds like a classic R & B lyric (see: Billy Paul's stellar "Me and Mrs. Jones"), which may have to do with how I decided to spend my house confinement since getting back. Right now, it's the dulcet tones of Teddy Pendergrass of Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes.
Next up, the Chi-Lites "You Got Me Walkin."
It was beautiful outside, the conditions were challenging yet I don't know that I could have enjoyed 6+ miles on a snowy afternoon more.
I'm not gonna lie, it was easy.
Amen, Lady Bird, nowhere near there yet.
Just last evening, Mac and I had agreed that there's nothing quite like a snow forecast that brings on the sleepy excitement of waking up in the middle of the night to peer outside and see the white stuff coming down steadily, knowing you'll wake up to a winter wonderland.
Taking my anticipation to heart, I woke up twice during the night and went directly to the living room window - the one that overlooks a street light, the better to gauge how thickly the snow was falling - before padding back to bed for an 11-hour night.
What? Snow is also the ideal time to catch up on sleep.
Good morning. It's beautiful outside and the conditions are challenging, but I'm up for a walk if you'd like to get out.
Would I! After yesterday's paltry two miles, I'd have certainly gotten out by myself, but here was conversational company offered up by the weather gods. Count me in.
First, though, I had to call Mr. Cosby with whom I'd scheduled an interview at his house today for a story. He sounded relieved when I canceled.
"Ever since they started talking about this snow, I was worried about you driving over here," the elderly man said. "They're telling people to stay in and don't drive, young lady!"
Well, that was easy.
Walking along Broad Street, I got behind a woman walking a massive St. Bernard and the words came out of my mouth before I could stop them. "Shouldn't that dog have a wooden cask around his neck in this weather?"
When she turned around laughing, we realized we knew each other. Turns out she is fostering the 160-pound dog whose owner moved away and couldn't take him. "He loves this weather," she gushed. "He's going to want to stay out all day in this!"
Which, I would think, is exactly the reason that she should consider having a cask - we discussed whether it should be bourbon or brandy, although we know each other from a wine bar - so that she's got motivation to stay out as long as the well-insulated dog wants to.
Or maybe that's just me.
Going down the hill on Fifth Street toward the river, I asked of the sole walker coming up how difficult the incline had been to navigate. "I'm not gonna lie, it was hard!" he tells me and the color of his face attests to it.
Even going down had its challenges since the angle encouraged a far faster rate of movement than the slick and uneven surface warranted.
Still, I like to think that I am somewhat of a walking pro, or, at the very least, I've had enough experience to be out when the talking heads are warning humankind to hunker down and stay in. The best part was I had a willing partner in crime to do it with, so we set out from Brown's Island to explore.
Using my experience rationale (and knowing we couldn't access it from Brown's Island because the river was so high), I led him down the canal walk with the explicit intention of introducing him to the pipeline walkway.
On the snow-covered sign explaining the pipeline, someone had drawn a smiley face to greet us. It was obvious that others had preceded us earlier on the steps down, but sufficiently long ago that the footprints had already been covered over.
Still, it was pioneer enough for me.
As many times as I've walked the pipeline in every season and every weather condition, I'd never seen it look quite as charming. Lines of snow at each seam in the walkway made it look like a white railroad track going off into the horizon, while drifts covered all the little islands and land masses on either side.
I'd just been on the pipeline Thursday, but the river was even fiercer today, rushing especially high on either side as we navigated the normally uneven and now snow-covered and uneven pipeline itself. I already knew we wouldn't be able to make it to the end, but even so I was taken by how far along the pipeline the river had risen since Thursday - probably another six or eight feet.
It wasn't the first time I walked the pipeline only to turn around and retrace my steps and I doubt it'll be the last, but for the pipeline virgin, he really couldn't have asked for a more splendid introduction to my favorite walk.
From there, we meandered towards the Low Line before making a U-turn and heading west on Cary Street with a clear goal: interior warmth. Someone (I'm not going to mention any names) had neglected to wear a scarf and his face was freezing off.
Meanwhile, Little Miss 2 tanks tops, 2 long sleeved shirts, wool pullover, fleece tights and jeans, 2 scarves and gloves was just fine for a change.
Trudging uphill, he commented on the incongruity of footprint-covered sidewalks despite infrequent sightings of other walkers. By far, the highest concentration was a clutch coming out of Triple Crossing Brewing en masse, although for all we know, it was because they were closing early.
Dramatic enough to spark discussion, every detail of the landscape had a beauty worth noting (and completely photograph-worthy), whether it was polka dots of snow captured at the base of a fluted black column or snow-covered branches set against brick walls.
Walking into horizontally-blowing snow, we both knew we could get to 821 Cafe only to find it closed, so we kept Lift in mind for a fallback since they'd been open when I walked by earlier. I'll admit I was thrilled when we got to 821 to find them not only open but almost completely full.
But not for long, so we'd inadvertently managed to time it perfectly. I was even enamored by today's musical bag, which skewed heavily '70s - dare I say disco-like?- instead of the usual harder-edged thrash.
In the spirit of a snow day, they were going through a lot of Texas Beach Bloody Mary mix today.
My favorite long-time server came over to greet us and I couldn't resist asking if she hated people like us who felt the need to venture out in a blizzard, thus ensuring she had to work in this mess.
"A little bit, yea," she said wincing, but grinning. "No, no, you're fine, but we're closing the kitchen in an hour. Besides, I already know your order." Half order, black bean nachos, Boom.
Some would feel shame about being so predictable, but I'm not one of them. The problem was, my friend was new to 821 and hadn't a clue what he wanted off the large, laminated menu.
To buy time, I asked for Espolon on ice, causing her to smile ruefully and share some of her own memories from the old Sprout days that involved drinking Espolon from the bottle in the back room while playing baseball with a band's new record that she and her fellow workers deemed dreadful.
As many times as I ate or heard music at Sprout, I can't say I saw any ball games there. But the funny part was when she asked about my friend's drink order, inquiring if he was "going down the same path" as me. Oh, the innuendo.
Negative. His need was for hot tea, the better to compensate for his scarf-less state and resulting frigid hands. I can honestly say that for the first time in memory, my hands registered as warmer than my companion's and I'm talking male or female.
It was a mighty proud moment for me.
Things warmed up when he said that he was happy to share a full order of nachos with me, 'though when she dropped them off, he observed dryly, "We probably could have shared the half order."
We tucked into them as the dining room began to empty out and the kitchen started closing down. Wiping down a table nearby, our server looked over and nodded approvingly, saying, "It's really nice you finally found a nachos partner."
Tell me about it. Black bean nacho-eating conversational walkers aren't exactly a dime a dozen, you know.
Needles to say, we polished off every last bean of that full order (puh-leeze!) while he battled with himself about whether to drive in this weather to keep his plans tonight or whether to cancel and hunker down to enjoy the snow from a cozy perch at home.
Unlike me, he didn't have a Mr. Cosby to wag a metaphorical finger at him and tell him not to drive.
Only once we were the sole occupants of 821 did we suit up and head out into the horizontal blizzard, or at least for a half a mile or so before we parted ways so he could go his way and I could go mine.
I know, I know, that sounds like a classic R & B lyric (see: Billy Paul's stellar "Me and Mrs. Jones"), which may have to do with how I decided to spend my house confinement since getting back. Right now, it's the dulcet tones of Teddy Pendergrass of Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes.
Next up, the Chi-Lites "You Got Me Walkin."
It was beautiful outside, the conditions were challenging yet I don't know that I could have enjoyed 6+ miles on a snowy afternoon more.
I'm not gonna lie, it was easy.
Thursday, January 5, 2017
All About the View Ahead
They should just make me walking ambassador for the city because I know how to dazzle.
It's one thing to take a date's conversational temperature when you're sitting at a restaurant or waiting for a movie to start, and quite another when they're hoofing it next to or behind you for five or six miles.
And, honey, never more so than on the first excursion out.
I don't gravitate to the huffing and puffing type. More than once, I've been told that their primary concern is whether they'll be able to keep up - which shouldn't be a concern if you're half a foot taller than me - and I hate to break it to them, but it's my main concern, too.
My companion on this morning's cold and gray walk was a long-time daily runner and regular exerciser, so I felt comfortable taking him through his paces to see what he could do (besides compliment my posture, which is always a fine start).
Naturally we had to begin in Jackson Ward (where he admitted he knew little about my neighborhood), wind our way down to the river and give him his first T Pot Bridge experience.
"I've got a salacious story, but I'm not sure if I should tell you," he says as we approach the new bridge. Come on, I adore salacious. He had me laughing almost immediately, showing me the spot on the bridge where he and a girlfriend once took liberties with each other in full view of some fishermen.
We agree, at least, that such activities are the provenance of the under-40 set.
I'm pleased that he's as taken with the high volume of the water rushing over the dam remnants under us as I am every time I walk it. To not appreciate the sheer noise of the experience is to miss much.
After climbing to the overlook where he rhapsodizes about a view he's never seen, we re-cross the bridge and I lead him down under the Manchester Bridge.
"Where are you taking me?" he wonders aloud, dropping behind me to navigate the rocky trail. Trust me, I assure him.
Although we have to hop rocks to get on because the river is high, we barely make it ten feet before he tells me he has no idea where he is. When I tell him we're walking on a pipeline approaching the pipeline walkway, he's amazed.
"How have I never been down here? How did I not know this existed?" he asks from behind.
I point out that he's having a singular experience on the pipeline because the water is so high it's almost even with the pipeline, a river rarity that makes walking on a rounded, uneven surface feel like an even greater adventure.
It's also a return to major volume as we pass a couple of Class IV rapids that look like they could spit out a kayaker without notice, the water rushing so furiously that even the birds have stationed themselves on high rocks out of harm's way.
Climbing up the ladder off the pipeline, we pass a couple of guys who ask if we were the ones they'd just seen from the overlook walking the pipeline. They want to do what we did. My date, the newly-minted expert, points out the steps to take them there.
A good sign - I've already converted him to the pleasures of the pipeline.
We walk back along the Canal Walk, across a mostly empty Brown's Island (where he tells me about the view from the top floor of the Federal Reserve where he once attended a party) and climb the hill behind Ethyl to the muddy, straw-covered Gary Gerloff Trail still in recovery mode after the soggy Folk Fest in October. This, too, is a new path for him.
It's somewhere on the hill coming up Second Street that he makes a joke about his aching legs. I raise an eyebrow. Are you looking to be disqualified? He's joking, he claims.
True or not, the key thing - his legs will recover, after all - is that he's held up his end of the conversational walk every step of the way. We've covered nuggets of personal history, Richmond anecdotes, uncovered shared friends and agreed what a true gentleman one of my exes - whom he knew well - was. For the record, he wants to be colored interested and intrigued.
Best of all, the only time he lagged behind was to enjoy the view. Some walkers are made, not born.
It's one thing to take a date's conversational temperature when you're sitting at a restaurant or waiting for a movie to start, and quite another when they're hoofing it next to or behind you for five or six miles.
And, honey, never more so than on the first excursion out.
I don't gravitate to the huffing and puffing type. More than once, I've been told that their primary concern is whether they'll be able to keep up - which shouldn't be a concern if you're half a foot taller than me - and I hate to break it to them, but it's my main concern, too.
My companion on this morning's cold and gray walk was a long-time daily runner and regular exerciser, so I felt comfortable taking him through his paces to see what he could do (besides compliment my posture, which is always a fine start).
Naturally we had to begin in Jackson Ward (where he admitted he knew little about my neighborhood), wind our way down to the river and give him his first T Pot Bridge experience.
"I've got a salacious story, but I'm not sure if I should tell you," he says as we approach the new bridge. Come on, I adore salacious. He had me laughing almost immediately, showing me the spot on the bridge where he and a girlfriend once took liberties with each other in full view of some fishermen.
We agree, at least, that such activities are the provenance of the under-40 set.
I'm pleased that he's as taken with the high volume of the water rushing over the dam remnants under us as I am every time I walk it. To not appreciate the sheer noise of the experience is to miss much.
After climbing to the overlook where he rhapsodizes about a view he's never seen, we re-cross the bridge and I lead him down under the Manchester Bridge.
"Where are you taking me?" he wonders aloud, dropping behind me to navigate the rocky trail. Trust me, I assure him.
Although we have to hop rocks to get on because the river is high, we barely make it ten feet before he tells me he has no idea where he is. When I tell him we're walking on a pipeline approaching the pipeline walkway, he's amazed.
"How have I never been down here? How did I not know this existed?" he asks from behind.
I point out that he's having a singular experience on the pipeline because the water is so high it's almost even with the pipeline, a river rarity that makes walking on a rounded, uneven surface feel like an even greater adventure.
It's also a return to major volume as we pass a couple of Class IV rapids that look like they could spit out a kayaker without notice, the water rushing so furiously that even the birds have stationed themselves on high rocks out of harm's way.
Climbing up the ladder off the pipeline, we pass a couple of guys who ask if we were the ones they'd just seen from the overlook walking the pipeline. They want to do what we did. My date, the newly-minted expert, points out the steps to take them there.
A good sign - I've already converted him to the pleasures of the pipeline.
We walk back along the Canal Walk, across a mostly empty Brown's Island (where he tells me about the view from the top floor of the Federal Reserve where he once attended a party) and climb the hill behind Ethyl to the muddy, straw-covered Gary Gerloff Trail still in recovery mode after the soggy Folk Fest in October. This, too, is a new path for him.
It's somewhere on the hill coming up Second Street that he makes a joke about his aching legs. I raise an eyebrow. Are you looking to be disqualified? He's joking, he claims.
True or not, the key thing - his legs will recover, after all - is that he's held up his end of the conversational walk every step of the way. We've covered nuggets of personal history, Richmond anecdotes, uncovered shared friends and agreed what a true gentleman one of my exes - whom he knew well - was. For the record, he wants to be colored interested and intrigued.
Best of all, the only time he lagged behind was to enjoy the view. Some walkers are made, not born.
Friday, August 26, 2016
If I Was a Drink
When planning an all day adventure, it's essential to pick a partner open to following your lead to create the perfect storm.
First, I need someone willing to knock off a quick five miles walking along the river, not to mention someone eager to climb rocks, remove shoes and cool down in one of the James' many natural Jacuzzis situated between rocks and created by the rushing water fed by nearby falls.
Someone who agrees that the second a snake is spotted - even a five inch one- it's time to move on.
Second, it's essential I have someone willing to cross state lines to eat lunch, and by lunch, I mean eat crabs until we can't eat anymore.
After a brief and soul-sucking stretch on I-95, we took Route 301 up past Fort A.P. Hill, through Port Royal and Dahlgren and landed in downtown Pope's Creek, Maryland at Captain Billy's Crabhouse.
And unlike my visit there last June, this time we ate outside on the deck overlooking the Potomac River and the bridge that had brought us there. Five other tables were occupied when we arrived and we outlasted them all, including a couple who sat down after us, only to rethink their decision and move indoors.
Amateurs.
Everything about being there was ideal - the jet skis buzzing by with rooster tails arcing behind them, the noisy birds atop almost every post on the nearby docks, the especially white clouds in the sky - including our 22-year old waitress, Brittney, who's lived in that area her entire life, making her skittish about moving to Short Pump to live with her boyfriend.
She's tempted only because then she'd have access to Olive Garden and the Cheesecake Factory. Honestly, we wanted to kidnap her and bring her back to Richmond with us, if only to show her (cue music) a whole, new world.
Instead, we ordered crabs, steamed shrimp and coleslaw and began the slow process of eating a lunch that would take a couple of hours to finish satisfactorily.
Although we differed on a few points - I don't use malt vinegar or a knife and we remove the smallest legs at different points in the process - both of us grew up being home-schooled by our elders in Advanced Crab Eating for Connoisseurs.
Few attain our level of mastery.
The afternoon passed in a haze of claw cracking, view admiring (and a bit of boat envy when a couple set out in the boat we'd been hearing bang against the dock since we sat down) and contentment, with just enough of a breeze to keep flies away.
Only the music - modern country with an occasional classic rock artist like Steve Miller or '90s throwback such as 311 - could have used some improvement, although I was having such a wonderful time I found myself somehow sucked in by a Brad Paisley song.
If she was a drink, she'd be single barrel bourbon on ice
Smooth, with a kick, a chill and a burn all at the same time
She's Sunday drive meets high speed chase
She ain't just a song, she's the whole mixtape
I can't say if I'd have even noticed the song if I hadn't been so happily eating crabs on the river on a summer's day, or perhaps southern Maryland is just a place where such a song fits.
By the time we bid Brittney farewell, the early dining crowd was beginning to arrive, our hands still reeked of crabs despite multiple washings and we knew our clothes were more than a tad ripe.
Not ashamed to admit more than a couple hunks of crab landed in my bra and on the chair next to me once my hands and mouth got going.
The drive back down 301 was relatively uneventful except for when it was highly dramatic, but my partner in crime called for reinforcements and Super Bruno not only saved the day, but teased her about her crabby breath before sending us on our way.
Third, and perhaps most importantly because it would be at this point (8 hours into our adventure) that most people would falter, I require someone who sees the value in a completely unique experience, even if it is after a long day and situated 35 miles in a different direction.
And that's after we got home, cleaned up and changed. Coincidentally, we'd both chosen flowered dresses for our rendezvous in Goochland.
Lickinghole Creek Brewery was positively packed when we drove up its dusty, red clay-covered driveway to join the throngs there for pick-your-own sunflowers. Okay, probably just as many were there for beer, given the lines.
But we were there to gather armfuls of free flowers with which to brighten up our city apartments and remind us of a fabulous day.
Walking towards the fields, we saw an artist busy at his easel capturing all the yellow flowers nodding around him and passed scores of people clutching bouquets of sunflowers.
Pegging us for new arrivals, a woman advised, "Go to the back rows!"
The sum total of my experience working in fields harvesting involved picking strawberries, which, I'm here to tell you, bears little resemblance to cutting flowers taller than me.
Unlike low-growing berries, sunflower fields are tall and dense and once you hack your way through fields of squash and melons to get to them, it's sticky hot, even just before sunset.
Which is not to say that being surrounded by so many flowers under puffy, pink-tinged clouds as dusk settled in wasn't worth every drop of sweat that rolled down the back (and front) of my sunflower-printed dress, because it was.
But so is having a partner who thinks a day that begins on the rocks, moves out of state and ends in a field is just as wonderful as I do.
Brad would say she's the whole mixtape.
First, I need someone willing to knock off a quick five miles walking along the river, not to mention someone eager to climb rocks, remove shoes and cool down in one of the James' many natural Jacuzzis situated between rocks and created by the rushing water fed by nearby falls.
Someone who agrees that the second a snake is spotted - even a five inch one- it's time to move on.
Second, it's essential I have someone willing to cross state lines to eat lunch, and by lunch, I mean eat crabs until we can't eat anymore.
After a brief and soul-sucking stretch on I-95, we took Route 301 up past Fort A.P. Hill, through Port Royal and Dahlgren and landed in downtown Pope's Creek, Maryland at Captain Billy's Crabhouse.
And unlike my visit there last June, this time we ate outside on the deck overlooking the Potomac River and the bridge that had brought us there. Five other tables were occupied when we arrived and we outlasted them all, including a couple who sat down after us, only to rethink their decision and move indoors.
Amateurs.
Everything about being there was ideal - the jet skis buzzing by with rooster tails arcing behind them, the noisy birds atop almost every post on the nearby docks, the especially white clouds in the sky - including our 22-year old waitress, Brittney, who's lived in that area her entire life, making her skittish about moving to Short Pump to live with her boyfriend.
She's tempted only because then she'd have access to Olive Garden and the Cheesecake Factory. Honestly, we wanted to kidnap her and bring her back to Richmond with us, if only to show her (cue music) a whole, new world.
Instead, we ordered crabs, steamed shrimp and coleslaw and began the slow process of eating a lunch that would take a couple of hours to finish satisfactorily.
Although we differed on a few points - I don't use malt vinegar or a knife and we remove the smallest legs at different points in the process - both of us grew up being home-schooled by our elders in Advanced Crab Eating for Connoisseurs.
Few attain our level of mastery.
The afternoon passed in a haze of claw cracking, view admiring (and a bit of boat envy when a couple set out in the boat we'd been hearing bang against the dock since we sat down) and contentment, with just enough of a breeze to keep flies away.
Only the music - modern country with an occasional classic rock artist like Steve Miller or '90s throwback such as 311 - could have used some improvement, although I was having such a wonderful time I found myself somehow sucked in by a Brad Paisley song.
If she was a drink, she'd be single barrel bourbon on ice
Smooth, with a kick, a chill and a burn all at the same time
She's Sunday drive meets high speed chase
She ain't just a song, she's the whole mixtape
I can't say if I'd have even noticed the song if I hadn't been so happily eating crabs on the river on a summer's day, or perhaps southern Maryland is just a place where such a song fits.
By the time we bid Brittney farewell, the early dining crowd was beginning to arrive, our hands still reeked of crabs despite multiple washings and we knew our clothes were more than a tad ripe.
Not ashamed to admit more than a couple hunks of crab landed in my bra and on the chair next to me once my hands and mouth got going.
The drive back down 301 was relatively uneventful except for when it was highly dramatic, but my partner in crime called for reinforcements and Super Bruno not only saved the day, but teased her about her crabby breath before sending us on our way.
Third, and perhaps most importantly because it would be at this point (8 hours into our adventure) that most people would falter, I require someone who sees the value in a completely unique experience, even if it is after a long day and situated 35 miles in a different direction.
And that's after we got home, cleaned up and changed. Coincidentally, we'd both chosen flowered dresses for our rendezvous in Goochland.
Lickinghole Creek Brewery was positively packed when we drove up its dusty, red clay-covered driveway to join the throngs there for pick-your-own sunflowers. Okay, probably just as many were there for beer, given the lines.
But we were there to gather armfuls of free flowers with which to brighten up our city apartments and remind us of a fabulous day.
Walking towards the fields, we saw an artist busy at his easel capturing all the yellow flowers nodding around him and passed scores of people clutching bouquets of sunflowers.
Pegging us for new arrivals, a woman advised, "Go to the back rows!"
The sum total of my experience working in fields harvesting involved picking strawberries, which, I'm here to tell you, bears little resemblance to cutting flowers taller than me.
Unlike low-growing berries, sunflower fields are tall and dense and once you hack your way through fields of squash and melons to get to them, it's sticky hot, even just before sunset.
Which is not to say that being surrounded by so many flowers under puffy, pink-tinged clouds as dusk settled in wasn't worth every drop of sweat that rolled down the back (and front) of my sunflower-printed dress, because it was.
But so is having a partner who thinks a day that begins on the rocks, moves out of state and ends in a field is just as wonderful as I do.
Brad would say she's the whole mixtape.
Sunday, July 24, 2016
Heatwave in My Brain, Smolder in My Soul
The cure for anything is salt water: sweat, tears or the sea. ~Isak Dinesan
My first choice would be the sea and my last resort, tears. So I sweat, while the rest of Richmond seemingly takes a different tack: retreat.
It could be when you're walking down the street and, block after block, there are no other people to be seen walking, much less the usual lounging on porches.
It's going four blocks to the ice cream shop and seeing that they're sold out of over half the flavors. Seems the neighborhood has been mainlining gelato the past few days.
It's most certainly when your friends - modern-day hippies and activists when it comes to environmental concerns - praise the benefits of releasing toxins through sweat, then admit that they're going to buy a window A/C unit tomorrow to install in the "community" room of their collective's house.
It's meeting a friend I haven't seen in months for brunch at Amuse (housemade ginger limeade, chilled one-note strawberry soup, Cheddar Bay biscuits du jour, yum, and a fresh take on tres leches cake with chocolate sauce), which is mobbed, but seeing people choose to leave rather than sit on the balcony.
Or it might be when I'm standing outside in my fourth change of clothes for the day, watering my garden and filling the birdbath at 10:30 at night.
I get it, it's next level hot. Call it "soup," call it oppressive, while I take cold showers and baths and train three fans on me while I do nothing more than read in bed or sleep.
Once I got up this morning, my apartment was already 93 degrees and it wasn't much past 9:30.
Arriving home from the Silent Music revival seeing Dharma Bombs play a soundtrack to Buster Keaton's madcap chase caper, "The Goat," it's a refreshing 96 degrees in here, down from 98 when I'd come home from a feisty three hour meeting discussing the past year's theatrical season and who's award-worthy.
While I'm at home, I pretty much live in a tank top and underwear with my hair up. A constant sheen is my new normal. There can't be a toxin left in my body.
No season suits me better than Summer in the South.
Baby, I was born to sweat.
My first choice would be the sea and my last resort, tears. So I sweat, while the rest of Richmond seemingly takes a different tack: retreat.
It could be when you're walking down the street and, block after block, there are no other people to be seen walking, much less the usual lounging on porches.
It's going four blocks to the ice cream shop and seeing that they're sold out of over half the flavors. Seems the neighborhood has been mainlining gelato the past few days.
It's most certainly when your friends - modern-day hippies and activists when it comes to environmental concerns - praise the benefits of releasing toxins through sweat, then admit that they're going to buy a window A/C unit tomorrow to install in the "community" room of their collective's house.
It's meeting a friend I haven't seen in months for brunch at Amuse (housemade ginger limeade, chilled one-note strawberry soup, Cheddar Bay biscuits du jour, yum, and a fresh take on tres leches cake with chocolate sauce), which is mobbed, but seeing people choose to leave rather than sit on the balcony.
Or it might be when I'm standing outside in my fourth change of clothes for the day, watering my garden and filling the birdbath at 10:30 at night.
I get it, it's next level hot. Call it "soup," call it oppressive, while I take cold showers and baths and train three fans on me while I do nothing more than read in bed or sleep.
Once I got up this morning, my apartment was already 93 degrees and it wasn't much past 9:30.
Arriving home from the Silent Music revival seeing Dharma Bombs play a soundtrack to Buster Keaton's madcap chase caper, "The Goat," it's a refreshing 96 degrees in here, down from 98 when I'd come home from a feisty three hour meeting discussing the past year's theatrical season and who's award-worthy.
While I'm at home, I pretty much live in a tank top and underwear with my hair up. A constant sheen is my new normal. There can't be a toxin left in my body.
No season suits me better than Summer in the South.
Baby, I was born to sweat.
Saturday, May 30, 2015
Lick My Tongue
Ask me for a dark secret and I'll share with the entire room. FYI, I can also stare, get lost and cook.
Walking the pipeline so often, I've seen plenty of people fishing but yesterday was the first day I ever saw men throwing nets. It seemed so, I don't know, European or old-school. Charming and unexpected.
According to the one man staying dry on the sand (as opposed to the two with nets wading crotch-deep in the river in their shorts), the were casting for small perch, although in the 15 or so minutes I watched, they pulled in exactly zero.
Still, it's always cool to see new things happening on the river.
Despite my recent birthday, I am even still at this age navigationally-challenged. Today on my annual trek to Gallmeyer Farms in Henrico, I looked up a new route. Keep it fresh, right?
Instead, I somehow ended up on 895, almost immediately passing over the very road I'd been searching for. After getting off on 295 simply to escape the unknown, I eventually wound my way back to the strawberry farm.
Time eclipsed? Turned out to be a tragic 35 minutes for what should have been a 12-minute drive. It no longer even embarrasses me, it's just who I am.
Coming back from the farm with the box of ripe strawberries perfuming the car, I determined to go back the way I'd intended to come in hopes of seeing where I'd made my mistake. But the failure was technology's, not mine (vindicated!), because the directions had left out a key turn that would have put me on the correct road
Just so you know, this is a very satisfying moment for someone who gets lost as often as I do (such as Tuesday evening leaving Merroir for my parents' house and missing a turn...but I blame the darkness). I hadn't done a thing wrong for a change.
The reason I'd gone for strawberries was partly selfish (they're magical right now) and partly intentional. I was hosting a dinner party tonight and wanted them for dessert, along with the pound cake I'd put in the oven at 11:45 p.m. last night, by the way, the coolest time to bake when you don't use air conditioning.
With clear instructions from one of the guests ("Not gonna lie, I'm not easy to cook for. No meat, no dairy"), I'd chosen Alton Brown's guacamole and someone named Melissa Rubel Jacobson's chipotle shrimp tostada recipes, both of which went over smashingly well. In the process, I went through four avocados, three limes, two colors of tomatoes and onions and most of my cilantro plant.
Given today's heat and the amount of cooking going on in my bite-sized kitchen, I realized late in the game that I should have chilled the metal bowl and beaters before whipping heavy cream for the dessert but managed to achieve stiff peaks even so (culinary aside: the phrase "stiff peaks" ties with "hard ball stage" in candy-making for smuttiest sounding cooking terminology).
Is there anything more May-like than just-picked strawberries and cream? Don't get me wrong, I enjoy pound cake, but it plays second fiddle to berries and mounds of whipped cream this time of year.
On my walk to Belle Isle this morning, I'd noticed that Coalition Comedy was doing a "Dating Game" show tonight and immediately made a mental note. It's true, I remember that cheesy dating show, so I adored the idea of improv comedians riffing on it.
Paying my admission, I heard a woman member of the troupe tell a male one, "Lick my tongue," a proposition which appalled him. "What? No!" he said, backing up. "This is workplace harassment!"
The show hadn't started and already I was laughing.
On the counter was sign suggesting patrons write an anonymous "deep secret" on a piece of paper for use in the sketch. Example: "I call my Mom when I score." I considered some possibilities and then jotted down a secret.
The name of the dating game was "Secret Suitcase"- "The dating game where two contestants fall in love by ignoring all the major red flags!" - and the premise was identical to the real "Dating Game" with one lucky contestant and three eligible men or women.
The recorded music resembled the "Jeopardy" theme.
In the first game, it was a cocky plastic surgeon who referred to himself as a "titty doctor" meeting eligible bachelor girls Crystal ("I have a snack meat addiction"), Denise Jr. ("I judge men who don't sleep naked") and Emily ("I used to date Fabio") and having to eliminate one.
In between rounds, our host did half-assed commercials for Samsonite luggage (all the secrets were written on cardboard "suitcases"), saying things like "Samsonite Luggage...leather and so many compartments" and "Samsonite, what else kind of luggage is there?"
Much of the humor came from the inane questions the emcee asked when he put contestants in the "hot spot." Like, if you had to eat someone who was still alive, how would you do it? (Well, I have a robust pinking shears collection so I'd just cut him up...").
After intermission, we had a woman, Kelsey, choosing from three bachelors to pick out the best of true love. "Look at these three fine, strapping bachelors," the host said.
"I'd do any of them," the giggling Kelsey replied. When one of the bachelors revealed that his member was fake, she dealt with it. "As long as it's a really big fake..."
Another secret read, "I have no idea where my life is going and for the first time, I'm okay with that." One time, a bachelor mentioned the "Kama Sutra" and the host told Kelsey, "I think that's a sex book." Her pause was momentary.
"If it is, I'll start reading!" she gushed.
Once she'd decided on a bachelor and he came out to meet her, they danced together (just like on the TV show) and then the host tossed his index cards of questions up in the air, also like on the show. Somebody had done their cornball homework.
And, as it happens, my deep, dark secret was used in the show, not that anyone but me knew. The woman who'd appropriated it ended up being the bachelor's chosen date. Coincidence?
There must be something to my secrets after all. And, no, I do not call my Mom when I score.
Walking the pipeline so often, I've seen plenty of people fishing but yesterday was the first day I ever saw men throwing nets. It seemed so, I don't know, European or old-school. Charming and unexpected.
According to the one man staying dry on the sand (as opposed to the two with nets wading crotch-deep in the river in their shorts), the were casting for small perch, although in the 15 or so minutes I watched, they pulled in exactly zero.
Still, it's always cool to see new things happening on the river.
Despite my recent birthday, I am even still at this age navigationally-challenged. Today on my annual trek to Gallmeyer Farms in Henrico, I looked up a new route. Keep it fresh, right?
Instead, I somehow ended up on 895, almost immediately passing over the very road I'd been searching for. After getting off on 295 simply to escape the unknown, I eventually wound my way back to the strawberry farm.
Time eclipsed? Turned out to be a tragic 35 minutes for what should have been a 12-minute drive. It no longer even embarrasses me, it's just who I am.
Coming back from the farm with the box of ripe strawberries perfuming the car, I determined to go back the way I'd intended to come in hopes of seeing where I'd made my mistake. But the failure was technology's, not mine (vindicated!), because the directions had left out a key turn that would have put me on the correct road
Just so you know, this is a very satisfying moment for someone who gets lost as often as I do (such as Tuesday evening leaving Merroir for my parents' house and missing a turn...but I blame the darkness). I hadn't done a thing wrong for a change.
The reason I'd gone for strawberries was partly selfish (they're magical right now) and partly intentional. I was hosting a dinner party tonight and wanted them for dessert, along with the pound cake I'd put in the oven at 11:45 p.m. last night, by the way, the coolest time to bake when you don't use air conditioning.
With clear instructions from one of the guests ("Not gonna lie, I'm not easy to cook for. No meat, no dairy"), I'd chosen Alton Brown's guacamole and someone named Melissa Rubel Jacobson's chipotle shrimp tostada recipes, both of which went over smashingly well. In the process, I went through four avocados, three limes, two colors of tomatoes and onions and most of my cilantro plant.
Given today's heat and the amount of cooking going on in my bite-sized kitchen, I realized late in the game that I should have chilled the metal bowl and beaters before whipping heavy cream for the dessert but managed to achieve stiff peaks even so (culinary aside: the phrase "stiff peaks" ties with "hard ball stage" in candy-making for smuttiest sounding cooking terminology).
Is there anything more May-like than just-picked strawberries and cream? Don't get me wrong, I enjoy pound cake, but it plays second fiddle to berries and mounds of whipped cream this time of year.
On my walk to Belle Isle this morning, I'd noticed that Coalition Comedy was doing a "Dating Game" show tonight and immediately made a mental note. It's true, I remember that cheesy dating show, so I adored the idea of improv comedians riffing on it.
Paying my admission, I heard a woman member of the troupe tell a male one, "Lick my tongue," a proposition which appalled him. "What? No!" he said, backing up. "This is workplace harassment!"
The show hadn't started and already I was laughing.
On the counter was sign suggesting patrons write an anonymous "deep secret" on a piece of paper for use in the sketch. Example: "I call my Mom when I score." I considered some possibilities and then jotted down a secret.
The name of the dating game was "Secret Suitcase"- "The dating game where two contestants fall in love by ignoring all the major red flags!" - and the premise was identical to the real "Dating Game" with one lucky contestant and three eligible men or women.
The recorded music resembled the "Jeopardy" theme.
In the first game, it was a cocky plastic surgeon who referred to himself as a "titty doctor" meeting eligible bachelor girls Crystal ("I have a snack meat addiction"), Denise Jr. ("I judge men who don't sleep naked") and Emily ("I used to date Fabio") and having to eliminate one.
In between rounds, our host did half-assed commercials for Samsonite luggage (all the secrets were written on cardboard "suitcases"), saying things like "Samsonite Luggage...leather and so many compartments" and "Samsonite, what else kind of luggage is there?"
Much of the humor came from the inane questions the emcee asked when he put contestants in the "hot spot." Like, if you had to eat someone who was still alive, how would you do it? (Well, I have a robust pinking shears collection so I'd just cut him up...").
After intermission, we had a woman, Kelsey, choosing from three bachelors to pick out the best of true love. "Look at these three fine, strapping bachelors," the host said.
"I'd do any of them," the giggling Kelsey replied. When one of the bachelors revealed that his member was fake, she dealt with it. "As long as it's a really big fake..."
Another secret read, "I have no idea where my life is going and for the first time, I'm okay with that." One time, a bachelor mentioned the "Kama Sutra" and the host told Kelsey, "I think that's a sex book." Her pause was momentary.
"If it is, I'll start reading!" she gushed.
Once she'd decided on a bachelor and he came out to meet her, they danced together (just like on the TV show) and then the host tossed his index cards of questions up in the air, also like on the show. Somebody had done their cornball homework.
And, as it happens, my deep, dark secret was used in the show, not that anyone but me knew. The woman who'd appropriated it ended up being the bachelor's chosen date. Coincidence?
There must be something to my secrets after all. And, no, I do not call my Mom when I score.
Saturday, May 23, 2015
Fine Art of Having Fun
It was a splendid day for a birthday walk.
Given that it's a long holiday weekend, I was expecting the city to be deserted - it sure is in my neighborhood - only to find it crawling with activity. Downtown, gaggles of families and couples were milling about on practically every block. Brown's Island was teeming with joggers, dog walkers and picnickers, probably lured out by the 70-degree weather.
Even the Pipeline Walkway was crowded and several times I had to stop and let people nervously make their way behind me. I overheard a woman ask her friend, "Would you come down here at 2 a.m.?" and the other responded, "Heck, no!" as if they were traversing a war zone or ghetto siege.
I don't know, on a full moon night, it might be a beautiful place to be.
Midway down the pipeline, I said hello to a guy fishing and he proudly pointed to the rockfish he'd already caught for dinner. When I told him I'd grown up having rockfish or bluefish my Dad had caught for dinner every Friday night of my youth, he grinned.
"Chesapeake Bay?" he asked, already knowing the answer. When he wished me a good day, I shared that it was my birthday and got my first spoken "happy birthday" of the day.
A woman sitting on the walkway while her man fished below pointed at my t-shirt ("Virginia is for wine lovers"), telling me how much she liked it.
Near the end of the walkway were groups of people tubing the river, paused against rocks, maybe for lunch. I usually see them near Belle Isle, but maybe this is where they get out of the water.
Over on the Capital Bike Trail were more bikers than I'd ever seen riding it, maybe because May is bike month, along with the usual walkers and joggers. Two canal boat tours passed by, the occupants on one cheering when they saw fish jumping and then another's waving to some of the bikers who got their attention.
In the Slip, I saw several groups of young girls in volleyball team shirts, their young voices shrill and laughter obnoxiously loud as they lagged behind their coach or chaperone patiently trying to herd them.
When I got back to Grace Street, I passed a mother and daughter trying to get into Pasture, which isn't open until tonight. Naturally, I inquired if they wanted me to suggest another restaurant.
"That would be wonderful, but she's got to go to the bathroom badly plus we have to be at the convention center by 1:30 for a tournament," the woman said plaintively.
No problem, I got this. Leading them down the street to a Port-a-Potty, the young girl looked eternally grateful. Waiting for her, Mom introduced herself as Gwen from Annapolis, here for, what else, a volleyball tournament.
I led them over to Lucy's, conveniently located a block from their destination and they seemed thrilled. "People here are so nice!" Gwen enthused. Especially people having a birthday today.
Horoscope for May 23 birthday
This year you are so upbeat that some of your friends might not be able to relate to you in the same way. Try to be more responsive to those in your immediate circle. In any case, you put the finishing touches on the fine art of having fun.
Okay, so that might not be news, but it's always good to hear, even for us upbeat types.
Given that it's a long holiday weekend, I was expecting the city to be deserted - it sure is in my neighborhood - only to find it crawling with activity. Downtown, gaggles of families and couples were milling about on practically every block. Brown's Island was teeming with joggers, dog walkers and picnickers, probably lured out by the 70-degree weather.
Even the Pipeline Walkway was crowded and several times I had to stop and let people nervously make their way behind me. I overheard a woman ask her friend, "Would you come down here at 2 a.m.?" and the other responded, "Heck, no!" as if they were traversing a war zone or ghetto siege.
I don't know, on a full moon night, it might be a beautiful place to be.
Midway down the pipeline, I said hello to a guy fishing and he proudly pointed to the rockfish he'd already caught for dinner. When I told him I'd grown up having rockfish or bluefish my Dad had caught for dinner every Friday night of my youth, he grinned.
"Chesapeake Bay?" he asked, already knowing the answer. When he wished me a good day, I shared that it was my birthday and got my first spoken "happy birthday" of the day.
A woman sitting on the walkway while her man fished below pointed at my t-shirt ("Virginia is for wine lovers"), telling me how much she liked it.
Near the end of the walkway were groups of people tubing the river, paused against rocks, maybe for lunch. I usually see them near Belle Isle, but maybe this is where they get out of the water.
Over on the Capital Bike Trail were more bikers than I'd ever seen riding it, maybe because May is bike month, along with the usual walkers and joggers. Two canal boat tours passed by, the occupants on one cheering when they saw fish jumping and then another's waving to some of the bikers who got their attention.
In the Slip, I saw several groups of young girls in volleyball team shirts, their young voices shrill and laughter obnoxiously loud as they lagged behind their coach or chaperone patiently trying to herd them.
When I got back to Grace Street, I passed a mother and daughter trying to get into Pasture, which isn't open until tonight. Naturally, I inquired if they wanted me to suggest another restaurant.
"That would be wonderful, but she's got to go to the bathroom badly plus we have to be at the convention center by 1:30 for a tournament," the woman said plaintively.
No problem, I got this. Leading them down the street to a Port-a-Potty, the young girl looked eternally grateful. Waiting for her, Mom introduced herself as Gwen from Annapolis, here for, what else, a volleyball tournament.
I led them over to Lucy's, conveniently located a block from their destination and they seemed thrilled. "People here are so nice!" Gwen enthused. Especially people having a birthday today.
Horoscope for May 23 birthday
This year you are so upbeat that some of your friends might not be able to relate to you in the same way. Try to be more responsive to those in your immediate circle. In any case, you put the finishing touches on the fine art of having fun.
Okay, so that might not be news, but it's always good to hear, even for us upbeat types.
Wednesday, May 13, 2015
Whenever I Call You Friend
Friendship happens when you're not looking for it.
My first best friend took the position using the direct route. My family - and I only had three sisters, not five, at that point - was moving from an apartment in D.C. into a new house in Maryland. A little girl knocked on our side door and inquired of my mother, "Do you have any little girls I can play with?"
Little did she know that she'd hit the mother lode. Cindy Smith was five years old and serendipitously, so was I. We became friends that May day and remained so for years.
Of course, these days if an unattended five-year old knocked on someone's door, they'd probably call Child Protective Services on the parents, but back then, even a five-year old was allowed to walk two houses to inquire after friends.
In college, I worked part-time at a department store and on a night when store employees were taking inventory, a process that lasted until midnight and involved as much laughter as work, I was sent to the hosiery department to help out.
The college girl working the department looked none too pleased to see me when I showed up. Once we became friends, she admitted that she'd hated me on sight. My sin? Apparently I looked like the type of girl she disdained.
Before long, we were sharing life stories, learning to drink together and spending every warm day laid out in the sun hoping to achieve the perfect tan. Even when she moved many states away, our bond stayed strong and we were always able to pick up conversation as if it had been days and not months or even years since we'd last confided in each other.
Work delivered me another girlfriend back in the '90s when I was managing editor and she was art director of a couple of monthly papers. Even when the publisher decided her services were no longer needed (although they definitely were), we'd discovered so much in common over shared deadlines working at her studio on southside that we carried on outside of the publishing world.
Our friendship of almost two decades continues unabated, having weathered break-ups, the trials and tribulations of having sisters and acceptance of the aging process, meanwhile road-tripping to Washington, D.C., Baltimore and the Outer Banks in between our monthly wine-down conversation marathons.
Over the last six tumultuous years, I've stumbled onto new friends while out and about, hardly surprising given my vigorous social schedule. Out is where you found me.
One time I went to meet a casual friend only to find that she'd invited Pru, a woman I'd met a few years back, to join us. Pru and I clicked immediately and that friendship took off while the other withered and died. You know when it's right.
Another time at a party, the hostess came up to me to tell me how much she loved my blog for its positivity and particularly its odd slant given my detachment from mainstream media. When I found out she was a Gemini, too, you could almost hear the heavenly chorus of angels singing above us.
Some friendships are just meant to be.
Months ago, a blog reader messaged me saying she'd like to join me for my daily walk if I was amenable. Somehow, I lost that message until last week when I responded, albeit four months late, with a heartfelt yes.
Since she'd left comments on my blog before, I knew a little about her (such as she didn't like going out alone and took inspiration from my many solo outings), including that she was an avid walker. Today we met at the Oregon Hill overlook to walk together, both happy to have a companion, agreeing that most people we know can't/won't walk as far as we like to.
Five plus miles later, we'd had a satisfying walk on the Pipeline Trail, down to Great Shiplock Park and Chapel Island before meandering up through downtown during worker bee lunch hour. Despite how recently we'd first laid eyes on each other, we had almost non-stop conversation getting acquainted.
Best sign seen on our walk: Our beer is as cold as your ex-boyfriend's heart.
Doubtful.
By the end of our adventure, I was asking if we could walk again and even meet up for an evening since she doesn't like flying solo and I'm always looking for company.
I may be a Luddite, but look at me, a blog reader may become a friend.
Arriving home, I found a message from another reader suggesting we do lunch. I agreed post-haste to his invitation because life has proven I have absolutely no idea where new friends may come from.
Chances are they aren't going to knock on my door and ask if there's anybody to play with. Too bad because I'd love that.
My first best friend took the position using the direct route. My family - and I only had three sisters, not five, at that point - was moving from an apartment in D.C. into a new house in Maryland. A little girl knocked on our side door and inquired of my mother, "Do you have any little girls I can play with?"
Little did she know that she'd hit the mother lode. Cindy Smith was five years old and serendipitously, so was I. We became friends that May day and remained so for years.
Of course, these days if an unattended five-year old knocked on someone's door, they'd probably call Child Protective Services on the parents, but back then, even a five-year old was allowed to walk two houses to inquire after friends.
In college, I worked part-time at a department store and on a night when store employees were taking inventory, a process that lasted until midnight and involved as much laughter as work, I was sent to the hosiery department to help out.
The college girl working the department looked none too pleased to see me when I showed up. Once we became friends, she admitted that she'd hated me on sight. My sin? Apparently I looked like the type of girl she disdained.
Before long, we were sharing life stories, learning to drink together and spending every warm day laid out in the sun hoping to achieve the perfect tan. Even when she moved many states away, our bond stayed strong and we were always able to pick up conversation as if it had been days and not months or even years since we'd last confided in each other.
Work delivered me another girlfriend back in the '90s when I was managing editor and she was art director of a couple of monthly papers. Even when the publisher decided her services were no longer needed (although they definitely were), we'd discovered so much in common over shared deadlines working at her studio on southside that we carried on outside of the publishing world.
Our friendship of almost two decades continues unabated, having weathered break-ups, the trials and tribulations of having sisters and acceptance of the aging process, meanwhile road-tripping to Washington, D.C., Baltimore and the Outer Banks in between our monthly wine-down conversation marathons.
Over the last six tumultuous years, I've stumbled onto new friends while out and about, hardly surprising given my vigorous social schedule. Out is where you found me.
One time I went to meet a casual friend only to find that she'd invited Pru, a woman I'd met a few years back, to join us. Pru and I clicked immediately and that friendship took off while the other withered and died. You know when it's right.
Another time at a party, the hostess came up to me to tell me how much she loved my blog for its positivity and particularly its odd slant given my detachment from mainstream media. When I found out she was a Gemini, too, you could almost hear the heavenly chorus of angels singing above us.
Some friendships are just meant to be.
Months ago, a blog reader messaged me saying she'd like to join me for my daily walk if I was amenable. Somehow, I lost that message until last week when I responded, albeit four months late, with a heartfelt yes.
Since she'd left comments on my blog before, I knew a little about her (such as she didn't like going out alone and took inspiration from my many solo outings), including that she was an avid walker. Today we met at the Oregon Hill overlook to walk together, both happy to have a companion, agreeing that most people we know can't/won't walk as far as we like to.
Five plus miles later, we'd had a satisfying walk on the Pipeline Trail, down to Great Shiplock Park and Chapel Island before meandering up through downtown during worker bee lunch hour. Despite how recently we'd first laid eyes on each other, we had almost non-stop conversation getting acquainted.
Best sign seen on our walk: Our beer is as cold as your ex-boyfriend's heart.
Doubtful.
By the end of our adventure, I was asking if we could walk again and even meet up for an evening since she doesn't like flying solo and I'm always looking for company.
I may be a Luddite, but look at me, a blog reader may become a friend.
Arriving home, I found a message from another reader suggesting we do lunch. I agreed post-haste to his invitation because life has proven I have absolutely no idea where new friends may come from.
Chances are they aren't going to knock on my door and ask if there's anybody to play with. Too bad because I'd love that.
Monday, November 17, 2014
Victim of the Modern Heart
Make the most of it, that was the plan.
So even though I'd walked a couple of miles this morning, by afternoon, I'd found a willing accomplice for another, more ambitious walk. After all, the polar vortex is coming.
Meaning, while it was 51 degrees today and the projection is for 69 tomorrow, we're also looking at a low of 28 degrees tomorrow night. I'm going to freeze my patootie off come my Wednesday trek.
But for today at least, the weather was brisk but bearable, so we set out on foot. Our first stop was at Perly's where we were told they were closed although it wasn't even 2:00 yet. No doubt they were running out of ingredients and patience by that point.
Hey, Perly's was on the way. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
Never one to let denial stand in the way of a diverting afternoon, we continued on down Second Street, admiring the magnificent vista of the James at the top of Brown's Island Way. A young woman was coming up the hill, pushing her bike and puffing a bit, giving us the look (it sure is steep).
Crossing Brown's Island and greeted by gusts coming off the river as we walked beside it to the path leading down to the Pipeline Walkway, thrilled when the sun appeared and added its warmth to that of movement.
Then it was east along the Capital Trail (I shared my wish for a parallel raised walkway for pedestrians only under the train trestle) to Chapel Island to look at the remains of the Trigg Shipbuilding Company.
Besides the particular pleasure of being on an island, I was amazed at a photograph of the stadium-like structure once on the island that would've been drained so they could build the torpedo boats in it and then filled with water to launch them into the river. Brilliant 19th century technology.
Wandering back along Tobacco Row to admire the warehouses turned lofts and apartments (my favorites had narrow balconies on the first floor, created from the lip of the former loading dock), we wound our way over to Cary to see the recently-completed religious freedom sculpture erected in front of the new Marriott Hotel. It's a fitting replacement for the painted wall covered up by hotel construction that honored the site where the Virginia Assembly passed the Statute for Religious Freedom.
That's the kind of thing that matters to us heathens.
The good news on Main Street downtown is that finally (finally!) there are retail signs of weekend life down there. Subway had a sign on the door touting new Saturday hours and even the CVS recently began Saturday and Sunday hours. Hotel guests and downtown dwellers alike will fist bump in approval.
By the time I was back in J-Ward, we'd covered a 5 1/2 mile route, a worthy addition to my earlier couple of miles.
Although my morning oatmeal and fruit had carried me that far, I was ravenous by then. Coincidentally, my fellow walker had an itch to watch the Detroit game, so we drove to Gus' Bar and Grille, although at less than two miles away, it wouldn't have been much more of a walk. Kick-off, however, wouldn't allow it.
And while I (understand and) can watch football, I'd yet to dive into today's Washington Post, so I brought it along. Walking in to Gus', a guy in a Redskins jersey approaches us and leads us to a booth, "So it'll be easier for you to read your paper," he graciously says. It didn't hurt that there was a TV in the booth for the fan to watch.
Over 20 hot wings, I meandered through the kinds of stories I look forward to in the Sunday paper. A review of a new Peggy Lee bio (hadn't known she was the basis for Miss Piggy), where I learned she was a nutcase (and had four husbands).
An opinion piece about the use of the word "feminist," a subject near and dear to my heart (that will be an entire blog post one day soon). Touring whisky distilleries in Tasmania (traveling with someone originally labeled "ex-boyfriend" but by the end of the piece, "husband"...ah, the power of whisky). The new Elaine Sturtevant retrospective at MoMA (why it matters, why it doesn't).
A ridiculous two-month study showing that kids make better lunch selections in the school cafeteria if you reward them for healthy choices with stickers and fake tattoos (let's bribe their taste buds and reinforce the need for constant praising/rewarding). One-derful Records' recording of the Jackson 5's "Big Boy" and the subsequent unearthing of that master tape that pre-dates the Motown years.
In between sections, I kept an eye on Detroit's best field efforts on the mute screen, celebrating when they did something right and returning to the paper when they couldn't move the ball. Favorite player name: Golden Tate (did his parents know he was going to play football?).
Mostly I tried to ignore the very drunk trio of guys nearby high-fiving and lamenting being mid-40s and still single. Based on their corny, loud obnoxiousness and infantile humor, it was hardly surprising women weren't flocking to them.
My bowl of chili (I cook carrots in my chili so I'm always a little disappointed when no one else does) arrived with a plate of blue, red and yellow corn chips, so I scooped my sports-appropriate dinner out of a bowl with reds and blues as the clock ticked down and Detroit players put on their sad faces.
It's not whether you win or lose, boys. How about if we give you a sticker or a fake tattoo to make it feel all better?
If not, try Rose and some 1987-era Earth, Wind and Fire, say "Touch the World" and see if that doesn't send you over the moon.
Make the most of what you got, whatever it is. Right?
So even though I'd walked a couple of miles this morning, by afternoon, I'd found a willing accomplice for another, more ambitious walk. After all, the polar vortex is coming.
Meaning, while it was 51 degrees today and the projection is for 69 tomorrow, we're also looking at a low of 28 degrees tomorrow night. I'm going to freeze my patootie off come my Wednesday trek.
But for today at least, the weather was brisk but bearable, so we set out on foot. Our first stop was at Perly's where we were told they were closed although it wasn't even 2:00 yet. No doubt they were running out of ingredients and patience by that point.
Hey, Perly's was on the way. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
Never one to let denial stand in the way of a diverting afternoon, we continued on down Second Street, admiring the magnificent vista of the James at the top of Brown's Island Way. A young woman was coming up the hill, pushing her bike and puffing a bit, giving us the look (it sure is steep).
Crossing Brown's Island and greeted by gusts coming off the river as we walked beside it to the path leading down to the Pipeline Walkway, thrilled when the sun appeared and added its warmth to that of movement.
Then it was east along the Capital Trail (I shared my wish for a parallel raised walkway for pedestrians only under the train trestle) to Chapel Island to look at the remains of the Trigg Shipbuilding Company.
Besides the particular pleasure of being on an island, I was amazed at a photograph of the stadium-like structure once on the island that would've been drained so they could build the torpedo boats in it and then filled with water to launch them into the river. Brilliant 19th century technology.
Wandering back along Tobacco Row to admire the warehouses turned lofts and apartments (my favorites had narrow balconies on the first floor, created from the lip of the former loading dock), we wound our way over to Cary to see the recently-completed religious freedom sculpture erected in front of the new Marriott Hotel. It's a fitting replacement for the painted wall covered up by hotel construction that honored the site where the Virginia Assembly passed the Statute for Religious Freedom.
That's the kind of thing that matters to us heathens.
The good news on Main Street downtown is that finally (finally!) there are retail signs of weekend life down there. Subway had a sign on the door touting new Saturday hours and even the CVS recently began Saturday and Sunday hours. Hotel guests and downtown dwellers alike will fist bump in approval.
By the time I was back in J-Ward, we'd covered a 5 1/2 mile route, a worthy addition to my earlier couple of miles.
Although my morning oatmeal and fruit had carried me that far, I was ravenous by then. Coincidentally, my fellow walker had an itch to watch the Detroit game, so we drove to Gus' Bar and Grille, although at less than two miles away, it wouldn't have been much more of a walk. Kick-off, however, wouldn't allow it.
And while I (understand and) can watch football, I'd yet to dive into today's Washington Post, so I brought it along. Walking in to Gus', a guy in a Redskins jersey approaches us and leads us to a booth, "So it'll be easier for you to read your paper," he graciously says. It didn't hurt that there was a TV in the booth for the fan to watch.
Over 20 hot wings, I meandered through the kinds of stories I look forward to in the Sunday paper. A review of a new Peggy Lee bio (hadn't known she was the basis for Miss Piggy), where I learned she was a nutcase (and had four husbands).
An opinion piece about the use of the word "feminist," a subject near and dear to my heart (that will be an entire blog post one day soon). Touring whisky distilleries in Tasmania (traveling with someone originally labeled "ex-boyfriend" but by the end of the piece, "husband"...ah, the power of whisky). The new Elaine Sturtevant retrospective at MoMA (why it matters, why it doesn't).
A ridiculous two-month study showing that kids make better lunch selections in the school cafeteria if you reward them for healthy choices with stickers and fake tattoos (let's bribe their taste buds and reinforce the need for constant praising/rewarding). One-derful Records' recording of the Jackson 5's "Big Boy" and the subsequent unearthing of that master tape that pre-dates the Motown years.
In between sections, I kept an eye on Detroit's best field efforts on the mute screen, celebrating when they did something right and returning to the paper when they couldn't move the ball. Favorite player name: Golden Tate (did his parents know he was going to play football?).
Mostly I tried to ignore the very drunk trio of guys nearby high-fiving and lamenting being mid-40s and still single. Based on their corny, loud obnoxiousness and infantile humor, it was hardly surprising women weren't flocking to them.
My bowl of chili (I cook carrots in my chili so I'm always a little disappointed when no one else does) arrived with a plate of blue, red and yellow corn chips, so I scooped my sports-appropriate dinner out of a bowl with reds and blues as the clock ticked down and Detroit players put on their sad faces.
It's not whether you win or lose, boys. How about if we give you a sticker or a fake tattoo to make it feel all better?
If not, try Rose and some 1987-era Earth, Wind and Fire, say "Touch the World" and see if that doesn't send you over the moon.
Make the most of what you got, whatever it is. Right?
Friday, November 14, 2014
Chilly with a Chance of the Past
Scenes from a morning walk...
Coming down the hill toward Brown's Island, I see that 5th Street is blocked to vehicular traffic and tents are already set up on the island. People are scurrying about industriously and PortaPotties abound. Is this more Marathon madness?
Winding my way down the sandy/rocky path to the pipeline walkway, I manage to ram my shoulder into a branch for an instant bruise and admire an enormous gaggle of geese on the flatwater at the same time.
Further ahead on the pipeline, I spot a father and toddler girl avidly watching something. It turns out to be three guys in tiny kayaks repeatedly throwing themselves into a rapid, flipping over a couple of times and coming back out. One isn't even wearing gloves despite temperatures in the '40s.
As I stand there marveling at their choice of morning activity, one spots me, waves and does another flip in the falls, sending me on my way so they won't continue on my account.
Suddenly I'm smelling something delicious and then I spot a couple huddled over a campfire making what must be breakfast by the edge of the river. They're very near the rock where I usually sit to take off my shoes when I'm going wading, but today the little beach is all theirs.
Heading back up the hill, I detour to the University of Richmond Downtown campus to see Caryl Burtner's "Missing Richmond" exhibit. I've only been in Richmond since 1986, so there's a lot of history I missed.
It's a compelling show with a gallery of large photographs showing buildings that now sit on what once were slave trade-related buildings - auctions, offices of slave traders, that sort of despicable thing.
But it was the second gallery that I really enjoyed, filled with small boxes holding photographs of buildings then and now. many of the pictures were taken long before I arrived and many of the businesses were long gone by the time I got here.
Places such as Lum's, Murphy's, the Lee Street Theater, a Hot Shoppes, even the house that sat where theMosque Landmark Altria Theater now sits. My favorites were any that showed students from the '70s and '80s, a glimpse into a world I missed.
Each box held four photographs old and new of the same place, plus fragments from the building, say a piece of masonry or tile or glass. In the bag for the Murphy Hotel was a die, an indicator of its gaming history I suppose.
On the walls are large-scale reproductions of some of the box photographs, including one from 1998 when the Times Dispatch building was imploded, an occasion for which I was out of bed at dawn so I could see it happen from a nearby corner. It was truly a marvel to witness.
I missed a lot but not everything. I'm trying to make up for it by taking in as much as possible now.
When's the last time you saw somebody cooking breakfast over a fire on the banks of the James?
Coming down the hill toward Brown's Island, I see that 5th Street is blocked to vehicular traffic and tents are already set up on the island. People are scurrying about industriously and PortaPotties abound. Is this more Marathon madness?
Winding my way down the sandy/rocky path to the pipeline walkway, I manage to ram my shoulder into a branch for an instant bruise and admire an enormous gaggle of geese on the flatwater at the same time.
Further ahead on the pipeline, I spot a father and toddler girl avidly watching something. It turns out to be three guys in tiny kayaks repeatedly throwing themselves into a rapid, flipping over a couple of times and coming back out. One isn't even wearing gloves despite temperatures in the '40s.
As I stand there marveling at their choice of morning activity, one spots me, waves and does another flip in the falls, sending me on my way so they won't continue on my account.
Suddenly I'm smelling something delicious and then I spot a couple huddled over a campfire making what must be breakfast by the edge of the river. They're very near the rock where I usually sit to take off my shoes when I'm going wading, but today the little beach is all theirs.
Heading back up the hill, I detour to the University of Richmond Downtown campus to see Caryl Burtner's "Missing Richmond" exhibit. I've only been in Richmond since 1986, so there's a lot of history I missed.
It's a compelling show with a gallery of large photographs showing buildings that now sit on what once were slave trade-related buildings - auctions, offices of slave traders, that sort of despicable thing.
But it was the second gallery that I really enjoyed, filled with small boxes holding photographs of buildings then and now. many of the pictures were taken long before I arrived and many of the businesses were long gone by the time I got here.
Places such as Lum's, Murphy's, the Lee Street Theater, a Hot Shoppes, even the house that sat where the
Each box held four photographs old and new of the same place, plus fragments from the building, say a piece of masonry or tile or glass. In the bag for the Murphy Hotel was a die, an indicator of its gaming history I suppose.
On the walls are large-scale reproductions of some of the box photographs, including one from 1998 when the Times Dispatch building was imploded, an occasion for which I was out of bed at dawn so I could see it happen from a nearby corner. It was truly a marvel to witness.
I missed a lot but not everything. I'm trying to make up for it by taking in as much as possible now.
When's the last time you saw somebody cooking breakfast over a fire on the banks of the James?
Thursday, November 6, 2014
No Shortcuts
Sure, it's gray out there and the sky is intermittently spitting, but the air was warm enough that my first thought on stepping outside was to go to the river.
Heading east, I ran into a chef at the first corner and another at the second. I spotted an enormous tent set up in the back of Abner Clay Park and wondered about its purpose.
Heading south toward the river, I'd put my umbrella up whenever I began to feel rain on my face but it never lasted long and I'd take it down again. Walking past Penny Lane Pub, I smelled the stale odor of cigarettes and spilled beer, particularly unappetizing before 11:00 in the morning.
Once down on Brown's Island, I found myself completely alone, not another soul on the island. Now that was kind of cool.
Taking the path down toward the silvery river to the pipeline walkway, I was greeted by honking geese and rushing water. The last couple of times I've walked the pipeline, there's been a campsite set up to one side with a couple in sleeping bags but today there was no trace of them.
All good things must come to an end, I suppose.
Walking back through downtown, I was hardly the only one in shorts today, a change from the last few days when people were acting like jackets and hats were in order (they weren't).
But it was when I got to Fifth Street that I knew something was up. Starting from midway down the block between Broad and Marshall, a line snaked down to Marshall, turned the corner and went all the way to Third Street, made a U-turn and wound all the way back to Fifth. What the hell?
I tapped on the shoulder of a guy taking pictures of this mass of humanity to ask. "America's Got Talent auditions," he replied with a rueful smile.
You mean all these people have talent, I asked. "I didn't say that," he said emphatically. "But they all think they do." Or at least their parents did; there were so many children in line with their stage mothers at their side.
Walking on the north side of Marshall, I had to dodge and weave to get around the endless members of the VCU Peppas, brass and drums in hand, and perhaps on their way to join the line. Or maybe just to play for the wanna-be talent, who knows? I didn't stick around to find out.
I kept on walking away from the deluded masses, passing a little girl with too much make-up on (as in any for a child of 7 or 8) and her focused-looking mother who was pulling a polka dot suitcase on wheels.
The child was carrying her balled-up brightly colored jacket. "Didn't I tell you to fold that jacket properly?" he mother said in a voice that would chill your blood. The chastened child looked down at the sidewalk and attempted to please her mother as she walked.
It had been a beautiful gray morning for a walk to the river and "America's Got Talent" was a giant buzz kill of an ending to it. Everybody wants the shortcut to the dream.
Not me. I'm perfectly happy living it. Or my idea of it anyway.
Heading east, I ran into a chef at the first corner and another at the second. I spotted an enormous tent set up in the back of Abner Clay Park and wondered about its purpose.
Heading south toward the river, I'd put my umbrella up whenever I began to feel rain on my face but it never lasted long and I'd take it down again. Walking past Penny Lane Pub, I smelled the stale odor of cigarettes and spilled beer, particularly unappetizing before 11:00 in the morning.
Once down on Brown's Island, I found myself completely alone, not another soul on the island. Now that was kind of cool.
Taking the path down toward the silvery river to the pipeline walkway, I was greeted by honking geese and rushing water. The last couple of times I've walked the pipeline, there's been a campsite set up to one side with a couple in sleeping bags but today there was no trace of them.
All good things must come to an end, I suppose.
Walking back through downtown, I was hardly the only one in shorts today, a change from the last few days when people were acting like jackets and hats were in order (they weren't).
But it was when I got to Fifth Street that I knew something was up. Starting from midway down the block between Broad and Marshall, a line snaked down to Marshall, turned the corner and went all the way to Third Street, made a U-turn and wound all the way back to Fifth. What the hell?
I tapped on the shoulder of a guy taking pictures of this mass of humanity to ask. "America's Got Talent auditions," he replied with a rueful smile.
You mean all these people have talent, I asked. "I didn't say that," he said emphatically. "But they all think they do." Or at least their parents did; there were so many children in line with their stage mothers at their side.
Walking on the north side of Marshall, I had to dodge and weave to get around the endless members of the VCU Peppas, brass and drums in hand, and perhaps on their way to join the line. Or maybe just to play for the wanna-be talent, who knows? I didn't stick around to find out.
I kept on walking away from the deluded masses, passing a little girl with too much make-up on (as in any for a child of 7 or 8) and her focused-looking mother who was pulling a polka dot suitcase on wheels.
The child was carrying her balled-up brightly colored jacket. "Didn't I tell you to fold that jacket properly?" he mother said in a voice that would chill your blood. The chastened child looked down at the sidewalk and attempted to please her mother as she walked.
It had been a beautiful gray morning for a walk to the river and "America's Got Talent" was a giant buzz kill of an ending to it. Everybody wants the shortcut to the dream.
Not me. I'm perfectly happy living it. Or my idea of it anyway.
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