Most cherished room

Yesterday I attended the last writing class of the current semester.  One of the pieces Janet distributed was published in The New Yorker a year ago, and I found it so fascinating that I had to reproduce it here.

THE ROOF
s	n	o	w	s	n	o	w	s	n	o	w
n	o	w	s	m	o	w	s	n	o	w
o	w	s	n	o	w	s	n	o	w
w	s	n	o	w	s	n	o	w
s	n	o	w	s	n	o	w
n	o	w	s	n	o	w
o	w	s	n	o	w
w	s	n	o	w
s	n	o	w
n	o	w
o	w
w

Cathal McCabe, The New Yorker, November 9, 2012

One of our in-class assignments was to write something about the place where we live. I had an idea almost immediately. I have tweaked it somewhat this morning, and here it is.

We bought our current house in late 1999. We had lived in a number of homes but none of them held a candle to this one. A friend of mine knew the owner and knew that we were looking for a house so we arranged to see it without an agent. It was an older home that had been extensively redone fewer than ten years earlier by that owner. From the moment we walked into the sun-filled living room, I knew immediately that we were in trouble, because it was above the price range we had set for ourselves. Somehow we made it work and we have lived here ever since.

Oddly, the place in the house that has come to mean the most to me was not one of the original selling points: not the living room with many windows and a beautiful cathedral ceiling with skylights, not the bathrooms in each of the three upstairs and one downstairs bedrooms, not the kitchen whose walls are primarily windows, not the room with the Jacuzzi and steam sauna, not the wall in the family room that looks like Jerusalem stone, not the second kitchen downstairs that is the dream of anyone who has prepared for Passover. The place that has meant the most to me, especially during the past two years, is a small room off the downstairs bedroom that we knew immediately would be a home office. A couple of years after we moved into the house, we had built-in desks, bookshelves, and file cabinets installed around the perimeter of the room to make it into a true home office. It is not a large room but we designed it so that we can both work there without bumping into each other.

My first memories of the room were before the built-ins were in place, when we had an old desk, an old table, and a few old bookshelves. The room served as “command central” for planning Dina and Aaron’s wedding. After the invitations went out, I would spend each evening updating my Excel spreadsheet with information from response cards that came in every day. Two years later it again served well for planning Simmie and Ronen’s wedding.  

As computers became more and more a part of both our work and personal lives, we found ourselves spending more and more time in that room. When my pulmonary function made it difficult to commute into Midtown Manhattan every day, I was able to put in a productive day “at work” without leaving the house. Over time, as Pfizer reorganized and I was working daily with colleagues who were literally scattered all over the world, from Shanghai to Milan, it mattered little whether I was in Manhattan, Riverdale, or Sharon as long as I had high speed internet access and a telephone. While my pulmonologist kept encouraging me to consider whether it was time to stop working, I was happy to be able to keep doing the work I loved.

When the chemotherapy shrunk the tumor in my brain sufficiently for me to be able to begin to focus again, I found myself spending more and more time back at my familiar desk. To spare my having to go up and down stairs, which taxed my breathing, energy, and balance, Barry had moved our clothing into the extra bedroom that is adjacent to the office, and moved enough utensils from the main kitchen so that we could eat our meals in the downstairs family room. It was six months before we finally moved back upstairs.

Because I was no longer able to perform my responsibilities in clinical research at Pfizer, the nature of my “work” changed, but the office has continued to serve me well. It is here I sit writing this blog, here I play my Lumosity games, and here that I have created the photo albums of our grandchildren. Sometimes I think about moving upstairs, where the large windows with southern exposure bring in bright sunlight. But I doubt I would ever be as comfortable as I am in this familiar space.

It is funny how what started as the low point, both figuratively and literally, became the real high point of my life in this house.

Have a wonderful weekend.

Love,

Rebecca

  

Countdown

A couple of months ago, in anticipation of our upcoming return, I signed up to receive weekly updates from a site called “News of St. John.”

A video posted this morning including two of our favorite beaches, Hawksnest and Cinnamon, reminded me that it’s time for me stop grousing so much about the cold, when in just a few weeks we will have this welcome break! 

Love,

Rebecca

  

A close call

Shortly into his third song at Carnegie Hall last night, “Only Love Can Break Your Heart,” Neil Young suddenly stopped playing and yelled “wrong!” Barry and I looked at each other and thought “oh, no, he’s not going to do that to us again, is he?” At least this time we had a great on-street parking space right outside of Carnegie Hall. But it turned out that what was wrong was that the audience’s clapping, which from where Mr. Young was sitting sounded off-beat, was a distraction. So everyone stopped, and he resumed the performance. WHEW!

It was a great show! I did not take notes, other than to quickly grab a pen and scribble “Only Love” on a piece of scrap paper. But I was able to quickly pick up the full set list on-line this morning:

Set 1
1. From Hank to Hendrix
2. On the Way Home (Buffalo Springfield song)
3. Only Love Can Break Your Heart
4. Love in Mind- grand piano
5. Mellow My Mind- guitjo
6. Are You Ready for the Country- tack piano
7. Someday- tack piano
8. Changes (Phil Ochs cover)
9. Harvest
10. Old Man

Set 2
11. Goin' Back
12. A Man Needs A Maid- grand piano
13. Ohio
14. Southern Man
15. Mr. Soul (Buffalo Springfield song)- pump organ
16. Needle of Death (Bert Jansch cover)
17. The Needle and the Damage Done
18. Harvest Moon
19. Flying on the Ground Is Wrong (Buffalo Springfield song)- tack piano
20. After the Gold Rush
21. Heart of Gold

Encore
22. Comes A Time
23. Long May You Run

And here is the review from this morning’s New York Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/08/arts/music/temperamental-neil-young-starts-run-at-carnegie-hall.html

When we left Carnegie, the temperature was still in the high 20s, so we got home before the sub-freezing temperatures set in. We slept later than usual this morning and it will undoubtedly take a few days to get back on track, but it was totally worth it! Long may he run.

On a completely different topic, something in the news reminded me of a really funny incident that happened some years ago. Shortly after we moved to New York City, some Sharon friends whose two sons must have been around 8 and 10 years old at the time spent a few days with our family. While the parents attended a wedding, Barry, the girls and I went with the boys to see a movie followed by lunch at a kosher fast-food hamburger restaurant in Queens. There are no such restaurants in the Boston area, so this was a real treat for the boys. The older boy quickly ate two burgers and asked for a third. I was a bit concerned but he was quite convincing so we bought it. When everyone was finished eating, we piled back into the car to head back to our house. Before we even got on the highway, the boy said “I think we need to pull over.” Sparing the details, he left part of that lunch by the side of the road. But he had a great spirit, and got back in the car with a grin and said “I knew that third burger was too good to be true!”

As I am sure you all know, following a December ruling by a federal district judge, same-sex marriages could be legally performed in the state of Utah. About 1000 marriage licenses were issued during the first two weeks after this ruling, but on Monday of last week, the Supreme Court ordered a halt to same-sex marriages in Utah. Those thousand couples are probably wondering if the ruling was “too good to be true.” Unfortunately the stakes are quite a bit higher than an upset stomach. Whatever your opinion of this issue, it is clear that there is a human toll on the couples, and in some cases, their children.

It is just noon, and the temperature is about 10^o. I have to decide if I feel up to leaving the house to go to my last music class.

If you are anywhere in the northern half of the country, STAY WARM!

Love,

Rebecca

How to get to Carnegie Hall

When I was a girl growing up and studying piano in St. Louis, the idea of having a chance to even set foot in Carnegie Hall was but a distant dream. But you never know where life will take you, and we have been to Carnegie Hall countless times over the years and are headed there this evening.

When we purchased our Neil Young tickets for this evening, we asked about accessibility seating, and were instructed that they would send us tickets for seats in the balcony but that we should call the morning of the concert to be reassigned. So this morning I placed that call.

When you call Carnegie Hall, you are offered the following choices:

To purchase tickets or to make a donation, press 1

For schedule information, press 2

For directions to Carnegie Hall, press 3

When you press 3, you are then offered options for directions for driving, directions by subway, and parking information. But my father, may he rest in peace, a classical violinist in his younger years who probably never imagined artists like Arlo Guthrie or Neil Young on that stage, always gave me a somewhat different response to that question:

How do you get to Carnegie Hall?  PRACTICE!!!!

F.Y.I. - The Origins of That Carnegie Hall Joke - Question - NYTimes.com

Love,

Rebecca

  

Long may you run

It is only the first week in January, and I have already had enough winter! I have not left the house since we came back on Wednesday. I love this house but that does not keep me from feeling a bit stir crazy.

I do not know much about our new mayor, Bill De Blasio, but I have to say I am feeling a bit sorry for the poor guy. He was sworn in on Wednesday and spent his first whole day in office dealing with an approaching storm. Lest you are wondering, it is not that anyone holds the mayor responsible for the weather. It is just that there have been some past storms that have not been handled very well, including one just a few years ago under Mayor Bloomberg, and the criticism was understandably quite harsh. Fortunately, New York seems to have weathered the storm fairly well. But no sooner was that over, this morning a helicopter was forced to make an emergency landing in the Bronx, just a short distance from our home. There were some injuries but none fatal. The plane landed on the Major Deegan Expressway, so it has already been dubbed the “Miracle on the Deegan,” a nod to the 2009 “Miracle on the Hudson.” In January of that year, a plane carrying 150 passengers and crew struck a flock of Canadian geese shortly after takeoff, lost power, and was forced to land in the Hudson River, miraculously with no fatalities. So you have to feel a bit for Mr. De Blasio for having such a challenging first few days on the new job.

We have tickets to see Neil Young at Carnegie Hall on Monday evening. We have not seen him for many years; the last time we bought tickets to one of his concerts must have been twenty years ago. The best I can say is that it was a memorable evening. He came onto the stage at The Beacon Theater, sat down, and, without saying a word, he started to play his first song; I cannot remember what song it was. Then, still without a word, he started a second song, and midway through he just stopped, arose, said something like “I cannot do this” and walked off the stage. That was it! I remember for years grousing about how it took us longer to retrieve our car from the garage than Mr. Young was on stage performing! We later heard that this was neither the first, nor the last, time he had done this. So we have been understandably reluctant over the years to buy tickets to a solo performance, though we did see him once with Crosby, Stills and Nash. In the past few years we have seen the two Jonathan Demme documentaries on Neil Young, “Heart of Gold” and “Journeys.” Based on these, he seems to be doing much better emotionally now than he may have been in years past. So we are looking forward to, or at least cautiously optimistic about, this concert.

Meanwhile, just stay warm, and have a great week.

  

Love,

Rebecca

 

Not too late

Today’s New York Times crossword puzzle was, not surprisingly, related to the start of the new year.

The clue for 37 across was “New Year’s greeting.” This turned out to be

HAPPY 2014

From the “down” answers I had the “happy” fairly quickly. But it took a while before I realized that the remaining four squares were numbers rather than letters. You may be wondering, how did those four numbers work in the corresponding “down” answers?

The clue for 27 down was “1971 #1 hit for Carole King”, which is

ITS2LATE (It’s Too Late)

The clue for 39 down was “Classic Stephen Foster song,” which is

0SUZANNA (Oh, Suzanna)

The clue for 24 down was “Achieved through difficulty,” which is

HARD1 (hard one)

The clue for 32 down was “Try!” This turned out to be

GO4IT (go for it)

I am only embarrassed to admit that I was not able to complete 27 down immediately!

Through the wonders of YouTube, here’s an amazingly good quality video from a performance circa 1971. Barry saw her on tour early that year when she performed in Rochester (where we were students) but my finances did not allow for such things.

We are bracing for some brutal weather the next couple of days. The refrigerator and pantry are full, so as long as we have power we should be fine. To all of you in the path of this storm, take care of yourselves!

    

Love,

Rebecca

A great end of 2013

We had a wonderful end to 2013. We drove up to Sharon first thing Sunday morning. Simmie prepared butternut squash soup for dinner (along with hot rolls and salad) that really hit the spot! Then on Monday we took Eliana and Maya to see Disney on Ice in Providence. It was loads of fun, with all the familiar characters and lots of lights and music.

On Tuesday afternoon we picked up Joshua and drove into Boston to see a Celtics game. We had purchased the tickets as a Chanukah gift for Joshua, and selected the 31^st because it was one of the few day games for which we were all available. As we were driving up to Boston, there was very heavy traffic on I-93 as well as on the roads that cross over I-93, with many police and fire department cars parked on the overpasses. It quickly became clear that something was going on in the southbound lanes. And soon we saw a hearse followed by officers on horseback, as well as many other cars driving along with that group. We turned on the radio and quickly learned what we had seen: the funeral procession for an area soldier who was killed in Afghanistan a couple of weeks ago. It was a sobering moment, clearly an excruciatingly painful way for this family to end their year.

We finally made our way to the TD Garden, parked, and found our way to our seats. I had not paid much attention but when we arrived I saw that the Celtics were playing the Atlanta Hawks. And a little light bulb went on in my head: didn’t the Hawks used to be a St. Louis team? I had a faint recollection that they had left St. Louis and gone to Atlanta. Thanks to the wonders of modern technology, within a few minutes I had responses to e-mail queries of my brother and youngest sister, both of whom I figured would know this information. It was a little difficult to select a side, but the Celtics fans are a very devoted bunch and it is hard to sit at a game in Boston and not root for the Celtics, so I went with the flow. Joshua, on the other hand, amused himself with getting excited every time the Hawks scored.

It was a very exciting game. Although early on the Celtics pulled out fairly far ahead, as the game progressed the Hawks caught up and the two teams took turns being 1-2 points ahead. If the Celtics player had gotten that last shot, with just a second remaining, they would have won. But instead, it ended at 92 for the Hawks and 91 for the Celtics. Disappointing, but we got to eat popcorn and peanuts and licorice and see a very exciting game. Then we got to sit in horrific traffic leaving the TD Garden.

We picked up dinner at a new local restaurant called The Chubby Chickpea. They have a limited vegetarian menu but Joshua really loves their chicken, so it was the perfect addition to “his” day of fun. After dinner, Joshua and Ella came back to our apartment for a sleep-over while their parents went to a party. The children stayed up a little later than usual (shhhhh! don’t tell Dina!) because we were having so much fun just talking and laughing.

The Chubby Chickpea

We had planned to stay in Sharon through the weekend, but two things occurred. First, a minor problem with our car, and second, we heard the weather predictions of a snow storm followed by frigid weather over the weekend. Since I can barely leave the house when it is that cold, we decided to come back to New York today. The snow is supposed to begin here shortly, so we had time to stop and pick up some groceries in case we are unable to get out for the next few days.

We were sorry to have to cut out trip short, but we did have a great time with our grandchildren in those three days – a very good way to end a year and start a new one!

     

Love,

Rebecca