The Boy Who Was Born That Day

Posted on May 6, 2026 by Steph

Beth, Noah, and I spent a lot of time together the past two weekends, leading up to his birthday. We went to a film festival and a music festival, and we ate out four times. (And in between, Beth took a whirlwind trip to Chicago and she and I went to a poetry reading together.)

On the last Saturday of April, we took an expedition into the city to attend Filmfest DC and to have dinner at China Chilcano. We did the same thing (same festival, same restaurant) last year, on Noah’s birthday. This year the festival ended before his birthday, so we went the weekend before.

Film

We saw a film from Argentina, Risa and the Wind Phone, which takes place in a town in Tierra del Fuego that is still recovering from a catastrophic fire ten years earlier. Many of the characters lost relatives in the fire. There’s an out of commission phone booth where people go to talk to their dead family members. The protagonist, a ten-year-old girl, while using the phone to speak to her father, discovers that unlike other people who are using the phone as a therapeutic device, she can actually talk to the dead and the dead have requests—a lot of requests—and messages they want her to deliver. This becomes her summer project, in which she is accompanied by her babysitter and a hamster. Over the course of the film, she develops a father-daughter-like relationship with the babysitter and learns some unexpected things about her own father. It was magical and not just in a magical realism way. I highly recommend it, if it becomes available to stream.

China Chilcano is a Chinese-Japanese-Peruvian fusion restaurant. We got a lot of the same dishes we got last year, starting with yucca fries and cilantro-squash dumplings. I got Brussels sprouts with chili glaze, peanuts, and a fried egg. Beth got a cauliflower dish, and Noah got a vegetable-noodle bowl. I had a condensed milk custard with meringue and passionfruit sorbet for dessert. It was a fun outing, movie and meal both.

Theater and Novels

Sunday morning Beth left the house at dawn to fly to Chicago to see her high school friend Michelle act in Follies that afternoon. She only decided to go a few days ahead of time and stayed just one night. It was an unusually spontaneous decision for her (she kept exclaiming about it), but she was able to fly with miles, so it felt affordable.

That morning since she wouldn’t be going to the farmers’ market, I delivered baked goods (almond flour banana-chocolate chip muffins and matzoh toffee bark) to a bake sale there to benefit the Montgomery County Immigrant Rights Collective, where Beth has been volunteering since retiring. They were so grateful for the donation (which almost doubled their stock) that I felt I was getting undue credit (having only baked the muffins—Beth made the toffee bark) and I had to keep saying it was from her, too.

I spent much of the rest of the day reading, first Charterhouse of Parma (still slow going) and then 1984, finishing the second half of the latter pretty much in one sitting. I rarely read in long chunks like that anymore and it was nice.

Poetry

Tuesday evening Beth and I went to Favorite Poem Night at the library. Usually I read a poem, but I decided to just go and listen this year because I couldn’t manage to pick one; nothing was speaking to me. I think it was because two years ago I read “Hope is the Thing with Feathers,” with hope in my heart for the election and last year I read “The Mary Ellen Carter,” inspired by its message about rising up in the face of challenges, but this year I am just tired, not as fired up as I was a year ago.

I realized later this was the poem I should have read. It’s by Langston Hughes.

I am so tired of waiting.
Aren’t you,
for the world to become good
and beautiful and kind?
Let us take a knife
and cut the world in two—
and see what worms are eating
at the rind.

I enjoyed the event, but I was hoping there would be a poem that would make me feel better about the power of the human spirit and that didn’t really happen. “That’s a heavy lift,” Beth said when I mentioned it in the car on the way home. Poetry does sometimes do that, though, I said. It just didn’t happen to do it for me that night.

Birthday Dinner #1

Noah turned twenty-five on Sunday. We celebrated by going out to dinner three nights in a row. We started Friday with pizza at Roscoe’s. We go out for pizza or get takeout pizza every other Friday (making it at home on the alternate Fridays), so it wasn’t unusual, but we did let him choose where to go. Earlier in the day Beth went to a May Day rally in the city, which I considered attending, but I skipped because I still had a lot of reading for book club, and I knew I wouldn’t get much of it done over the weekend because we had plans. (As it turned out I ended up taking Tuesday off work because that was the only way I was going to finish The Charterhouse of Parma in time, I had sunk way too much time into this book not to finish it, and it was looking like a slow work week anyway).

Music Festival

Saturday afternoon, we went to Porchfest in Adams Morgan. I found it a little ironic that Takoma Park has its own Porchfest we’ve never attended, and we went for the first time to a different one, but Noah wanted to go to this bigger one and we weren’t all going to be in the same place on the weekend of Takoma’s Porchfest anyway. Some of the bands do play on porches or stoops on residential blocks; others play on the sidewalk in front of retail spaces. A jazz group was playing on the balcony of Madam’s Organ.

We saw a few acts. We caught the tail end of a group called Freezer Burn playing classic rock (Beatles and the Romantics) on a stoop, before moving on to Indie band called Staring in Spaces, playing in front of a bookstore. There was a beer pong table set up in front of the tent where the band was playing. It was quite crowded and I couldn’t see very well. I could actually see the beer pong game better. But the next singer we saw, Bryce Bowyn (synth pop), was playing in a plaza in front of a bank, which was more spacious. Also, we found a concrete rectangle where we could sit and I could see, so that was nice. The singer had good stage presence and was quite the energetic dancer.

On our way to the final band that we wanted to see, La Unica (Latin-Irish), we ran into some trouble. Between people watching the band playing at Madam’s Organ and people trying to get in or out of a bar across the street or people trying to walk from point A to B (or B to A), the street and sidewalks were a total logjam. It was almost impossible to move in any direction. I have to say most people were considerate, even solicitous, but there were a lot of people and most people doesn’t translate to all people, so there was pushing and yelling. I got yelled at for not moving and for trying to move. The three of us tried to stick together but we all got separated. I finally got out of the crowd by getting into the slipstream of a big man who was managing to part the crowd. Almost immediately, I found Noah, who was waiting at the edge of the scrum, but Beth was nowhere to be seen.

Because of the size of the crowd, our phones were useless for texting, so after waiting a little while we decided to proceed to the next stage that we’d agreed upon in hopes of finding Beth there. It was in a plaza in front of an elementary school. We tried to text every now and then, but the texts would not go through. I had Noah stay in one spot in front of the stage, so I could find him, while I wandered through the crowd (looking for Beth) and then waited in a long line for the porta potties.

Through all this, I was also listening to the band, which was more Latin than Irish. There was a fiddle, but more Latin instruments. They were singing Celia Cruz and Harry Belafonte songs, among others. People in the audience did a conga line. When they finished, we waited for the crowd to clear out so we could see if Beth had been there all along, but she wasn’t. Noah finally got her on the phone, and we managed to meet up on our way to the restaurant where we’d planned to have dinner. Poor Beth had the worst of it, being more freaked out by the crush of the crowd than either Noah or me—she’d turned back, which is why she didn’t make it to the next stage—and then being alone for at least an hour while we were all trying to contact each other.

Birthday Dinner #2

It was a relief to be reunited. We had a relaxing dinner at Bua, a Thai restaurant in Dupont Circle, near the apartment where we lived from 1991 to 2002, the last year with an infant Noah. We picked it because we’d eaten dinner on the balcony of this establishment the night before Noah was born (on the day my obstetrician told me—“This baby isn’t coming any time soon”). I used to maintain it was the strong Thai iced tea that put me into labor. As a result, we have an on-and-off tradition of having Thai food the night before Noah’s birthday. We managed to get a table on the same balcony where we ate that fateful night twenty-five years ago, which made me happy. From Bua, we headed to Kramerbooks for dessert, another nostalgic spot for us. Even though Noah does not remember living in this neighborhood, it still evokes his baby year for me, so it was fun to be there on his birthday weekend.

Presents, Cake, and Birthday Dinner #3

On Noah’s actual birthday, we had a video call with North, and he opened his presents on the call. He got two gift cards to Panera, one Apple gift card from my mom, a check from YaYa, a new mouse and keyboard, and three books. It was a pretty good haul and he seemed pleased. After lunch we had his birthday cake, a strawberry lemonade cake Beth made.

In the afternoon he went out shopping for presents for Mother’s Day and my birthday and we met up in the city for dinner at an Italian restaurant we’d never tried near Union Station. It was a little higher end than our usual spots, the kind of place where they replace the silverware and wipe down the table between courses. We had focaccia, arancini, and pasta. Noah and I got the same dish, a ricotta-goat cheese ravioli in a lemon-cream sauce with spinach. While we were eating, we saw a couple tables get a flaming chocolate dessert that intrigued us. Turns out it was a piece of tiramisu enclosed in a globe of chocolate. When the server sets it on fire, the chocolate melts and reveals the tiramisu. Of course, we got it, along with a rice pudding brulée with edible flowers, and they also brought a tiny slice of complimentary chocolate cake with a candle and a birthday card for Noah. I thought the card was a nice touch.

This is what Beth posted on Facebook on Noah’s birthday:

A quarter century ago, on May 3, I ate dinner alone at a restaurant across the street from the Columbia Hospital for Women. I had a window table and I will never forget looking out onto M Street and feeling like the whole world was entirely different. And it was. I had become a parent.

Tonight I had dinner with the boy who was born that day, who has grown into a kind and thoughtful young man, and with Steph, who was recovering from an emergency c-section 25 years ago. We capped off a lovely meal with a flaming tiramisu.

So much has changed during Noah’s lifetime. In 2001 I was not his parent in the eyes of the law. But the fierceness of my love for him is the same today as it was on that very first day.

Beth left for Wheeling yesterday, two days after Noah’s birthday, and she’ll be gone a while, so it was nice to spend the last two weekends with the boy who was born that day.

#SpringBreak

Posted on March 31, 2026 by Steph

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North was home for spring break and returned to school two days ago. If you follow me on Facebook, you’ve seen a lot of what we did, tagged #SpringBreak, but here’s more detail about how it all went down:

First Saturday: Hugs and Heights

“Hug again,” I instructed Beth and North. We were in the parking lot of the Shady Grove Metro station where Jaden, their ride from school, had dropped them off. I’d hugged them when we met and then Beth hugged them and I tried to get a picture, but I wasn’t quick enough, so they reenacted it.

Later that evening they were teasing me about the posed photo and I protested, saying the original hug was spontaneous. It wasn’t as if I’d forced them to do it for a picture. And then Noah said it wasn’t as if I’d created an AI image of the two of them hugging. North said that would be surprising, first if I did it and second if I knew how to do it.

When this conversation took place, we were in another parking lot, this one at North’s high school. We were walking toward the building to see the closing night of the spring musical, In the Heights. North didn’t expect to see too many people they knew on stage as it’s been almost two years since they graduated—and they said it felt strange to walk into the building— but they like the show and they were curious to see it.

It was an ambitious production, with hundreds of students involved, between the large cast, the crew, and the pit orchestra. There’s a new theater director and by choosing a play with mostly Latino characters, she brought in a lot of students who haven’t been in the theater program previously. (The school is about half Latino.) She also took advantage of the fact that the school has a large and well-regarded salsa dancing club. The club did all the choreography, and it was fabulous. Unfortunately, the sound system wasn’t the best and it was often hard to hear the dialogue, especially from the boy playing Usnavi. So, it was lucky that three of the four of us saw this play just a year ago on North’s last spring break and were familiar with the plot. And North did end up seeing some people they know—a few on stage and some fellow STAGE alums in the audience. They met up with Rowen (who came with us to In the Heights last year) and Arwen in the lobby during intermission.

We got home late for us, around ten-thirty. I pointed out it was the second night we’d been out in the evening because the night before Beth and I had gone to see a performance of music and poetry on the theme of sanctuary (performed largely though not entirely by immigrants) at the community center.

Beth said, “We like the night life, baby.”

“But we really don’t,” I said. Noah’s the only one of us who likes to stay up late. Even the college student wanted to go straight to bed, after a long day featuring a drive from Ohio and a show.

First Sunday: Flora and Fauna

On Sunday afternoon, while Noah was at his weekly games gathering, Beth, North and I went to Brookside Gardens. It was one of the warmest days of their break, a beautiful day with highs in the low eighties and no humidity and it seemed incumbent on us to get outside. We saw daffodils and flowering trees, turtles sunning on a log, and sculpture in the shape of a crow, ginkgo leaves, and a frog.

Once we got home, we started watching shows we hadn’t watched since we were with North in Oberlin for their surgery in January (North and I watched one episode of Emily in Paris and Beth, North, and I watched two of Gilmore Girls). Over the course of North’s break, we finished the current season of Emily in Paris (which North thinks has gone on longer than it needed to, but they want to see it through to the end to see if Emily and Gabriel end up together.) I am wondering if we can finish Gilmore Girls, which we started the summer North was fourteen, this summer.

Monday: Birthday, Blossoms, Banana Cold Foam, and Beyond

When North came into our bedroom on Monday morning, Beth and I sang “Happy Birthday” to them. We discovered that morning that the cherry trees that line the street that runs along our back yard had burst into bloom overnight, as if to mark the birthday of our cherry blossom baby. Cherry trees have a wide range of bloom periods, but the ones on our block track well with the ones at the Tidal Basin. We thought from the original prediction of peak bloom that North might miss it, but now everything looked good for a Friday expedition. This was cheering.

After a discussion about the moral implications of picking up their birthday reward drink from Starbucks when we have all been boycotting it since the strike started last fall, I confessed I had just been there the day before for the first time in over four months to claim a reward for expiring stars. North decided it was okay if they didn’t spend any money, just took a free drink. (My calculation had been the same when I got a free slice of strawberry-matcha loaf.) So that morning North and I took a bus to downtown Takoma, got a free venti iced latte with banana cold foam from Starbucks, then went to Takoma Beverage Company, where I got a latte for myself and a chocolate croissant to split.

We walked home and took a detour to the hospital parking lot where there are still scattered remnants of the glacier-like ice pile that has been there since late January. I have been fascinated by its slow melting and wanted to show it to North, and they were polite enough to indulge me by going to look at several two-month-old, four-foot-tall mounds of dirty ice. (It used to be twelve feet high and at least eighty feet long.) Next, we walked down the length of the block of Garland that has a couple dozen blooming cherry trees. It was as if we were performing a symbolic walk from winter to spring.

When we got back home, there was a chocolate cake cooling on the dining room table, and Beth was getting started on the strawberry-cream cheese frosting.

Around lunchtime, North got a call from my mom and sister, who were on a layover in Seattle on their way to Alaska, where they (and Dave and Lily-Mei) were taking a trip to celebrate Sara’s fifty-fifth birthday and see the Northern Lights. They sang “Happy Birthday” to North and they must have failed to confer with each other ahead of time because they both sang the harmony part. Apparently, Dave and Lily-Mei did not care to sing in the airport. It was a short call because they were in a hurry, but it was nice of them to think of North.

That evening, after North’s requested dinner of mushroom ravioli and vegetarian sausage, we had cake and ice cream and North opened presents. Our main present to them was to pay for a second tattoo, but they also had checks from the grandmothers, gift certificates to the closest coffeeshop to our house and the closest book store, maple sugar candy, a box of caramels with a cherry blossom pattern on them, and two crochet kits (one to make an apple and one to make Snoopy). We let them choose the evening entertainment. They chose Juno, which we all enjoyed.

I had been a little sad that this was North’s first birthday without a celebration with friends because none of their closest friends from high school was home for break the same week as them, but then I found out their college friends are throwing them a party after break, so I was less sad.

Tuesday: Coffee, California Tortilla, and Clothes

North had a psychiatrist appointment in the morning, so I met up with them afterward for coffee and tea at Lost Sock, which is on the same block in Takoma, DC. Then Beth swung by to pick us up, drop me at home, and take North shopping for clothes with their birthday money.

They came home in the mid-afternoon with leftovers from their lunch at California Tortilla, rave reviews for the new quinoa base there, a pair of embroidered jeggings and a yellow high-waisted bikini for North and a pair of striped grey and white pants for Beth.

I made breaded tofu sticks, carrots, and strawberry-applesauce for dinner. North said, “Thank you for making tofu sticks when I was home because you love me.” This meal is a favorite of theirs. That night we watched a couple episodes of Grownish. The shows in the Blackish universe (Blackish, Mixedish, and Grownish) are another longstanding family viewing commitment (since North was eleven!) and we were close to finishing. (We finally did several days later.)

Wednesday: Swimming and Cinema

What spurred North to buy a bathing suit was that I’d asked if they wanted to go swimming while they were home. (They hadn’t brought one home and needed a new one for summer anyway.) So, with the new suit procured, North and I went to the new recreation center in Silver Spring, where Beth goes frequently since retiring, but where I’ve only been once before (last month). Beth couldn’t go with us because she had an appointment to take her car to the shop. There’s a café in the lobby, which we patronized before swimming and soaking in the hot tub.

From there we proceeded to Panera where we had lunch, and then to a movie theater where we saw undertone. This is not Beth’s kind of movie, but we think Noah, as the family’s cinephile would have had interesting things to say about its innovative use of sound. Unfortunately, he couldn’t come. For the past several weeks, he’s been working two to three days a week editing a series of short videos for the National Association of Letter Carriers and he never knows until right before the work comes in when he will have to work, as the project is passing back and forth between several people. Anyway, because of this, thinking he might have work we ended up not going one the one day all three of us could have gone (Tuesday). I was bummed about that.

That night North made a cucumber salad with vegetarian chicken and a topping made of smashed tater tots and I went to book club to listen to the opening lecture on The Charterhouse of Parma. I’d stopped reading it after three chapters because I thought I needed the historical background on the Napoleonic wars and other cultural factors before I continued with it and the lecture was clarifying. While I was gone, everyone else watched Twinless.

Thursday: Trip to Tattoo

This was the day North got their tattoo (of a branch of cherry blossoms) under their collarbone. They’d selected a studio in Southern Maryland, near St. Mary’s, which is two and half hours away, so we made a day trip out of it. While they were getting the tattoo, Beth and I took a pretty hike on a trail that was mostly in the woods with occasional views of the St. Mary’s River.

Later North told us that the tattoo artist and the receptionist were a lesbian couple who want to raise kids, and they were full of questions about having lesbian moms. From their curiosity, North concluded that having lesbian parents is not as common in Southern Maryland as it is in Takoma Park or Oberlin.

Afterward we picked them up, we had a late lunch at Noodles & Company and got frozen custard at Rita’s. There was a lot of traffic coming home, so by the time we got home, Noah, who’d been working that day, was making dinner (gnocchi with fresh mozzarella and cherry tomatoes).

Friday: Chilly Cherries

Friday morning, North wanted to go to Koma to use their gift certificate. If you’re counting, this was the sixth coffeehouse we patronized together in the first seven days of their break. We swung by the hospital parking lot ice piles on the way home and found them smaller than four days earlier but still there. North and I finished our season of Emily in Paris and Beth helped them do their taxes and in the early afternoon all four of us set out to see the cherry blossoms.

It was a chilly, gray day, in the low fifties with intermittent rain, but we had plans for the next day, so it was this day or never and never wasn’t really an option. We had pretty good luck in that the rain mostly held off while we were at the Tidal Basin, and the blossoms were perfect puffs of pale pink and white. North posed, pulling the collar of their sweater down to show off their cherry blossom tattoo. A couple saw Noah taking pictures with a real camera and must have sized him up as a good photographer and asked him to take their picture (with their phone). We finished up with visits to the MLK and FDR Monuments, as those are our favorites. It was a nice expedition, marred only slightly by seeing at least a half dozen National Guardsmen near the MLK Memorial. And honestly, nowadays, when I see them, I think at least it’s not ICE.

On the way home, we picked up North’s favorite pizza (from Roscoe’s) and then watched A Date for Mad Mary, which Beth had put in the movie pool around St. Patrick’s Day because it’s Irish. (The random drawing part of our movie selection process means seasonal picks are often watched early or late.)

Saturday: Democracy and Death

Beth and I went to No Kings 3 on Saturday. In the driveway, before I got in the car, I stopped for a minute to pet UNO because he was approaching me and meowing. (I was glad later that I did that and didn’t hurry into the car.)

We could have walked to a No Kings action from our house, as we did in June, or go to a big one in D.C., as we did in October, but instead we drove an hour and a half west to Hagerstown, where an ICE detention facility is planned. On the way, we saw people crowded onto at least six Beltway overpasses with signs. One of my favorites was “No Kings, Only Queen,” with a picture of Freddie Mercury.

We’d packed lunch and ate in in the parking garage, then we proceeded to No Kings. People were spread out along four blocks radiating from an intersection, about a quarter to a half block in each direction, several rows deep near the middle and sparser at the ends. There were columns of balloons in each of the colors of the Maryland flag (red, gold, black, and white) with a No Kings crossed out crown on top at each of the corners.

There was a stage with someone leading chants and a few speakers. I often couldn’t hear who they were, but one was the comptroller of Maryland, who apparently has some role in authorizing the facility, and is against it. A lot of local officials are for it, thinking it may bring economic development. Western Maryland one of the more conservative parts of the state. Hagerstown went for Trump by about 60%.

That’s why I was surprised that the reaction from passing cars was so overwhelmingly positive. There was only car from which people yelled out obscenities. Some drivers had no reaction, but around half were honking, smiling, waving, and giving thumbs up. Some cars were circling around repeatedly, though, presumably to increase support. I have no idea how much of the crowd was, like us, outside agitators from more liberal parts of the state.

After standing awhile, I wandered through the crowds to get a look at the signs. I liked “Grantifa: Grandmas Against Fascism,” and “Salt the Roads: Keep ICE off Our Streets,” but the best one was held by a Latino family whose members were taking turns holding it: “We Are Not Animals & You Are Not King.” There weren’t a lot of Latinos in the crowd, and I thought they were brave to be there.

I ducked into a coffeehouse to use the bathroom and get a coffee and a dark chocolate bar. When I exited, I saw two twelve- or thirteen-year-old white boys go by on scooters. One said to the other, “Are they against ICE?” and the second one said yes and the first one said, “I support that,” which I took to mean they supported the protest, but I was wrong. Later I saw the same two boys had gone to the sign making station and gotten supplies to make “Trump is King. Support ICE” signs and then aggressively positioned themselves in front of a woman with a camera.

We stayed almost two hours and drove home. Shortly after we got back, we got a group text from Rose, one of UNO’s people, letting us know that in the few hours we were gone, he’d been seriously injured and they had to put him down. It was a shock because I’d just seen him and he’d been fine. It feels so strange not to have to check for him in the driveway before we pull out, or to think the next time I take Walter outside, he won’t be able to eagerly follow an utterly uninterested UNO around the yard. He was old for an outside cat, at least fifteen, and as Beth said, “he lived his best life.” Still, we are very sad and we will miss him.

Sunday: Goodies and Goodbye

Sunday morning, North was in the living room watching television, Noah had yet to get up, and Beth was gathering tote bags to go shopping. I came into the room holding something behind my back. And told North, “I just saw a big rabbit leave your room.” Their eyebrows shot up and I brought the Easter basket forward and they laughed.

It was a week before Easter, but it seemed nicer to give it to them in person rather than mailing the candy. They dug in immediately.

Shortly after lunch, we all got in the car to take North back to the Shady Grove Metro parking lot, where we met Jaden. After we were all surprised by seeing someone in a Santa suit entering the station, we said our goodbyes, dropped Noah off at Panera for his Sunday games, and then headed home for an afternoon and evening alone in our suddenly emptier nest. It won’t be long until we see North again, though, as a road trip to see them act in a play in mid-April is in the works.

A Richer Place

Posted on February 22, 2026 by Steph

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We welcomed the Year of the Fire Horse at the National Museum of Asian Art yesterday. We arrived about a half hour before the lion dance was scheduled to start so we wandered around the museum, looking at early modern Japanese pottery and ancient Iranian metalwork. Have you ever heard about the tradition of mending broken pottery with gold and how this practice could be seen as a symbol of how our scars can be seen as something that makes us stronger or more beautiful? I feel like I see it all the time on social media and I don’t know if that was the original symbolic intention, but I did see a pot like that, which was kind of cool.

We went outside to the steps of the museum, which were crowded with people who had come to watch the lion dance. It started about fifteen minutes late and the couple behind us was having a protracted discussion about whether it was worth continuing to wait. It was. There were two full-sized lions (one purple and one red), with two adults inside each, and one orange baby lion with two small children inside. The three lions danced to the music of the drums and received red envelopes from a few members of the crowd and pretended to gobble fortune cookies out of a basket on the ground and then threw the cookies to the crowd. The baby lion had a chaperone, an adult not in costume who followed it around and gave it instructions when it got off course. It was seriously cute.

We used to go to see the Lion Dance in Chinatown occasionally when we lived in D.C., and I think we might have taken Noah once when he was very small (pre-blog). Seeing the tiny children inside the dragon costume did shake loose a memory I hadn’t thought of in ages. One year one of my grad school professors at the University of Maryland invited her students to see a lunar new year performance at her small son’s Chinese dance school, followed by a buffet feast. Try as I might, I could not remember her name or even what class she was teaching but I remember her son’s first name, even though I only met him once. It was Logan, which his mother explained his parents gave him because it was an English name that sounded like a Chinese one. (The child was biracial.) It’s funny the little glimpses into other people’s lives we remember years later. Given that this event happened about thirty years ago, Logan could have his own kid old enough to learn the lion dance by now.

When the dance was over, we headed over to the Arts and Industries Building, where there were food and crafts booths and more performances. I initially had some trouble finding food that was both vegetarian and not too diabetic-unfriendly, but I ended up with eggrolls, a tofu dish, and half a small and very expensive Korean black sesame seed cheesecake, which I shared with Noah. Beth and Noah had noodles, and she got a Vietnamese bahn mi sandwich, which is a favorite of hers. Everything was delicious. I only regretted that I couldn’t have a Thai iced tea. I used to love those, but they are super sweet and I have yet to try one since diabetes. We briefly listened to some Mongolian singers before heading home.

As we walked across the Mall, headed back to the Metro, I was feeling emotional about multiculturalism. When the kids were small and we’d go to the Folklife Festival (which, sadly, has been cancelled for this year in favor of some fake State Fair* on the mall) or to Takoma Park’s Fourth of July parade and we’d be watching musicians and dancers from all over the world and eating food from different cultures I would so often talk to the kids about how the United States is a country of immigrants that one year when Noah was around twelve he interrupted and supplied the lesson himself. But it’s true. I like living in a country and a region with a lot of immigrants. I think it makes us stronger and more interesting.

So that’s one reason Beth has gotten involved with a local organization that helps support immigrant communities. She’s not sure what she’ll be doing yet—maybe delivering groceries to people who are afraid to leave their houses, maybe observing drop-offs and pickups at our kids’ old majority-Latino elementary school in case ICE shows up. It’s a way to protect and give back to the people who make our home a culturally richer place.

By the way, I read that the year of the fire horse, which happens only every sixty years is supposed to “bring intense, fast-paced change.” That could certainly be good or bad. Let’s keep our fingers crossed for good.

*No shade to real state and county fairs, which I really like.

The Rails

Posted on December 14, 2025 by Steph

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On the Rails: Snowfall

The first Friday in December we woke to the first snowfall of the year. It was just about perfect, two inches that didn’t stick to streets or sidewalks, so we didn’t need to shovel, but enough to make the neighborhood Christmas decorations, porch gourds, yellow leaves clinging to trees, winter berries, and creek rocks look festive. The only thing I would have liked was for it to stick around a little longer. Two days after it fell it was all but gone.

Off the Rails: Home Invasion

Five days later we had a less pleasant experience. Beth got up at six, which is her normal weekday time and discovered a stranger in the living room, standing in between my desk and an open window. It wasn’t a thief; it was an elderly man with dementia who thought it was his house. He’d come in and out through the window several times and had been engaged in 1) reorganizing items on the porch (he tied the rainbow flag in a knot) and 2) removing items from my desk and lining them up around the perimeter of the porch when Beth stumbled upon him. Beth called 911 and he was taken away in an ambulance.

When she called, I was still in bed and could hear her talking on the phone with someone, which I thought was odd at that hour, but she sounded so calm I wasn’t worried until she came into the room to tell me what was going on. By that point the dispatcher had told us to stay behind closed doors, so I never even saw the man.

In the end, everyone was fine, nothing was taken. In fact, the man left behind some items (a pillow and a hat) that aren’t ours and we suspect may have come from a neighbor’s porch. (I asked our next-door neighbors and they weren’t missing anything.) Both cats, even Walter who usually likes strangers, were freaked out and hiding in the basement. It was hard to find Willow, who most emphatically does not like strangers, and that was the scariest part, thinking maybe she’d been put outside with my computer monitor and had run away.

Riding the Rails: Travels

The next day Noah set off for Boston. He had some hotel points leftover from his trip to London last year and he’d decided to use them to see a concert. He took an Amtrak train from Union Station to Boston. He was there for two nights and one day. He took a historical walking tour and went to see the electropop band Pvris. I’m glad he got to have a little adventure.

North had an adventure, too. Instead of flying or getting a ride home for winter break, they opted to take the train, too. This was an odd coincidence, as neither of them has taken Amtrak before. Taking the train from northeastern Ohio means boarding a train at a little after one a.m. They got a friend to drive them to the Elyria station and spent the night and the next morning riding the rails. They said they slept “better than I thought I would but not as well as I would have liked.” They enjoyed the scenery, much of which was snowy and hilly, and it was considerably cheaper than flying.

We picked them up at Union Station. Beth and I had eaten lunch, but North hadn’t so they got a felafel sandwich and then we got dessert. Beth and North had ice cream, and I got coffee and a peppermint cookie/brownie mash-up. We admired the big Christmas tree Norway sends every year, which was beautiful as always. I was happy not to see any National Guardsmen or women at Union Station for the first time since late summer. I don’t know if this means they are recalling some of the troops. It would be nice if they were allowed to go home to their families for the holidays and even nicer if they didn’t come back. Standing outside Jersey Mike’s and Insomnia Cookies is probably not what they signed up for when they joined the Guard.

We got back home, North reunited with the cats, and Beth and I did a little work before eating our pizza dinner in front of a silly holiday romance. It was a cozy first night home. North went to bed early and slept for almost eleven hours.

The next afternoon we participated in the Takoma Cocoa Crawl. There were fourteen restaurants and coffeehouses in Takoma Park and Takoma, DC selling cocoa. We made three stops and got one cup at each. North chose Spring Mill Bakery which was offering half-price cocoa with a free gingerbread man. The cocoa was nice and creamy there. Beth’s choice was Red Hound because she remembered the orange-cinnamon cocoa there from last year. It was the highest quality of the three we tried, rich and complex. I chose Takoma Beverage Company because they had a hot chocolate bar where you could add your own toppings and I thought I could adjust the hot chocolate/whipped cream ratio to be more diabetic-friendly. I didn’t quite get it right on that score (I may have added too much crushed candy cane), but there’s always next year. Anway, it was a fun expedition.

Meanwhile, Noah was on a train coming home and he sent me some pictures of the walking tour, Christmas decorations, and the concert. He sent photos of a historic church, two former state houses, a historic cemetery where Sam Adams and other famous people are buried, a statue of Paul Revere, Christmas lights, and a surveillance robot from the hotel. He said at the cemetery, the tour guide pointed out a nearby bar and said it was the only place you could get a cold Sam Adams next to a cold Sam Adams. Not surprisingly, he said the concert, his main reason for going to Boston, was his favorite part. The venue was big, but he had a good seat, near the front. He got home around 9:15 Saturday night so Beth and I were able to chat with him a bit about his trip before going to bed.

It’s nice having North home for break, even if they aren’t quite finished with finals (one paper and one online exam to go) and it’s also nice having everyone under one roof again. This time of year, that makes me feel as if we are on the right track.

Moving Forward

Posted on November 15, 2025 by Steph

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No News

I guess I will start with a medical update, though there’s not much to report. North’s endoscopy went fine, but we are still waiting for biopsy results that will determine if they will have gallbladder surgery. My colonoscopy went fine. My blood sugar didn’t spike during the three low-fiber days—I was able to eat enough protein and fat to prevent that—and it didn’t dip dangerously low during the one and a half fasting days. It was at the low end of my target range, but stable. Just stopping my diabetes meds was enough to keep it high enough. I told Beth, “I guess I don’t really need to eat.” But I like to eat, so I was glad when it was all over and I could eat normally again.

Transitions

Beth came home from Wheeling the first Sunday in November, just in time to celebrate Noah’s half birthday with cupcakes the next day. I got three different flavors from a nearby bakery. He chose the maple-sweet potato with a marshmallow in the frosting, I had gingerbread with lemon frosting, and Beth had German chocolate. When I told him I bought cupcakes he said he’d forgotten it was his half-birthday. I guess twenty-four to twenty-four and a half doesn’t seem as momentous a change as say, four to four and half, but we keep doing it because it’s a tradition.

Election Day was the next day and that was a more dramatic change: big victories in the New York City mayoral race, Governors’ races in Virginia and New Jersey, and many down ballot races. Because I grew up mostly in Pennsylvania, I was especially heartened by the re-election of several Democratic judges in that state. Let’s hope that momentum carries into 2026.

During all this we switched over to standard time. As aggravating as it is to change the clocks and one’s body clock, one thing I like about fall back (besides the extra hour) is that the time change always makes it feel like we’ve officially crossed over from early fall to late fall, with Halloween over and Beth’s birthday and Thanksgiving on the horizon. I do like neatly marked transitions, so I put flannel sheets on the beds, grapefruit on the shopping list, and stocked up on lotion.

It gets dark around five now, which makes drying clothes on the line trickier because I need to remember to get them hung up earlier in the day than I did before. We had an overnight freeze last week and I picked all the green tomatoes and brought pots with the tenderest herbs (basil and cilantro) inside for a few nights. I used all the basil in one last batch of pesto and put the cilantro back outside.

Moving Forward

Even though it’s feeling like late fall, it’s still not that cold, with highs in the fifties and sixties most days. On Veteran’s Day, though, the high was in the high forties and it was windy, which made for a chilly day. Nevertheless, we had decided to go for a hike, because Beth had the day off and I didn’t have any urgent work. She had a work-related errand she needed to run near Frederick, dropping off some boxes of old CWA newsletters going back to the 1930s to be digitized, so we decided to make a day of it, eating lunch in Frederick and hiking in a nearby state park. We invited Noah to come along and he said yes.

That morning Facebook Memories reminded me of Veteran Days past. That feature is more effective for holidays like Veterans Day that always fall on the same calendar day than roving holidays. There were definite patterns. When the kids were younger, we had parent-teacher conferences that day (until North was in high school and they got moved to the week before Thanksgiving). We also went to the Veterans Day sale at Value Village and because the kids were at school for at least a half day and Beth and I weren’t in conferences until afternoon, she and I often went out for breakfast or lunch before or between conferences. In later years, when we could leave the kids alone in the afternoon, we had longer outings, to see a movie or take a hike. The most memorable one was last year, when we went to Great Falls, to see if getting out into nature could help us shake off some of our post-election grief and shock.

This year, we were buoyed by better (if less earth-shattering) election results. After Beth dropped off the boxes, we had lunch at The Orchard, which I recommend if you find yourself in Frederick. I was tempted by the maple-pecan cheesecake, but I didn’t think I should have it because I’d had a sandwich (Brie, tomato, tofu, and pesto) for lunch, so Beth suggested we come back after the hike and that’s what we did.

We went for two short hikes in Cunningham Falls State Park. We decided to forgo the cliff trail because it was marked difficult and chose to start with the (moderate) falls trail. It was a mostly flat, wooded trail. We still have a lot of fall color at home, but here the leaves had mostly fallen, exposing the austere architecture of the trees. There’s beauty in that, too. We reached the falls, which didn’t have a lot of water. Next, we walked around the lake and watched geese flying low over the water, crossed a creek, and found some red winter berries.

Then we went back to the same restaurant, sat at the same table, and the same waitress brought us hot chocolate (Beth), tea (me), and dessert (me and Noah). And that was our Veterans Day outing. I can only hope we’ll keep moving forward and that our Veterans Day hike in 2026 will celebrate even more positive changes for our country.

#FallBreak

Posted on October 26, 2025 by Steph

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North came home for fall break and stayed eight and a half days. It went by fast, but we packed a lot into that time.

First Saturday: No Kings

North got home late Friday evening. Noah was up to greet them, but we’d gone to bed and we didn’t see them until the next morning. I did tag my Facebook post about anticipating their arrival #FallBreak, and it became a theme I kept up in my posts all week.

We ended up leaving North home alone for most of their first day home because it was No Kings 2.0 and they thought a long rally would be too strenuous. Noah was coming along this time, and we split up almost immediately so he could wander around the crowd filming the protest. He’d met with Mike recently for job-hunting advice and Mike said he should have a website of his work and suggested this would be a good place to film.

There were many signs on the No Kings theme (I reused mine from June), including one with a sad T-Rex that said, “No Rex.” There were many people in inflatable unicorn, dinosaur, and frog costumes. I heard one man tell someone with a microphone who asked why he was dressed as a unicorn, “They were sold out of frog costumes.” I wasn’t sure if it was a joke or true, but it was funny either way. On the frog theme, there was a sign that said, “Amphifa: Amphibians Against Fascism.” I also saw two women in handmaid’s costumes.

I can only report on signs and costumes because we were too far from the stage to hear anything, except when Bernie Sanders spoke, and even then, I only caught about a quarter of what he said. I clapped anyway when other people clapped, because it seemed unlikely that he was saying anything objectionable.

Organizers are estimating seven million people attended nationwide in thousands of locations. Even if that was optimistic, independent estimates are at least five million and that it was probably the largest single-day protest in U.S. history.

First Sunday: Picking Pumpkins

Our civic duty done, we were able to turn our attention to seasonal fun the next day. We went to Northern Virginia to get our pumpkins. We used to do this because there was a specific farm stand that we liked to patronize, as it belongs to the family of a friend from college. That stand doesn’t sell pumpkins anymore, as of last year. However, over the years we built up a whole routine of activities in the neighborhood, so we keep going there.

We headed first for Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, listening to an Apple Halloween playlist and critiquing the choices. Then we took our late afternoon stroll, passing the pond, the Korean Bell Garden, and other familiar sights. Noah took a lot of pictures of lichen on benches. We saw a couple and a larger group posing for wedding photos, but fewer Homecoming photo shoots than we usually see.

We went to our new farm stand, and got pumpkins, pumpkin butter, and decorative gourds, and posed in the pumpkin arbor. We got a feast of Chinese food from our favorite vegetarian Chinese restaurant (which is one of the main reasons we keep trekking out to Northern Virginia for pumpkins) to eat at the picnic tables at Nottoway Park. We couldn’t order the food ahead because of a problem with the online ordering system so our timing was thrown off, and it was getting dark by the time we’d finished dinner and began our after-dinner stroll in the community garden plots, but we could make out some tomatoes and collards and flowers. Our last stop was ice cream at Toby’s. I got half pumpkin and half apple pie with whipped cream and Beth correctly guessed I had the whipped cream to complete the pie theme.

Monday to Wednesday: Berkely Springs

Monday morning, we left for a quick trip to Berkeley Springs, West Virginia. Beth, North, and I haven’t been there since President’s Day weekend 2020, less than a month before the world shut down. This timing caused all three of us to look back on the trip nostalgically during the time when weekend trips were not on the table. We hadn’t been as a foursome since the kids’ spring break in 2016. North is very fond of Berkeley Springs. I think that’s why when during a low period, they needed to draw a pen-and-ink street scene in their eleventh-grade painting class, they choose a block in Berkeley Springs.

As you can probably guess from the name, there are mineral springs in town that were used by Native Americans, George Washington, and continually ever since. The site of the historic baths is a state park, and you can reserve time in the private baths. The other main attractions in town are restaurants, shops, and a cat café.

We visited all these, but on our first evening, we decided to stay in at our rental house in the woods. This was no hardship as the house had a view of a ridge decked out in fall colors and was equipped with a skee ball machine, a Pac-Man machine, a hammock, and fire pit. We used them all, after a brief walk in the woods. I lay in the hammock for a while, looking up into the yellow and green leaves and watching squirrels in the branches and hawks circle above the trees. I made broccoli melts for dinner, and we made S’mores at the firepit.

The next morning, we browsed in the shops and North bought a pair of colorful wooden parrot earrings in a shop of Himalayan handicrafts and then we soaked in the Roman Baths. The water is heated to 104 degrees and it’s very pleasant and relaxing.

We went back to the house for lunch, and then to the cat café, where we pet and played with many of the cats who are awaiting adoption in the cozy two-story house, equipped with structures to climb on, private dens for sleeping, and many toys. It’s a much nicer place than the shelter where we adopted Matthew and Xander. (We adopted Walter and Willow from a foster home.) It must be good for their socialization, too. There are separate rooms for shy cats and one for kittens. The two smallest kittens were being segregated from the rest because a cold had gone around the place the week before. One of them, a long-haired black kitten named Odessa, who looked like a tiny version of Xander, climbed up on Beth’s lap and fell asleep and she was trapped there a long time. Noah and I spent most of our time in the main kitten room. There was a mama cat there with three nursing kittens and many other kittens who wanted to play with their toys and our shoelaces. By the time Beth made it to the room, they had collectively decided it was nap time and collapsed in piles to sleep.

Our next stop was the Paw Paw tunnel, where a towpath from the C&O canal goes through a rocky ridge. It’s a fifteen-minute walk on a damp, dark path, and it’s suitably spooky. We were told at a coffee shop we’d frequented earlier to “look out for ghosts.” We did not see any, or any bats, which we have seen in the past, but we did see a lot of white mushrooms growing where the path meets the brick wall. Beth lit the path with her cell phone light so we wouldn’t step into any puddles. I always enjoy this hike, which starts and ends with a walk through the woods between the Potomac River and the canal. You can also climb up the ridge afterward if you want, but we didn’t do it this time. Noah and I climbed up the stairs outside the tunnel to look out at the canal from above. When we emerged from the tunnel, I could smell the fallen leaves along the path. The scent reminded me of old paperback books.

We ordered dinner from the parking lot and picked up pizza, stromboli, and salad to eat back at the house. North tried pickles on their pizza and approved of the selection (which was called the Princess Brine).

Wednesday morning we were going to take a hike in Cacapon State Park, and we did start, but pretty soon into it, North decided hiking up to the top of the ridge was going to be too much for them, and we headed back into town, where we browsed the shops again and they got a jar of garlic-stuffed olives from an olive shop before we had lunch and hit the road for home.

Thursday to Friday: Baking and Coffee

Thursday and Friday Beth and I were back to work. North had invited me to go for coffee after their Friday morning psychiatrist appointment at the coffee shop in Takoma DC where we’ve always gone after their appointments and at first, I said yes, but then I remembered I had a mammogram that same morning, so North proposed that we go the day before and we did. We got coffee at Lost Sock and pumpkin and apple pastries at Donut Run. When I took North’s photo, I instructed them to “look autumnal,” which made them laugh.

That afternoon Noah made a baked lemon-blueberry pudding (apologizing before I said anything: “I know it’s not seasonal”) and North made toffee to use in chocolate chunk cookies they made the next day. They thought the cookies were too crispy but no one else had any complaints.

Second Saturday: Halloween Parade and Carving Pumpkins

North’s last full day at home was full of seasonal activity. We went to the Halloween parade in the early afternoon. I still enjoy watching other people’s kids in their costumes, even though my kids don’t participate any more. And we all enjoy judging the costumes ourselves. In the four-and-under section of the parade, there were two separate women dressed as flowers carrying their babies who were dressed as bees. I was amused because when I saw the first one, I thought “that’s original,” but I guess it wasn’t. Anyway, one of the flower-bee groups also had a beekeeper and they won. I can’t remember the category, but I it might have been Cutest, though come to think of it, that might have been a ladybug.

There was a well-executed astronaut with a homemade cardboard rocket affixed to his scooter and a truly impressive owl with many feathers and expressive papier mache eyes and a beak that both won in five to eight. There was an elaborate jellyfish; two girls, one dressed as a peasant and one as an aristocrat holding a bloody guillotine between them; and a tornado with little houses, vehicles, and trees attached to her in nine to twelve. Groups dressed as characters from the Chronicles of Narnia and Aladin also won.

In terms of trends, there were more inflatable costumes than usual, probably repurposed from protests. Beth noted that Harry Potter costumes are evergreen and there were also quite a lot of zombies. The only costume I saw that I thought deserved a prize that didn’t get one was a detailed, homemade Edward Scissorshands. But the boy was probably nine to twelve years old and the competition in that age group was strong this year.

When we got home, we carved our pumpkins. I’d been feeling under the weather all day, and I still had a lot on my list for the day (cooking, menu planning for the next week, doing dishes) so I found a simple moon-and-stars stencil so I could finish quickly. Although we didn’t plan it this way, everyone had one to two of the following elements on our pumpkins: cats, stars, and pumpkins. Beth said the thematic continuity was satisfying.

Noah and I made roasted white beans, cherry tomatoes and halloumi for dinner and then I roasted the pumpkin seeds so North could have some to take with them to school the next day. When all the chores were done, we all settled in to watch the end of Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, which we’d started the night before, and then Beth and I went to bed early because I was exhausted.

Second Sunday

A little before ten a.m., North’s friend Jayden picked them up and we said our goodbyes. Beth will see them in less than a week because North is getting an endoscopy on Halloween and Beth is going to stay with them overnight to make sure that they’re okay. They are already planning what movie to watch, and they bought an extra bag of candy in case trick-or-treaters come to the rental house. I will have to wait until Thanksgiving to see them, but that’s only about a month.

Did you go to No Kings? What kind of fall activities have you been enjoying?

All’s Well That Ends Well

Posted on October 20, 2025 by Steph

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Here it is, mid-October and I haven’t blogged about anything that happened this month. Not quite three weeks after we said goodbye to North at the Sacramento airport the day after the wedding, they came home for fall break. Here a few of the highlights of that time, before I get into our fall break adventures:

Street Festival

The first Sunday in October, Beth and I went to the Takoma Park Street Festival. We walked by the craft booths, she got an ice cream sandwich, and I got a caramel sundae before settling in to watch Ammonite play at the gazebo. There were so many people in Free DC t-shirts, I lost count even though I’d been trying to keep track. In the playground behind the stage, the Boy Scouts had set up a rope bridge, and I watched kids walk across it, thinking nostalgically of all the times my kids did that at Takoma Park events. And that was before I spotted the preschool-age girl in a pink tutu and sparkly silver sneakers playing air guitar to the side of the stage. She was very in tune with the music, striking dramatic poses at just the right time, switching over to drumming during drum solos. I couldn’t take my eyes off her; she was such a delight.

Seasonal Miscellany

The next week Noah and I started decorating the porch and yard for Halloween, a project that’s almost but not quite finished. Also that week, my book club held its second of four meetings on the Big Book for fall, Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man. We have two meetings to go, one next week and the last in early November.

The second weekend of October, Beth, Noah, and I got our flu and covid vaccines, and I wrote postcards the gubernatorial race in New Jersey, having written a batch for judges in Pennsylvania the weekend prior.

The weather took a turn for cooler, and it spurred both Noah and me to bake. He made pumpkin-oat muffins, and I made and almond flour banana cake with peanut butter frosting. We saved some of each for North.

A Bad Day

The day before North came home was a Thursday and it was an upsetting day. The first thing that happened was that I was looking at the November calendar page so I could make an appointment when I realized Thanksgiving was a week later than I thought and I had made the reservations for our Thanksgiving beach house for the wrong dates. I reserved the house in September, so I immediately went to the realty website to see if the house was available on the dates we wanted, and it was. I sent an email to the realtor seeing if we could make the switch without having to pay for both sets of dates. Then all day long in the back of my mind I was stewing about what to do if the answer was no.

Next, I had to go to a consultation for an upcoming (routine) colonoscopy, and the bus didn’t come so I had to take another less direct route to the Metro, and I thought I’d be late, but I almost didn’t care because the consequences of missing an appointment that could be rescheduled seemed low stakes in comparison to having possibly ruined Thanksgiving. I arrived at the unfamiliar building in time, but the elevator setup was very confusing, but eventually I found my way to the office.

At the appointment I had a chance to reflect on how difficult colonoscopy prep is going to be, not the awful drink and the unpleasantness that follows—I’ve done that before and know what to expect—but the three-day, low-fiber diet, followed by the day of clear liquid fasting. I didn’t have diabetes the last time I had a colonoscopy, and I didn’t have to worry about blood sugar spikes while avoiding fiber and crashes while not eating. I asked some questions about that (and then contacted my primary care provider afterward) but it seems like the answer is, yes, it’s going to be hard, deal with it.

Back at home, my sister and I had a discouraging email exchange about the effect AI is likely to have on her copywriting business and both of our jobs in the coming years. I have been afraid for a while that AI might put me out of a job before I intended to retire, and this made that fear more concrete.

Later that day, while picking cherry tomatoes in the garden I got stung by a bee that had gotten trapped under the back of my shirt, which probably hiked up while I was bent over and then fell back down when I straightened up.

There were some bright spots in the day: 1) The tech who weighed me at the medical appointment complimented me on my socks (red with black hearts) and I was surprisingly touched, because I was so low, any kind word seemed moving. 2) My blood pressure was unexpectedly good for a stressful day. 3) Then after the appointment, I went to a bakery in the same complex and had the most amazing pastry. It was a croissant in a cube shape, with pumpkin pie filling inside and meringue and pepitas on top. (Croissants are relatively safe pastry for me because all the butter in the dough slows down my blood sugar rise.)

And the next day, I found out the realty was willing to switch the reservation to the right dates at no charge and North came home, so all was well…

Seven For September

Posted on September 20, 2025 by Steph

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I often have the feeling that the first few weeks of September, up until the equinox, exist in a liminal season that’s not quite summer or fall. Anyone who’s still in school (and that’s down to one of us) is back at it, but some years it’s still hot, and even if it isn’t, the weather is not quite autumnal. Maybe a few trees have a scattering of yellow or red leaves, but they are the vanguard, a hint of what’s to come.

There’s a predictable rhythm to this time of year, though. Almost every year we have a Labor Day picnic in the back yard, go to the Takoma Park Folk Festival to hear music, and to the pie contest to eat pie. We did all those things, plus a few more over the past three weeks. Here’s what we’ve been up to, starting with the last couple days of August.

1. Labor Day Weekend

We had a low-key Labor Day weekend. On Saturday afternoon we took a walk at Brookside Gardens and Noah took a lot of photographs, mostly of animals (geese, a juvenile heron in flight, turtles, bees, and butterflies) and then we got frozen yogurt. As often happens on walks in botanical gardens, we encountered photo shoots—one wedding party and two quinceañeras. Seeing these groups, given the increased ICE presence in and around D.C., I was quietly inspired by the celebrants’ courageous persistence in continuing to mark joyful, culturally specific occasions in public. Some cities have been cancelling Latino festivals, like Day of the Dead parades. It’s not an unreasonable thing to do.

Sunday morning, we had our first family video call with North since dropping them off at school. Other than the continuing digestive woes, they seemed to be doing well.

Monday morning, Beth went kayaking and we all had a picnic in the back yard that evening with the usual spread: veggie hot dogs, baked beans, devilled eggs, corn on the cob, and watermelon. I made a fig cake but forgot to include the eggs. It turned out more like a torte, but it was tasty. (Suzanne, it reminded me of your plum torte, which I made last year.) There were no complaints, and it disappeared in two days. I do want to make it again with the eggs someday, though, to see how it is.

The following weekend was busier. We attended a Free DC March and the Takoma Park Folk Festival.

2. Free DC March

The Free DC march started at Malcolm X Park and went down 16^th Street, skirting the White House, and ending up at Freedom Plaza. Malcolm X Park, a.k.a. Meridian Hill Park, is big and multilayered. It has twelve acres of terraces, statues, fountains, and a Beaux Arts arch at least one of the entrances. We entered at the bottom and climbed the stone stairs up to the big plaza at the top, pausing at bench in the shade near a statue of Dante to eat a snack I’d packed and drink some water, as the day was hot.

When we got to the top, we sat on a bench, and watched people go by. It was a huge, joyous crowd, with people singing songs in Spanish and line dancing and waving flags. There were DC flags, of course, DC’s autonomy being the point of the march, but also some American flags and a huge Palestinian flag, and Beth said later she saw a Ukrainian flag, though I didn’t spot it. Beth and I both had homemade Free DC signs, but Noah didn’t so someone gave him one made with spray paint and a stencil. Beth knew some labor people there and thought we might meet up with them, but the crowd was too big to even try. Shannon, who’s the mother of one of North’s nursery school classmates, did run into us and we exchanged updates about our preschoolers college sophomores.

I thought there would be speeches at the park, but there weren’t and after a while, we left to march. Some of the organizers tried to shepherd people with Free DC signs up front so the most visible part of the march could stay more on message, and we ended up near the front. Among the many signs with the DC flag, I eventually saw one with that meme in which the two horizontal stripes of the DC flag are replaced with two sub sandwiches. That’s my favorite. When we were several blocks along the route, Beth got a text from one of her colleagues, telling her there were still people waiting to leave the park. I later heard crowd estimates in the thousands, maybe as many as ten thousand.

At one point, I stepped away from Beth and Noah to take some photos, and before I knew it, I’d lost them. It took about a half hour and many texts to find each other again. During the time we were separated the march passed by Foundry Methodist Church and the thunderous sound of its bells ringing in support was deeply moving. Soon after, we passed through the Scott Circle Underpass. As we approached, we could see people lined up above us on the bridge and along the upper levels of the street on either side, waving DC flags and cheering. Once we’d funneled into the narrow space of the tunnel, the chants echoed off the concrete walls.

Soon after this, I finally spotted Beth and Noah. We’d never been far apart; the crowd was just dense. The march passed within about a block of the White House, circumventing Lafayette Square (here, predictably, the chanting got even louder) and then proceeded to Freedom Plaza. I think this is where the speeches happened, but by this time we were tired, hungry, thirsty, and in need of a bathroom. We gratefully picked up some free bottled water—our bottles had been empty for a while; Noah had spilled his in Malcolm X Park—and we skipped the program and left for Union Station to get a late lunch.

I’d been at Union Station a few days earlier and seen two soldiers in fatigues in the food court, apparently guarding the Jersey Mike’s Subs stall. (“Well, sandwiches are dangerous,” Noah commented when I told him about it later.) Even so, I was surprised at how heavily guarded Union Station was. During the march we’d seen about as many park police and DC police as you’d expect at a big protest, but the situation in the train station was over the top. DC police in riot gear with a dog near Insomnia Cookies and roaming National Guard soldiers with rifles I kept seeing all over, as I browsed the station for a place to eat and restrooms. I really don’t understand why this station has been chosen for this show of force, as it’s not a dangerous place at all, unless it’s because a lot of tourists pass through it. (We did see a middle-aged couple in MAGA hats on the sidewalk nearby.) Anyway, we ate our lunch at Pret amidst this unnerving spectacle. When we were telling North about it later, we said it seemed like a reminder we had not in fact freed DC, not yet anyway.

3. Folk Festival

Sunday Beth went grocery shopping in the morning, and we had our weekly call with North. In the mid-afternoon we walked to Takoma Park Middle School where the Folk Festival was happening. We were there for the last three hours, so we each got to pick an act. Here’s what we picked with the program descriptions:

Pam Parker: Thrilling audiences with her tremendous voice and thoughtful message
Marilyn Hucek: Indie pop with heart: bold, honest lyrics over lush, addictive melodies
GXB: Scorching, hook-laden Southern rock & roll filled with blues and heartfelt soul

All the performances were fun and after the heat of the day before and a rainy morning, the weather couldn’t have been nicer, mid-seventies, and sunny with a nice breeze. Because we see Purple School people wherever we go, at Pam Parker’s set we saw two more mothers from the kids’ preschool (one of whom, Cara, is our city councilperson and the other, Lane, is labor colleague of Beth’s). Apparently, Lane’s musician husband sometimes plays with Parker.

We all got food from different stands. I had a café con leche paleta when we first got there and then veggie dog with cheese and sauerkraut and ice cream for dinner. I forgot to bring my meds with me and went out of range on the hot dog bun and ice cream, but these things happen sometimes. I try not to freak out about it.

4. Garden Concert

Not satisfied with having seen three sets of live music a few days earlier, on the next Wednesday evening Beth and I went back to Brookside Gardens because they are having a series of free evening concerts this month on the lawn behind the visitors’ center. (Noah couldn’t come because he was going to a different concert that night.) I made a picnic dinner of egg salad, crackers, and plums and we set up camp chairs behind the visitor’s center to eat and listen to an hour and a half of blues and rock. Reese did a lot of covers—the Band, B.B. King, Bonnie Raitt, Carole King, and Kris Kristofferson, but she also did some originals. There was a Ben and Jerry’s truck there, so of course at intermission we got ice cream, and I wandered around looking at the late summer flowers growing near the stage.

5. Godzilla Minus One

The following Saturday afternoon, Beth left to spend a few days visiting with her high school friend Michelle and seeing her perform in a play, just outside Chicago. When Beth is gone, and we are left to our own devices, the kids and I often watch scary movies. Noah at first proposed we watch Beau Is Afraid, because it’s too violent to watch with Beth, but I read some reviews and I suspected it might also be too violent for me, plus it’s three hours long (“Two hours and fifty-nine minutes,” he primly corrected me when I brought this up as a concern.) So, he regrouped and suggested Godzilla Minus One, which he had once nominated for family movie night, and Beth had vetoed. I agreed. It’s a completely ridiculous movie, but in a good, fun way. I was wondering how, given that it’s a prequel, the movie would handle the question of the monster’s survival. If you want to know, you will need to watch it yourself, but you probably won’t be that surprised if you’ve watched any horror at all.

6. Pie Contest

On Sunday afternoon, Noah and I went to the farmer’s market pie contest. It’s the first time it’s been only the two of us—last year I went alone—and the second year North did not have an entry after a long stretch of pie contests. I think they were seven or eight the first time they entered, and I know they were seventeen the last time. I am obliged to mention that they won the contest twice, once with a cantaloupe pie when they were ten and once with a mushroom pie when they were thirteen. (I was pleased to see a cantaloupe entry this year, as it brought back memories.)

We left right after a family call conducted from three states, during which we learned that North had tried out for a play and is the intimacy coordinator for another one. We arrived twenty minutes after tickets went on sale and ten minutes before pie slices were supposed to be available. The line was quite long when we got into it. I left Noah to hold our place while I went to the nearby farmers’ market to get some ricotta. I’d hoped to get some chocolate milk for Noah and maybe some figs, too, but it was the last hour the market was open, and a lot of items were sold out.

When I rejoined Noah in line, it had not started to move yet, but it had gotten longer. We were standing in the sun, and it was hot. We’d purchased four tickets because the plan was to get a savory slice each for lunch and a sweet each for dessert. But once the line did start to move (about ten minutes late) I watched different flavors get crossed off the poster board and I told Noah that by the time it was our turn there might not be any vegetarian savory flavors left, and we’d have to get four sweet slices. “That would be terrible,” he deadpanned.

As it turned out, that was just what happened. Once we got inside the tent, I had some trouble picking my two sweet slices, partly because one of the flavors I’d scoped out ahead of time (chocolate-raspberry) was sold out. The bigger problem was that somehow many of the slices had gotten separated from their labels, and the servers had no idea which flavors were which. (I forgot to take any pictures, so the photo is from the farmers’ market website, and it was taken early on, before it got chaotic.)

The label situation was especially bad in the peach section, and of course, they all looked pretty much the same. I was surprised as the contest is usually more organized. I had wanted to try the ginger peach, but I chose a peach slice at random and when I tasted it, I was surprised that of many varieties of peach pie, I’d gotten the one I wanted. For my second slice, I selected an apple slice with no top crust because I reasoned it would have fewer carbs, and I usually like pie filling more than crust anyway.

We settled at a picnic table and Noah ate both of his slices (chocolate pecan and caramel apple) for lunch. I had the ginger peach, some smoked almonds I had in my bag, and an iced latte from Takoma Bev, where I got a takeout container to carry home the apple slice. We parted ways so Noah could go to his weekly Sunday afternoon board game group, and I could do some more shopping before heading home. Despite the long wait and confusion in the pie tent, it was a very satisfactory experience. The pie contest is a benefit for the farmers’ markets SNAP benefit matching program, so it’s always nice to feel you are doing good by eating pie.

7. Homecoming

Beth came home from visiting Michelle three days later. She’d been kayaking on the Fox River, seen Michelle’s play, helped her run lines for an audition, and gone to a museum. I made an apple-walnut kuchen to welcome her home. When she tried it, she said “this tastes like fall.” The next night I made eggplant parmesan for dinner because she loves eggplant. Because Beth got home Wednesday after dinner and we both had book club (different book clubs that meet at different times) on Thursday evening, we didn’t eat together as a trio until Friday, when we went out for pizza and soft serve at Red Hound. Beth and Noah got S’mores (marshmallow ice cream with chocolate sauce and graham cracker bits) and I got half chocolate and half pistachio. Then we came home and watched Only Yesterday. Because Noah really likes anime, especially the work of Hayao Miyazaki, we watch a lot of it, so it felt like familiar and comfortable thing to do.

Politically speaking, the last few weeks have been scary and trying. Who thought we’d have to give up Hulu to try to save the democracy? But we’re doing it. I hope you are finding comfort and strength in the things you love.

Last Two Weeks

Posted on August 26, 2025 by Steph

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North never made it to camp, and they didn’t even get a doctor’s appointment the week they were unexpectedly home. They didn’t have a lot of plans, as a lot of their high school friends had already left for school, and I think after a few weeks of not working, they were bored. They had long phone conversations with college friends and a couple online OSCA meetings. (They are one of two food coordinators who serve as liaisons between the co-ops and wholesale food vendors this year and they needed to plan food orders for the welcome picnic for new students.) They said it was the first week they wished they back at school. Lucky for them, it was their second-to-last week at home, so they didn’t need to wait long. This is what we did during those two weeks:

Week 1

Watch Movies

North was home, but Beth was gone, first at the CWA convention in Pittsburgh and then visiting her mom in Wheeling. What we mainly did in Beth’s absence was watch scary movies because she is not a fan. After Sinners, we went to Weapons in a theater, and then we watched Good One (which I hesitated to watch with Beth because I thought it might take a turn it did not) and The Gift. I’d seen that one alone in the theater ten years ago when Beth and the kids were out of town on a camping trip. Kind of funny I saw it again while she was out of town yet again.

Bake a Cake

Normally, North would probably bake something during a slow week, but it’s not that appealing when you feel sick much of the time. However, Noah made a ginger-apple cake with cream cheese frosting. It had three kinds of ginger (crystalized, fresh, and powdered). It was excellent and had quite a kick. I wondered if he thought all the ginger might settle his sibling’s stomach (they’d been drinking a lot of ginger ale) or if he was trying to summon fall during a miserably hot, sticky week by using autumnal flavors. North didn’t get better, but the weather eventually cooled down, so it worked on at least one front.

Protest

On Thursday night, I went to a Free DC protest. You’ve probably heard that the President tried to federalize the DC police. The legality of that is up in the air (and may change before I finally finish and post this), but there are National Guard troops from several states and other federal law enforcement agencies occupying the city, even though crime in DC is declining. They’ve set up checkpoints and some employees from Cielo Rojo, a Mexican restaurant a twenty-minute walk from my house, were seized in the city on their way to work. I’ve lived in the DC Metro area since 1991, so I am just heartbroken over all this. Not to mention that there have been more people seized in Takoma Park on the Maryland side of the border, including some landscapers in my friend Becky’s neighborhood. She posted video of it to Instagram.

The protests are happening in neighborhoods all over DC, every night at eight o’ clock. I went to the closest one, just over the DC/Maryland line. It was organized by our friend Sara, who used to work with Beth and is married to Mike, who frequently employs Noah. The bus schedule meant I got there early, so I went to the hardware store to get yard bags and then got myself some gelato. While I was eating it, a couple also eating gelato noticed my sign and asked where the protest was, so I told them, and they came along.

It was the second night there was a protest at this corner (Carroll and Maple if you’re local and want to come) and about fifteen to twenty people showed up, including my two recruits. Signs, pots, wooden spoons, and various percussion instruments are provided, and for five minutes, everyone makes a lot of noise, and people in passing cars honk or shout in support. That night, a Metro bus driver honked, too.

I resolved to go again sometime soon. As I told North, these protests are very short, and I should spend at least as much time holding the sign as I spent making it. I used colored tape to make the Free DC logo, as I did with my No Kings sign. I was pleased with it. Beth says I am becoming a “tape artist,” though North finds it amusing that “DC” is so much smaller than “Free,” because I ran out of room.

Week 2

Go to the Fair

Beth came home on Saturday afternoon, a day earlier than originally planned so we could go to the last day of the Montgomery County Fair. When we walked through the gates, I was awash in nostalgia. The fair always does that to me and now I have fifteen years’ worth of memories to add to those I mentioned in that post.

We did a few rides first thing. North wanted to ride the swings and some other favorites before eating in case they got sick to their stomach. I did the swings and the Mouse Trap with the kids. (Beth only rides the Ferris Wheel.) We went to get dinner next. North wanted dessert first for the same reason they wanted to do high-priority rides first. So, they got a root beer float while Beth got pupusas and Noah and I got crepes. Later in the evening, they got fried pickles while Beth and Noah were getting dessert.

In between we visited the animal barns. Because it was the last day, most of the stalls were empty of their tenants, but we saw sheep, goats, and North’s favorite, rabbits. I always feel a little sorry for them when I read the judges’ notes on their cages. I mean, would you like to be on display with a card that says, “uneven fur density?” I want to tell them “You are perfect just as you are,” but since they can’t read, I guess I don’t have to do that.

The line for the Ferris Wheel was long, so the kids went to ride something else while Beth and I stood in line, but it turned out that ride had a short but slow-moving line, so we had to give up our place and go to the back of the line before they came back. That was frustrating because it was getting late and it had been a hot day, so I was tired and ready to go home. But once we were high in the air, all together in the little car after in a week and a half apart, looking at the colored lights of the fair, it was worth it.

Bake a Cobbler

I had been planning to make a peach-blackberry cobbler to welcome Beth home, but I delayed it a little because of the presence of cake in the house. North said they wanted to help, so while Beth was grocery shopping on Sunday morning, I made the filling, and North made the crust and assembled it. They did a good job rolling the dough thin enough to cover the whole pan. I sometimes have trouble with that. I’ve been making this cobbler for decades, usually near the end of summer, and it tasted comfortingly familiar.

Go to the Doctor

On Monday afternoon, North finally had a doctor’s appointment (with a new doctor since theirs was on vacation). The results of their bloodwork were in the portal Monday night and by Tuesday morning we had a message from the doctor saying they had an elevated count of a specific kind of white blood cell, which was consistent either with an H. pylori infection causing an ulcer (the original theory) or gastroenteritis (a new one). They got another prescription and depending on the results of another test they might need an endoscopy. This will mean they’ll need to find a gastroenterologist in Ohio.

Protest Again

Tuesday night, Beth and I went back to the Takoma DC Free DC protest. We were the first ones to arrive and I was afraid no one else would come, but eventually over a dozen people gathered. One woman said she’d heard the protest the night before while in a meditation group at a church a block away and came to check it out. Sara wasn’t there that night and she brings the extra pots, spoons, and instruments, so there weren’t enough to go around. We chanted and clapped instead. Right at the end, a woman with a DC flag joined us. She said she’d been looking for a group that’s sometimes at the Takoma Metro but wasn’t that night.

Wade in the Creek

Wednesday morning the kids and I went on a creek walk. We’ve been doing this since they were small, often in the late summer, usually in Long Branch, the creek nearest our house. We altered our most common route this year because on my morning walks, I’d noticed a lot of deadfalls in the part of the creek where we usually wade since a big storm in mid-July. I also wanted to change the normal order of events to get food and beverages after the walk instead of before. This was in case North felt sick after eating.

So, we entered the water at the spot where we usually do, but we went in the opposite direction to a part of the creek I don’t see as often on walks. I don’t think there were any fewer trees down that way, but it was pleasant to wade in the water and look at pretty fungus on a downed log, little fishes in the water, and a spiderweb full of drops of water. We waded for twenty minutes until we got to a tree that was too big to clamber over and turned around, exiting where we entered. Then we went to the Langley Park farmers’ market where we got pupusas and drinks from Starbucks. North was able to eat most of a pupusa. It was a very satisfactory outing.

Go to the Hospital

North had a psychiatrist appointment Thursday morning, and I met them afterward for coffee at Lost Sock. They were somewhat subdued because they’d had a headache since the previous day. It didn’t feel like one of their usual headaches and it was accompanied by dizziness and blurry vision and a feeling they described as being “off.”

We went home and North talked to a nurse in the Complex Care program at Children’s (where North still gets most of their healthcare). They were advised to go to the ER, so that’s where Beth and North spent much of the day. As they left, Beth said, “We haven’t done this in a while.” Even so, we’ve gone to the ER with North so many times it’s a familiar ritual, if not a pleasant one.

Beth texted me updates throughout the day. North eventually got some IV migraine meds, and it did take the headache away, so it must have been a non-typical migraine, like the one they had when they were almost eleven that paralyzed their hands and feet.

We thought we had one health problem solved but the headache came back the next day mid-morning. They had been told to take ibuprofen and electrolytes if it did, so I went out and got them some Gatorade, but it only helped a little. Then Beth remembered we have another medication on hand that North hadn’t tried because it’s only semi-effective on their usual migraines and they rarely use it. But they tried it, and it worked, at least temporarily. They can take it twice a day for up to three days in a week, so that’s what they did, timing the doses strategically depending on our plans. It’s been more than a year since they’ve had to ration their migraine meds, but that’s where we are again.

Observe Friday Traditions

On their last day at home, North packed and that night we went out for our traditional Friday night pizza. Most of us got Red Hound, but North wanted their favorite Roscoe’s so we got takeout from two places and ate it at the tables on Laurel Avenue. (Maya, you can visualize us there. It was just up the street from where we met.) Then we went back to Red Hound for ice cream. I got orange with stewed figs. They always have interesting flavors there. North got doughnut peach-maple, but they couldn’t eat much of it.

At home, instead of randomly drawing a movie from the index cards in the cookie jar on the dining room table as we usually do on Friday nights, we looked at all the cards and picked the shortest one because it was late and while Beth and North were packed, I was not. The movie was Marvelous and the Black Hole, which I’d had on my list of possible movies to nominate for a few years but only nominated in this round. It was worth the wait.

And then North’s wait to get back to school was over, as we were leaving the next day. More on that trip soon…

Families, Folk, and Flowers

Posted on August 3, 2025 by Steph

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North finished up their day camp job on Wednesday. They originally thought their last day would be a Friday and they’d come up with a plan for us to meet them at work, have our weekly Friday night pizza at Roscoe’s and then go try out the nearby newish Peach Cobbler Factory in Takoma, DC. So, we ended up doing it on their last Friday at work (the last Friday in July) instead of their last day. Dessert was on them. Three of us got cobblers of various flavors (I got blackberry) but they also have other desserts and Beth got chocolate chip banana pudding. It was fun to try a new place.

Now North is in the middle of a week and a half off before leaving for their third and final job of the summer, a week of being a counselor at the sleepaway camp for kids of gay and lesbian parents they attended for five summers, starting when they were twelve.

Families First

That same weekend Beth and I went to the Families First rally on the mall Saturday afternoon. North couldn’t go because they had a five-hour online training for the sleep-away camp job (that on top of an hour and a half of asynchronous modules they had to complete before the training). The stipend for this job is so small that North joked that if they were getting even minimum wage, they would have earned half of it by the time they finished the training.

The protest was not particularly well attended. We didn’t expect it to be, as it didn’t seem to be well publicized and there weren’t any other people with signs on the Takoma metro stop platform. In fact, two curious people at the station asked where we were going with our signs, which means even people who are interested in protests hadn’t heard about it.

When we got there was only a scattering of people in front of the stage, but that was partly because it was a hot, muggy day and a lot of people were off to the side under the shade of trees. There were a lot of amenities, however. There were red-and-white checkered blankets spread out on the grass and various games (giant Jenga blocks, connect four frames, and cornhole) set up on the grass, to make it family friendly, and people were handing out battery-operated fans (the kind that spray water), and free snacks. There was also a water bottle-filling station that dispensed cool water. On its side it said, “You know what else is refreshing? Protecting Medicaid.”

The theme was support for families hurt by cuts to various federal programs. The website cited Medicaid, FEMA, food stamps, school lunches, so put those in lefthand column of my sign under the words “Families Need,” but I filled up another column with other issues that concern me (gender-affirming health care, reproductive rights, action on climate change, and academic freedom). On the flip side of the sign, I wrote Immigrant Families Belong Together, because I thought that was important enough to stand alone. The action was national, so the focus may have differed from location to location, but at this one the spotlight was squarely on Medicaid. There were passionate speeches from people affected by Medicaid cuts, including a man with developmental disabilities and a teen boy with a life-threatening respiratory disability.

There were some nice musical performances by the DC Labor Chorus and the Baltimore Urban Inspiration Choir. Congress had just left on recess (dismissed early so they couldn’t vote on releasing the Epstein files) so there were no politicians who spoke. Beth said the actions were timed to correspond with the beginning of the August recess to get people across the country motivated to visit their representatives and express their concerns. It was a shame there wasn’t a big turnout at this one because it was a good event. Still, we weren’t sorry when it ended early because it the weather was punishing. Many of the speakers thanked people for showing up in the heat.

(Near) Future Plans

On the way home from the rally Beth and I talked about things we’d been saying we should do this summer and have not done. Part of the reason was that our pink resurrection lilies were just starting to bloom, and this always makes me realize while summer break is not over, we can now count what’s left in weeks rather than months. We made plans to visit a sunflower field the next weekend, and I checked on the schedule for outdoor concerts at the National Arboretum (the next one is not until early September, so that won’t be an all-family activity). We also resolved to visit an African ice cream place in Silver Spring we’d heard about but never patronized.

The next day North and I made a kuchen out of the blueberries we’d picked three weeks prior and the two of us looked at a calendar to see if we could reasonably hope to finish season 6 of The Gilmore Girls, Season 5 of Grownish, and season 3 of Ginny & Georgia before North goes back to school in late August. The answer seemed to be a tentative yes.* Finally, North and I made plans to go to the Langley Park farmers’ market for pupusas the first Wednesday of August, the kids decided to collaborate on the long-discussed brownie sundaes (Noah would make the brownies and North would make a sour-cherry peach sauce). I resolved to make a blackberry-peach cobbler after Beth and North return from their travels and the kids and I will probably take our annual creek walk the last week North is home. I felt good about these late summer plans. They seemed do-able and like they would be fun.

Over the next few days, I started to remember other things that wouldn’t be as easy to fit into the time we had left. North had mentioned wanting to take a day trip to the Chesapeake Bay and I’d been thinking about the fact that the four of us haven’t been to the movies together all summer. We had a few weeks but only one weekend left because Beth and North will be travelling for the next two (North to camp, and Beth to her union’s convention and then her mom’s house) and then we leave to take North back to school on a Saturday.

Folk Rock

Thursday morning North had a doctor’s appointment. They’ve been having stomach pain and nausea, and their doctor thinks it might be an ulcer. They got meds for it, with instructions to take them for a couple weeks and see if they help (so far, they haven’t). That afternoon the kids made the components of the sundaes.

Beth and I didn’t have ours until the next day because we had plans that evening. We were going to see Emmylou Harris and Graham Nash at Wolf Trap as a belated anniversary celebration. Getting there turned out to be more of a challenge than we anticipated. On the way back from North’s doctor’s appointment Beth got a flat tire. Someone from road service came to remove it and put the spare tire on, but it wasn’t clear how we were going to get to Wolf Trap (which is in suburban Virginia) because it’s not safe to drive on a donut at high speeds and the Beltway would be the normal route. We considered trying to borrow a car, taking a Lyft, or driving an alternate route. We ended up choosing the alternate route.

Did I mention torrential rain with possible flooding was in the forecast? It had rained intermittently and with varying intensity all afternoon, everything from drizzle to moderately hard. We set out about 5:30 and got there a little before 7:00. The sky was clearing when we arrived and the hour we had before showtime was just long enough to get some food, picnic on the lawn, get some ice cream, eat that, and get to our seats. The food line was short, but the wait was long anyway. They kept apologizing and offering us free drinks or food and we finally accepted a box of popcorn for our trouble. We’d sprung for tickets under the roof and while the lawn would have been fine, we didn’t know the rain would stop right in time, so that was one fewer stressor in a day that had plenty of them.

The concert was fun. Emmylou Harris went on first and she started right on time. She sang “Red Dirt Girl,” the song I most wanted to hear, early in her set, and I learned from her introduction that “Bang the Drum Slowly” is about her father. She had a very talented and versatile group of musicians with her. The fiddle/mandolin player was especially good.

I was looking forward to Harris’s set more, but I ended up enjoying them equally. For one thing, Nash’s sound was better set up, so it was easier to hear the words. But instead of singing mostly from his solo career, which is what I think I expected, he sang a lot of songs from his time in the Hollies; Crosby, Stills, and Nash; and Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. It was more nostalgic because I’ve loved a lot of those songs since I was child and while I’ve been listening to Emmylou Harris for decades there’s nothing quite like the music you loved as a kid. I have to say, though, that when you hear him sing them alone, you do miss the harmonies. Though he wasn’t really singing alone. His band sang, audience participation was encouraged, and a lot of the songs (“Marrakesh Expresss,” “Our House”) became sing-alongs. Everyone seemed to know all the words. Finally, based on his stage patter, I’d say he is more invested in being Joni Mitchell’s ex than she is about being his.

It was quite late when we got home, after midnight, and I was wrecked the next day, but it was worth it. While we were at the concert the kids ate defrosted chili North made a while back and watched The Barbarian and Noah had his sundae, but North waited on theirs because they didn’t feel well.

(Where Have All the) Flowers Gone?

The next Saturday morning we were intending to go see the sunflower fields at the McKee-Beshers Wildlife Management Area. But when Beth visited the website that morning, she discovered the bloom was over. This was a surprise as our sunflowers are still going strong. But at least we found out before we left.

I’d been looking forward to this outing, for the family time, and being out in nature, and because I knew Noah would get good pictures. He always does. I floated the idea of going to see a movie instead, but Beth had work to do and there wasn’t anything playing nearby I wanted to see anyway, so I gave up on the idea. And a trip to the Bay would have been too time-consuming so I didn’t even mention it.

What we did do was try out the African ice cream place. It’s in Solare Social, an international food court tucked away in an out of the way street in downtown Silver Spring. There were a lot of interesting stands and Noah is already making plans to go back and have dinner there when he’s in Silver Spring for a concert next week. Beth and Noah sampled the spicy chocolate. It had too much of a kick for her, but he ordered it, with dried plantains. Beth and North got the grape-raspberry-black currant (Beth with cacao nibs and North without) and I got a malted ice cream with cacao nibs. It was fun to try yet another new (to us) dessert place.

We weren’t done with frozen treats, though. There was a meet-and-greet for Oberlin alums, students, and incoming students in Chevy Chase Sunday afternoon. This was the beginning of a remarkably social week for me, which I will report on later…

*We finished season 6 of Gilmore Girls tonight.

All For The Love Of You

A Chronicle of Suburban Lesbian Family Life

Category Archives: Excursions

The Boy Who Was Born That Day

#SpringBreak

A Richer Place

The Rails

Moving Forward

#FallBreak

All’s Well That Ends Well

Seven For September

Last Two Weeks

Families, Folk, and Flowers