Every Phase of Us

Posted on January 11, 2026 by Steph

Fire and Ice

My first work week of the year was a short one. I didn’t start to work until Wednesday and then I took off early on Friday to go to a protest. Between the kidnapping of the President of Venezuela and the killing of a protestor in Minneapolis, the year had gotten off to a dismal and dismaying start. There were nationwide protests planned for the weekend, but Beth had a prior engagement, so we decided to go to a Friday afternoon roadside protest in Silver Spring. I made my sign the night before; the side I meant to face the street had just the words “Fire Ice” in letters I hoped would be big enough to read from the road, with accompanying sketches of fire and ice. (I think if I use it again, I will make the letters thicker, so they are more legible from a distance.)

This recurring protest happens every week at 4 p.m. on 16^th Street, a six-lane thoroughfare. The weather was not inviting, in the forties and drizzling when we arrived, but there was a moderate turnout, several dozen people. I’m not a regular at this one, so I’m not sure how that compares to an average week. People’s signs were about various issues, but anti-ICE ones were popular and two people in the median held signs that said, “No Blood for Oil” and “No War.” Someone on the other side of the street had an upside-down American flag. My favorite sign might have been the one that said, “Alexa… change the President.” If only it were that simple…

As usual at these types of protests, there was a lot of positive engagement from passing traffic, near constant honking, waving, and thumbs up from drivers. I most appreciated honks from a school bus driver and a contractor’s truck with a Spanish surname in the name of the company. There was also an elementary school age child (perhaps Latino—it was hard to tell at a distance) who leaned out a rolled down window and yelled “Thank you!” repeatedly across several lanes of traffic. Another driver yelled to us, echoing “No Blood for Oil” and then wished us “a blessed weekend.” This isn’t something I’d say myself, not being religious, but I appreciated the sentiment.

A Ceremony to Prove It

Friday night after a dinner of homemade pizza we watched Train Dreams. In the scene in which the protagonist proposes to his wife, she says they are already married, they just need “a ceremony to prove it.” That line struck me because the anniversary of the two times Beth and I had a ceremony to prove it was in two days. Each one was a different kind of proof. As of today, it’s now been thirty-four years since our commitment ceremony with friends and family in one living room and thirteen since our legal wedding in another living room, with just the two of us, the kids, and an officiant.

On Saturday afternoon I made the spice cake I made for the first time for the commitment ceremony, and I have made almost every year since then. While it was in the oven I read a few chapters of The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym, which I’m reading because my book club is reading the modern re-reading Pym in February. Earlier that day Beth got a long-delayed haircut. In her first week of retirement, she also paid a visit to the dentist (also delayed) and attended the first meeting of her new Quigong class. She was happy to report she was not the youngest person there.

We had the cake Sunday afternoon, after a video call with North and before Noah left for his game club. It’s a comfortingly familiar cake by this point, dense, sweet, and moist. This year as most years I make a lemon frosting for it—the one year I made orange instead, North was quite put out.

We also exchanged cards and gifts. My card had a botanical illustration of a passionflower on the front. I circled the name of the flower, even though I know from writing about it—it’s a common ingredient in herbal sleep aides—that its name refers to the passion of Christ, not the other kind. Beth’s had pictures of the phases of the moon on it and said, “I love every phase of us” on the front.

One of the advantages of having an anniversary two and a half weeks after Christmas (other than relieving post-holiday letdown) is that we usually have leftover items on our Christmas lists and that makes gift-buying easy. This year we ended up with a reverse “Gift of the Magi” situation, in that without or planning it our gifts improved each other. Beth got me three kinds of nut butter—fancy nut butters being a diabetic-friendly treat—and I got her a nut butter mixer. It’s a lid with an attached crank that allows you to mix separated oil back into natural nut butters without splashing it out of the jar. We haven’t tried it out yet because while I opened one of the nut butters later in the afternoon, it was the pistachio-cocoa butter, which was creamy and didn’t need any mixing.

Happy anniversary, sweetheart. Even though I wish this phase of our lives did not involve the need for quite so many protests, I think we improve each other and this was a blessed weekend.

A Very Nice Birthday

Posted on November 27, 2025 by Steph

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Early Celebration

On Thursday, three days before Beth’s birthday, I made stuffed eggplant with vegetarian ground beef and tomato sauce for dinner because she loves eggplant and it was the last day I was choosing the menu before her birthday. She was quite appreciative of the dinner as well as the dessert, chocolate-covered pumpkin spice truffles I’d made the day before, not for her birthday per se, but more of an autumnal treat. The insides are made of crushed graham crackers mixed with pumpkin puree and they have the texture of the inside of a cake pop.

Pizza and Protest

Friday night we went to Red Hound, which is Beth’s favorite pizza place. A lot of their business is takeout and there are only three tables inside (plus some outside tables) so we were gambling an inside one would be free and the gamble paid off. We got pizza with goat cheese and all three of us got maple soft serve with caramel-apple cider sauce. They always have interesting flavors there.

Part of the reason I suggested we go to Red Hound was that it’s just a few blocks from the ongoing Free DC protest just over the DC line. People gather with pots and pans and percussion instruments every evening and make noise for five minutes. It was at eight o’clock in the summer but now it’s at seven. We got there a little early as Beth’s former colleague Sara who organizes the protest was setting up her bin of noisemakers. A thirty-something woman was telling her that she lives in the apartment building just across the street and watching the protest has become part of her six-month-old baby’s bedtime routine.

Indeed, once it had started, I looked up and she was at the window holding the baby and waving. Beth said it will be a fun story to tell him when he’s older and wants to know what life was like during that perilous time during his infancy when the country was teetering on the edge of dictatorship. In Beth’s version of this scenario democracy is saved.

We’d brought instruments with us since Noah still has some from his days playing percussion in middle and high school band. Beth took the tambourine and he had a cowbell. We’d only brought those two, so I picked a maraca from the bin and at seven sharp we all started to play. Pedestrians and people in passing cars honked or shouted encouragement. A Metro bus driver also honked in support. A man in front of the CVS across the street did a little dance and yelled, “You guys are the greatest.”

There were eight people there, counting us, and I knew two of the other five, Sara of course, and Jim from my book club. Jim told Noah to be careful hanging out with “this troublemaker,” gesturing to me. Sara, who has been doing this almost every night since August, says it still cheers her up every time. It was only my third time attending, but I am inspired to go again some time.

A Very Nice Birthday

On Beth’s birthday we had our usual Sunday morning video call with North, but it was somewhat unusual because we sang “Happy Birthday” and Beth opened her presents on camera. I got her Alison Bechdel’s Spent and some orange chocolates she likes. The kids got her two different graters (a garlic grater and a micro plane grater) that had been on her wish list. She also opened a pile of dark chocolate bars from my mom.

After lunch, we sang “Happy Birthday” again and had the cake I’d made the day before—dark chocolate with coffee frosting. It’s the cake I make most often for Beth’s birthday and I need to read the recipe through a patina of brown cocoa powder spills.

Noah left for his weekly board game group in Rockville, and Beth and I went for a walk in Brookside Gardens and Wheaton Regional Park (these parks are adjacent and you can easily cross from one to the other). We spent most of the hour-long walk on a series of interconnected wooded trails. We were usually alone but every so often we’d cross paths with other people, dogs, and horses. We spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing at home.

We had Burmese takeout for dinner and Noah came home early from his games to eat with us. (He’s usually out until after we’ve gone to bed.) We ordered a feast that lasted for days afterward, but the most popular dish (based on order of disappearance) was the eggplant fritters. After dinner we had more cake and watched a couple episodes of Man on the Inside. Beth declared it had been “a very nice birthday.”

Afterward

By Monday it was already time to start thinking about the next holiday. That afternoon, Noah chopped up onions, celery, and mushrooms for Thanksgiving gravy and stuffing at the dining room table. While he was doing that, I was chopping vegetables (including some of the same ones) in the kitchen for the soup we were having for dinner that night. This felt like a kind of cheering, festive parallel play. And that night Beth used the mushrooms and some of the onions to make gravy.

But even though we had turned our attention to Thanksgiving, her birthday wasn’t quite over. On Tuesday she got a card from her brother and a present from my sister (reusable cloth produce bags she’d requested) in the mail.

But the most exciting thing that happened on Tuesday was that North came home. Their flight from Cleveland was delayed, so we didn’t even leave the house to drive to National until ten p.m., a time we are normally in bed. Beth had thought traffic would be light by that time of night and it was until we got close to the airport, where there was quite the backup of cars. Turns out a lot of people are flying or picking people up from the airport two nights before Thanksgiving. It was almost midnight by the time we got home, but Noah and the cats were all up so North got to be reunited with the whole family. And the next morning, we left for the beach.

A Scary World

Posted on November 1, 2025 by Steph

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Pre-Halloween Activities

Two days before Halloween, I posted on Facebook: “Steph knows it’s a scary world out there, so she wrote to PA voters in hopes they might help hold the line, and she made some comfort in the form of soup in a pumpkin shell. Vote YES on judicial retention!” The first two pictures were of a cardboard sign and tombstones some neighbors made for their “International Development Graveyard.” The tombs read “USAID: 1961-2025,” “Environmental Conservation,” “Global Health,” “USAID Education Programs. RIP,” etc. I also included a photo of a stack of postcards, my second batch for Democratic judges in Pennsylvania, and my cream of pumpkin soup. There’s only so much we can do, but I try to keep doing it.

All Hallows Eve

The next afternoon Beth set out for Oberlin to stay with North during and after their endoscopy, which was taking place on Halloween. The doctors are closing in on an overactive gallbladder as the source of North’s ongoing digestive problems, but they wanted to have a look inside their upper digestive tract to rule out any other problems before scheduling a gallbladder removal surgery. The procedure went smoothly, and they didn’t find anything, but they are running a second H. pylori test (the first one came back negative, but this one’s from a biopsy and more accurate) as a final step before surgery.

Beth drove North to Cleveland Clinic and back to the rental house where she was staying in Lorain. It was Halloween, so they watched Muppets Haunted Mansion and ate pizza and candy. (Beth bought some in case any trick-or-treaters came to the rental unit, but none did.) North had been sad to miss Halloween festivities on campus (trick-or-treating at academic department offices and a party) so I hope this was some compensation. It reminded me of other times they had to miss trick-or-treating—for Outdoor Education in sixth grade and when they were hospitalized in eleventh grade. They really love Halloween, so the timing was not ideal. The next morning, Beth and North took a walk along the shores of Lake Erie and then Beth left for Wheeling for a quick visit to her mom.

Back home, Noah and I held down the fort. We replaced decorations that had blown down and put batteries in ones that make more noise than we want to hear all month. Noah also got the topple-prone witch that Beth and I had been struggling with for days to stand up and got both fog machines going. He had evening plans, filming an amateur production of Sweeney Todd, but I was grateful for his help before he left after dinner.

I was left alone to hand out candy to trick-or-treaters. We got about thirty. Toward the end of the evening, I was texting Beth and saying I hadn’t seen any fabulous costumes when a little autumn fairy knocked on the door. Her dress was covered in different colored leaves and she had green, leaf-shaped wings with glow sticks in them. Shortly afterward there was a teenage frog with (possibly homemade) crocheted eyes on a headband. I also appreciated a preteen Grim Reaper with a homemade scythe, a teen Elphaba who had gotten the shade of her green makeup just right, and a little dalmatian with nice spotted face paint. As always, we got a lot of compliments on our decorations. One mom said she always looks forward to our house more than any other.

Post-Halloween Thoughts

The next day on my morning walk, I came across another cardboard graveyard of political commentary. The stones said, “Due Process: 1791-2025” and “RIP Medicare & Medicaid.” That last one may be a bit premature, but it was a reminder (as if we needed one) of the stakes over the next few years.

There will be a time after this time, I keep telling myself, and we may be able to rebuild some of what’s being lost, or maybe even build something better. Some things are lost for good, though, like the East Wing of the White House. It’s not as important as due process, for instance, but I’ve lived in the D.C. area for thirty-four years and I have fond memories of White House tours: Christmas tours in the 90s and in 2023, an East Wing tour in 2010, garden tours in 2011 and 2022, and an Easter Egg Roll in 2014. There’s a reason they call it the People’s House. It belongs to all of us and it’s sad to see the physical symbols of democracy attacked as ruthlessly as its norms, laws, and spirit. That’s scarier than any bright green witch or robed figure with a scythe.

#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.

The Seaside Reminds You

Posted on July 23, 2025 by Steph

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The seaside
Reminds you of
Where you’ve been

“The Seaside,” by Janis Ian

We just got back from a week in Rehoboth with extended family four days ago. We stayed in a house where we’ve stayed twice before, once in the summer of 2020 and again Thanksgiving that same year. Because of covid, houses were going for cheap then and we could afford a five-bedroom house a block from the beach for just the four of us. I am very fond of this house. I love the aqua-painted kitchen, the wood paneling on most of the rooms, the cathedral ceiling in the dining area, and the indoor balcony that overlooks part of the first floor. We missed our families so much during those visits, it was satisfying to be back with mine this year.

The house is full of memories of those covid-era visits. There were little things, like the hooks where we hung our masks, and bigger ones. During the summer one North was partially paralyzed and in a wheelchair. We’d rented the house before we knew that would be the case, and so every time we left or returned to the house, we had to lug the wheelchair up or down the four brick stairs that lead to the porch and then we had to help North pull themselves up those same stairs.

When we arrived on Saturday and were walking up those stairs, this memory hit me hard. I asked Beth how many days she thought it would take not to think of that summer five years ago every time we went up or down the stairs and she said probably longer than a week. She was right.

Saturday

But about this trip… we all arrived at the beach in the late afternoon, despite having very different journeys. We had a four-and-a-half-hour trek from Maryland to Delaware, with a return to our house in the first five minutes of the drive for forgotten items, a stop for lunch, and moderate traffic. My mom, sister Sara, brother-in-law Dave, and twelve-year-old niece Lily-Mei arrived at the beach house, having been travelling from California since the previous morning. They flew to Philadelphia, arriving in the middle of the night after a re-routed connection (changed from Chicago to Colorado) and stayed overnight there and slept most of the next morning before driving to the beach.

North and I took a walk on the beach before the party was complete and then after a dinner of burgers, hot dogs, corn, and watermelon (with many cooks pitching in), everyone but Lily-Mei went to the beach or boardwalk. I was in the beach contingent with my mom, sister, and Dave. We admired an elaborate sandcastle with a stairway carved out of it, an intricate clear and purple jellyfish washed up on the beach, and the pink-tinged sky over the ocean. We saw dolphins and pelicans and osprey. Sara had not intended to swim on this outing, but the water was warmer than usual (and even more so for those accustomed to the Pacific) and she couldn’t resist, so she stripped down to her bra and underpants and dove in. Later she explained she always matches these garments just in case such opportunity for spontaneous swimming arises, though it’s more often in lakes and rivers when she’s at home.

There was some commotion on the beach further north. We saw what looked like police car lights on the beach and more searchlights on two boats close to shore, plus there were helicopters in the sky. We later heard it was a rescue mission for a lost swimmer, a young man, and sadly he was not found. It would be a few days before his body was discovered by a kayaker.

Sunday

Sunday morning, I woke to a message from my health care practice, letting me know the second strep test was negative. I’d been wearing a mask around those who weren’t in my immediate family (and presumably not yet exposed to whatever I had) but after learning it wasn’t strep, I put it away. I still had the sore throat at that point, but it lessened over the course of the week and eventually went away (mostly).

I took a walk on the boardwalk, finding a shady place on a roofed concrete platform in front of a hotel where I could watch the ocean. It was a sunny day, and the sea sparkled. I was wearing North’s crocs because the bottom straps of one of my Teva’s had slipped out of the base of the shoe when I was a half block from the house. As the crocs were the only shoes they had, I’d promised to return in an hour. However, when I texted to ask if they’d rather have the shoes back at eleven or an iced chai from Café a Go-Go, they opted for the chai, so I stayed out a little longer. (I ended up wearing my Birks for the rest of the week, despite my qualms about wearing them on the beach and getting them wet.) I can’t complain about the Teva’s lack of durability, however. I got them on a trip to the Southwest with Beth in the mid-nineties.

Beth, North, and I went to the beach in the early afternoon. We all stood in the shallow water together for a while and then North and I went in deeper. The water was very calm and full of jellyfish. We kept seeing them and brushing up against them and even stepping on them (which is an unsettling feeling.) We never got stung that day, though we did get that itchy, prickly feeling you sometimes get after sharing the ocean with a lot of jellyfish. However, it was the first time I’d been in the ocean since last July and North did not get as much time in the water as they would have liked on their trip to the beach with friends in June, so neither of us wanted to get out.

North’s trip in June was a senior beach week for most of the participants, but it was not what you might expect of a senior beach week. There was a chaperone (an aunt), the kids were not allowed out after nine p.m., and they were not allowed to swim unless a lifeguard was on duty and the aunt was watching, too, and the aunt rarely wanted to go to the beach. North loves the water and being back at the beach seemed to be bringing their frustration with this situation back.

Back at the towel, I finished up my book club book and then dozed in the sun. After a little while, I heard a tween girl’s voice and thought sleepily to myself, that girl sounds like Lily-Mei, without thinking about the fact that we were expecting Sara, Dave, and Lily-Mei and I’d even been wondering what was taking them so long. Do you see where this is going? They’d had trouble finding us and had settled one lifeguard stand over and then when they finally did find us North had gone back to the house and Beth and I both appeared to be asleep, so they didn’t want to wake us. Lily-Mei had concerns about going in the water because of the jellyfish, so she didn’t, and she and Dave left—maybe to go to Funland—I wasn’t sure, and Beth left, too, but I had another short swim while Sara read.

Mom made ratatouille for dinner and after the dishes were done, everyone but Mom and Noah went to the boardwalk. Sara and her family were headed for the arcade games at Funland and Beth, North, and I were tasked by Mom to get fudge at Candy Kitchen. Beth and North got frozen custard, and I went ahead to Funland to see if I could find Sara and her family. We hadn’t been separated long but they had already won a stuffed animal. Lily-Mei is a whiz at these games. Beth and North caught up with us and we watched the three of them play for a bit before coming home.

Monday

The next morning, I could see the fruits of their labor on the couch. There were three stuffed animals, and one of them was a truly enormous yellow duck. Apparently, Lily-Mei won the ring toss. You know that game, the one that’s so hard to win most people think it’s rigged? (Every time I went by the ring toss for the next several days I’d stop to see if anyone won and I never saw anyone do it.)

Discussing it, my mom said, “She wins so much stuff.”

And Dave said, “Yeah, she’s lucky.”

And my mom gave the proper grandmotherly response, “No, it’s because she’s good at everything she does.”

Beth went kayaking that morning; I was home all morning unpacking (which I hadn’t done yet), reading with Noah, conferring with my sister about my mother’s birthday cake and calling to buy the cake, chopping parsley and scallions for dinner, and generally hanging out with people. North made a tomato-cucumber-mozzarella-pesto salad for lunch and there was enough for me.

North and I spent a long time in the ocean that afternoon. Noah joined us briefly at the beginning and Sara for a longer time later. There were fewer (almost no) jellyfish, but not much in the way of waves. Sara and I took a walk on the beach, discussing parenthood and friendships and other things and then I got myself a frozen custard on the boardwalk.

I came home from the beach a little early to lend Noah a hand with dinner. He was making vegetarian crab cakes, and I got there in time to help with the frying part of the operation. They were a big hit. Both Mom and Sara asked him for the recipe.

Tuesday

It was our anniversary, the summer one that commemorates our first date (in 1987), but neither of us remembered it until the night before. We knew we had an anniversary this week, we even had dinner reservations, we just made them for the wrong night. We decided to keep things as they were because other people had made plans around this timing.

We opted to have a mini date on our actual anniversary. Beth needed ingredients for the meal she was making that night, so we went to the farmers’ market and a cheese shop and then got beverages and pastries and took them to the boardwalk. While we were gone, in an attempt to be “the cool older cousin,” North took Lily-Mei out for coffee and they got jagua tattoos on their hands.

Then Sara, Dave, and Lily-Mei were shopping in downtown Rehoboth for a dress for Lily-Mei to wear to her parents’ covid-delayed wedding in September. (They got legally married the summer of 2020 but never had a wedding and decided to do it this year.) Mom took my kids out to a late lunch, and Beth was working and then starting dinner prep, so I went to the beach alone in the mid-afternoon. (Sara worked almost every day we were there, and Beth worked intermittently, too. I was the only non-retired adult who was completely on vacation during my vacation.)

Almost as soon as I got there, the lifeguards cleared the water because lightning had been sighted five miles away. About a half hour later, they cleared the beach. People were still allowed on the boardwalk, so I went to a pavilion and read on a bench for a couple hours. Eventually, the lifeguards went off duty and I considered my options. There were dark clouds to the west and sunny skies to the east. I had not seen any lightning in the two and a half hours I’d been on the beach and boardwalk. People were trickling back onto the beach and some into the water. I decided I’d split the difference and read on the beach but not risk a swim. I told Beth later I didn’t think she’d want me to get electrocuted on our anniversary. “Or any other day!” she exclaimed. As a result, I read two-thirds of a novel in a day, which is a real luxury for me, and I did it with an ocean view, so I can’t complain too much about not getting to swim that day.

I came back to Beth’s signature beach week dinner—gazpacho, salt-crusted potatoes with cilantro-garlic sauce, a cheese plate, bread, and olives. She put Spanish guitar music on for ambiance and served dark chocolate for dessert. This meal is always much anticipated and enjoyed by the beach house crew. I think there would be a revolt if she didn’t make it.

After dinner everyone but Beth, who does not care for scary movies, watched The Presence, but we had to fast-forward through a scene that was not age-appropriate for Lily-Mei and then later had to consult some online summaries to learn what happened and how the plot twist at the end worked. North figured it out without help and Dave objects to the logic, in ways I can’t explain without giving spoilers.

After Beth and I had gone to bed, there was a long discussion, led by Lily-Mei and later related to me by North, about the relative hotness of various celebrities. It started with Brad Pitt because some of the group was going to see the F1 movie the next day. My mom’s verdict: yes, very much so, especially about thirty years ago. Lily’s Mei’s: not now or then. Everyone else was in the middle or expressed no opinion. Then Sara, Dave, and Lily-Mei (who were all kind of still on West Coast time) went out to the boardwalk and brought home fudge and other candy.

Wednesday

I had lunch with my mom because a large portion of the crew (everyone but me and North and mom) was going to see the aforementioned F1 movie. We went to our usual spot, a boardwalk restaurant where most tables have an ocean view and where I indulge in one of my once or twice-yearly departures from vegetarianism to eat fried clams. Mom got a grilled cheese sandwich with crab. The food at this place is fine, but not outstanding. We mainly go for the view.

Once I was back from lunch, North and I went to the beach. We were in the water a little over a half hour and got out because we kept brushing up against jellyfish. There were more that day than any other so far and I got stung in more places than I realized until I got out of the water and saw the angry red marks on both thighs just above the knee, one ankle, one wrist, and one forearm. It barely hurt when it happened, but the stinging and redness got worse with time. (It still hurt when I went to bed, but by the next morning, I was fully recovered.)

Beth and I had our delayed anniversary date. We did not exchange presents because we are going to an Emmylou Harris and Graham Nash concert later this month and that is our present to each other. We did get cards. In fact, we picked out the exact same card from BrowseAbout. It has two starfish on the front and says, “It’s written in the stars. You were meant for each other.” We both crossed out “you” and replaced it with “we.” This is less of a coincidence than it sounds like for two reasons. First, while the store has a large selection of cards, I couldn’t find many anniversary cards. More importantly, Beth often gets me a card with star imagery for our anniversary because the summer were both twenty, thirty-eight years ago, she wished on a star for me to fall in love with her and I did.

We went out for tapas (asparagus, spinach-ricotta gnocchi, brie and fig wrapped in phyllo, and a salad with strawberries, watermelon, feta, and candied pecans, all excellent). We were seated next to a long table of at least ten lesbians who were either in late middle age or seniors. They were about to go to a play together and seemed in high spirits. I told Beth if we retired to Rehoboth, it might not be hard to find a friend group.

We followed dinner up with ice cream on the boardwalk. I decided to get cinnamon with churro bits to continue the Spanish theme. Beth was in the mood for brownie sundae, but we went to a few places and couldn’t find one, so she got coffee with hot fudge. I said I thought one kid or the other could be induced to make brownies when we got home and mentioned we still had sour cherries in the freezer for a topping. She was enthusiastic about this idea.

While we were on our date, everyone else went to trivia night at a gay bar in town. Apparently, they won a couple categories, because, according to my sister, her husband knows something about sports, and her daughter is a good guesser. Everyone was home when we got home, but Sara, Dave, and Lily-Mei returned to the bar later that evening for karaoke.

Thursday

Beth, my kids, my mom, and I went to Egg for breakfast, Sara’s crew having elected to sleep in instead. Noah and I did what we usually do on summer visits to Egg—got two orders of lemon curd-blueberry crepes—I eat a half an order, and he has one and a half. He loves crepes and I can manage about a half order of sweet ones without a blood sugar spike so it works out for both of us.

I left Egg on foot to go to BrowseAbout to get a gift certificate for my mom’s birthday and to pick up a book for myself, as I had almost finished both books I brought with me. When I got there, I discovered that I’d left my debit card in the pocket of the skirt I’d worn the day before, so I had to go home, get it and return. I stayed in the air-conditioned house long enough to fold a load of laundry. The day was the hottest of our trip (only high eighties but quite muggy). Still, I can’t really complain about the walk, a long portion of which is along the boardwalk. I even found some wild blackberries growing in the dunes and ate a few. (I had no idea blackberry bushes could grow in sand.)

When I got back it was almost noon, and the house was quiet as Sara and Dave had taken all our offspring to Jungle Jim’s waterpark. I stayed in the house to blog and when they returned and had eaten a late lunch, North and I went to the beach.

If you’re wondering if we went into the water, you don’t know either of us very well. I did decide I’d take just a quick dip, but the waves were better than they’d been all week (though still not as big as I’d like) so then I decided I would stay in until I touched a jellyfish, but I ended up staying in for a half hour and getting almost as many stings as the day before. “Same time tomorrow?” North joked as we were getting out of the water and I was assessing the damage.

Some of the lifeguards had a vinegar solution so you could spray on stings, and I did and initially I didn’t think it helped much but the stings didn’t hurt for as long as the day before, so I guess it did. North, whose suit protects them better than mine, got back in the water for a little longer and then we both read on the beach until biting flies drove North back to the house. I had my legs wrapped in my towel and that mostly foiled them, but I followed soon after. I showered, read with Noah, and then returned to the pavilion to get a little more beach time without getting sandy or bitten again.

Dinner was spring rolls, made by Sara and Dave. They made them the last time they came to the beach, three years ago, and they may have found their own signature beach meal. (Once you find a meal that works for four vegetarians, one diabetic, one person with a gluten sensitivity, and a few picky eaters, you tend to stick with it.) Sara played Thai music because she said she was not going to be outdone by Beth when it came to ambiance.

We visited the boardwalk after dinner, got ice cream, and went to Funland. By this time, Sara had convinced a somewhat reluctant Lily-Mei that the big stuffed duck could not come home with them on the plane. I suggested leaving it in the house as a surprise for the next renters, but Sara thought the cleaning crew would throw it away, so she and Lily-Mei came up with the idea of taking it to the boardwalk and giving it away to another kid. They decided to go back to the ring toss, on the assumption that any parents who allowed their child to try it were willing to bring home an enormous prize.

I had some unvoiced doubts. What if the parents were assuming there was no way their kids could win the ring toss and that was the very reason they let them do it? Or what if a child who had failed to win would be uninterested in an unearned prize? But we went ahead and watched as the first person I’d seen win the ring toss all week did so. We watched the next contestant, a girl who was probably around seven years old. She did not win. When Sara asked her dad if his daughter could have the duck, he was very grateful and the girl flashed an enormous gap-toothed smile and said, “Thank you so much!” So that worked out well.

At Funland, Sara, Dave, and Lily-Mei rode the Viking ship while my kids rode the Paratrooper, a fast-moving, direction-switching Ferris Wheel. (Beth had peeled off to play Skee ball and my mom had headed home.) Then Noah went home and the remaining five of us went in the Haunted Mansion. We all tried to make funny faces when the camera for the souvenir photo went off. After all these years, I’m still not exactly sure where it is, so I had to do it several times before I saw the flash. The pictures turned out well. Sara and I went home after that, leaving Dave, North, and Lily-Mei to ride more rides.

One thing we didn’t do on Thursday is attend a Good Trouble rally, even though there was one in Lewes, which is just north of Rehoboth. I had thought it might be nice to go to a protest all together as Mom and Sara’s family are no strangers to them, but by the time I started thinking seriously about it, the week had filled up with planned activities and I didn’t want to try to reorganize the schedule to fit in one more thing. I have some mild regret about this, as I haven’t been to a protest now in over a month.

Speaking of politics, over the course of the week I noticed that the t-shirt shops all over town that have been carrying copious pro- and anti-Trump merchandise every summer since the 2016 election, suddenly had almost no shirts with political messages. I am not sure what to make of it, but it reminds me of how the Trump signs mostly disappeared from the red counties of western Maryland, western Pennsylvania, and Ohio between our drive in February to take North to school and the drive in May to bring them home.

Friday

Friday was such a busy day, I barely made it to the beach. In the morning North and I went to Café a Go-Go which we had not yet patronized together. We got drinks and split a slice of tres leches cake.

When I got home, I ran errands with Sara and Lily-Mei. We picked up another dress that Lily-Mei had her eye on for much of the week and had finally decided to buy with her own money. It was a shiny, silver sleeveless gown. It looked like something you might wear to the prom, but she was planning to wear it to my mom’s birthday dinner and the next school dance she attends.

Speaking of my mom’s birthday, the next two errands were to pick up her cake from the bakery and some ice cream from a convenience store. The cake was lemon with vanilla frosting and raspberry filling.

Once I got home, I took off again with my kids for a pizza lunch at Grotto’s. We would not be having our normal Friday night pizza, so we did lunch instead. Then we met up with Sara and Beth so Noah could take a picture of Beth, Sara, North, and me (the four Obies in the group) in front of the sign for a restaurant that’s called Obie’s by the Sea.

We came home, ate cake, and mom opened her presents. In addition to the gift certificate, she got jewelry and a diamond shaped piece of glass with pressed flowers inside to hang in a window. She seemed pleased with everything.

Next, Sara drove Mom to the bookstore to pick out some books while North and I made the briefest trip to the beach yet. We only swam twenty minutes, but the jellyfish were still there, so I didn’t mind the abbreviated swim much. Sara had asked Beth earlier if she thought North and I might prefer the Delaware Bay since Beth had not seen any jellyfish while kayaking there, and she said, “I will answer for my wife. No.” It’s true. I like swimming in bays fine, but it’s not the ocean. Nothing else is and I am not the ocean’s fair-weather friend. And, as I learned later, the bay is full of jellyfish this month, too.

We headed back to the house, showered, and went to my mom’s birthday dinner at a Japanese restaurant. We decided to take just one car because parking in Rehoboth is challenging. Beth, Noah, and I walked. (Between walking to coffee, lunch, the beach, and dinner, I ended up with over 20,000 steps that day.)

The restaurant is one we’ve been to as a group a few times before and a hit with our hard-to-accommodate crew. Mom got the seafood pasta she often gets. I got seaweed salad, edamame with Old Bay, and vegetable tempura. It was delicious as usual.

That night everyone but Beth and me (the early birds) went to a drag show at the same bar where they’d previously been to trivia night and karaoke. Mom had never been to a drag show, and she enjoyed it, especially when one of the drag queens asked if anyone had a birthday and she got to go up on stage and dance and collect money from patrons of the bar. She said it was “the greatest birthday ever.”

Saturday

We packed up the house in the morning. It was a little more stressful for me than usual because I’d slept poorly and being tired made our many belongings all over the house and every little decision about what food to try to fit in the cooler, what to throw out, and what to pawn off on someone else feel overwhelming. Beth and Noah drove to the realty to return the keys and everyone else lingered on the porch for a while to say our goodbyes after the house was locked. The West Coast relatives were headed to Philadelphia where everyone except Sara would be getting on a flight back to California. Sara is staying on the East Coast for another week, to visit my cousin Holly in northeast Pennsylvania.

My family didn’t leave right away though. We rarely do. Beth and Noah got cold beverages and found a shady place to read while North and I paid a visit to the beach. I finally got the idea to wear a long-sleeved t-shirt in the water to protect my arms from jellyfish stings. North’s suit, which only exposes their hands, feet, and lower calves had protected them relatively well all week. They had almost no stings. It worked, though my legs still got some bad stings behind each knee. We ended up exiting the water after less than a half hour, even though it was our last chance to swim in the ocean until next summer and the waves were a little bigger than they’d been most of the week. North spotted a dolphin for the first time that week, so that was nice.

North and I split up briefly. I took a short walk on the boardwalk and then popped into the tea and spice shop to stock up on my favorite teas and North got a takeout order of grilled cheese and fries for lunch. We all met up at the crepes stand, Noah bearing more fries, and we got crepes and orangeade. Even though I was sad to leave the beach (as always), sitting in the shade after a swim, eating our traditional last-day-at-the-beach lunch with my little family of four, I felt the stress of the morning packing rush melt away.

We made one last trip to the beach to put our feet in the water and got our last frozen custard. Soon we would hit the road (with a quick stop at a Crocs outlet) for a relatively traffic-free, intermittently rainy drive that would turn into challengingly heavy rain at the end. Back at home, two affectionate cats, many new blooms in the garden, a day of post-beach chores, and the rest of the summer awaited us.

Red, White, and Blue

Posted on July 11, 2025 by Steph

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We had a quiet few weeks after No Kings. We didn’t go to any protests, though I wrote a couple batches of postcards encouraging people in Florida whose vote-by-mail enrollment had expired to re-enroll. North quit their canvassing job, which ended up being too physically strenuous, and started a new one at a day camp in D.C. It’s an afternoon program at a Montessori school that has academic classes in the morning throughout the summer. North’s working from noon to sixish most days.

They had a week off between jobs (the last week of June) and during that week we had a heat wave, with several consecutive days of highs at or near 100 degrees. They were happy to be home and not out walking door to door talking to people about microplastics. (It’s still hot now, but more regular summer hot.) During their week off they made cookies and read Fun Home, which seemed like an excellent use of leisure time to me. Fun Home will be performed at Oberlin next winter and they are thinking of auditioning. The following week North started the camp job and Noah finished up the video editing job for a solar energy company he’d been doing on and off for over a month.

North had a four-day weekend after their first week at their new job, so Beth and I took the same days off so we could better pack a lot of fun activities (and some chores) into the Fourth of July weekend. This plan took a little determination for a couple reasons. After all, I have been feeling more red with anger, white with fear, and blue with sadness than filled with patriotism these days. And I have been sick for almost two weeks, never intensely so (and most of my symptoms are gone now), but I still have this worrying sore throat that just won’t go away or rather has gone away and come back more times than I can count.

White: Long Weekend and Beyond, Fence

First the big chore… last April and May, after we were cited by the city for peeling paint on our picket fence, Beth, Noah, and I painted it, or rather the side of it that faces the street. We have a corner lot, so it’s a long fence and once the most visible part was finished, we kind of lost interest in the project and hoped no one would notice the side facing our house wasn’t painted yet. We did intend to finish the job, but on our own timetable.

Well, we were cited again, so we picked it back up and throughout the long weekend between excursions, we were working on it. The kids were power washing it and I was treating the part they washed with a vinegar solution to retard algae, and Beth, who worked on it longer than anyone else, was painting. The following week, we all took turns painting and we finished it this afternoon.

Red, White, and Blue: Thursday, Smithsonian Folklife Festival

Onto the recreational activities… this year I had some reservations about taking our almost-annual family photos with everyone dressed in red, white, and blue in front of the Washington Monument we’ve been taking since Noah was two months old. But as authoritarianism encroaches, I don’t want to cede the symbols of patriotism or its substance, so we went ahead with it.

In addition to taking the picture, we were also on the mall to attend the Smithsonian Folklife Festival. The theme was Youth and the Future of Culture. The festival varies in size from year to year, but it seemed smaller than usual, in terms of displays and performances. At only six days, it was also on the short side.

One of the first things we saw was a colorfully painted board with little doors depicting slang terms from different decades you could flip to see definitions on reverse side. I was surprised to learn “moxie” had its heyday in the 1940s, as I would still use it. When we saw “scrub,” (90s) Beth said she knew what that meant because there was a song about it and I deadpanned, “A scrub is a guy that won’t get no love from me,” which made her laugh. From the current decade, there was “rizz,” which I do know, but probably wouldn’t use for fear of sounding like a middle-aged mom who is trying too hard.

We watched a skateboarding demonstration. Not everyone skating could be said to be a youth, as the oldest one looked like 40-something dad and maybe he was. He was wearing a t-shirt that said on the back he’d skated 47 miles to raise money for a rare disease (I forget its name). On the front was a photo of a small child and the words, “Never give up.” I wondered if it was his child and if the child had the disease. The youngest skater was a tween girl who was having trouble with one of her tricks. When she finally nailed it, she lit up and said, “I did it!” It was more charming than if everyone had executed every move perfectly.

Next, we looked at low-rider cars and then went to see two bands (a youth mariachi band and a group of young black percussionists) play together. They were practicing for weekend performances and considering it was their first time playing together, they sounded quite good. Among other pieces, they played a medley of songs from Carmen. Everyone but me got agua fresca to sip while we listened. It’s always inspiring to watch young people do something well. And of course, I have a soft spot for young percussionists.

The food offerings weren’t that tempting. We considered the vegetarian tacos, but Beth said if we were going to get overpriced Mexican food, we should go home and get San Pancho, which we did, followed by ice cream from Red Hound. It was nice to eat at the outside tables on a pretty evening, but I was starting to feel my energy ebb. I’d been under the weather for several days at that point and it was starting to catch up with me.

Red, White, and Blue: Friday, Fourth of July

We attended Takoma Park’s quirky little parade in the morning. We used to go almost every year, but between cancellations for covid in 2020 and 2021 and various people’s travel the next three years, we hadn’t been all together since 2019, so that was fun. On our way there, as we walking past the groups lining up for the parade, we saw Noah’s sometimes boss Mike and his family getting ready to march in a “Dance Against DOGE” contingent. Mike had his sound system on wheels; it was the same one he brought to Takoma Pride.

The parade was much the same as always—swim teams, dogs from an obedience school, Cub Scouts, bagpipes, Japanese and Caribbean drums, politicians (including Jamie Raskin handing out copies of the Constitution), people in papier mâché animal costumes, and whimsical floats of various sorts, but what really spoke to me was the woman in the Wonder Woman costume carrying a sign that said, “Evil Wins When Good People Do Nothing.” We stopped at an ice cream truck for something cold to fortify us for the walk home. Ice cream before lunch is one of our Fourth of July traditions.

After the parade, North made homemade pizza for lunch. We’d had a dinner dilemma because we always have pizza for dinner on Fridays, but we have variations on the same picnic dinner every Fourth of July and this year the Fourth was on a Friday. So, a pizza lunch was how we resolved it.

We worked on the fence in the afternoon, and we had the picnic dinner in the back yard. Everyone pitched in—North shucked corn and made sour cherry sauce for ice cream, Noah sliced watermelon, I made devilled eggs, and Beth cooked the hot dogs, cleared off, washed, and set the patio table with all the aforementioned food, plus cole slaw and baked beans.

We planned to watch the D.C. fireworks from the roof of Beth’s office building, which we’ve done a couple times before, but as we were eating our dinner, I decided I was just too wiped out, so everyone else went without me. I heard later that it was a nice display, but there was a malfunction of the fireworks that were supposed to spell out USA, with the letters tilted as if falling over or superimposed over each other. That seemed a little on the nose.

Blue: Saturday, Berry Picking

Saturday afternoon, after working on the fence, we went berry picking at Butler’s, our usual berrying destination. We got four quarts of blueberries and two quarts of blackberries. We picked two varieties of blueberries, one of which was supposed to be sweeter and the other tarter. I thought I could tell the difference, but North said they tasted the same.

There were only three other people on the wagon that took us to the blueberry fields, not many people picking and no kids, so Noah said he was afraid no one would instruct anyone else to only pick the blue berries and without hearing that it wouldn’t be a proper berry picking trip. But soon after that, a family with kids arrived and almost immediately we heard what color berries we were supposed to be picking. The funniest thing we heard was a mom telling the wagon driver that her small son didn’t want to pick berries, just to ride back and forth on the wagon, and would that be okay?

I found a robin’s nest with three eggs in it hidden in the blackberry canes. I hoped it was not abandoned, that the mother was laying low during berry picking hours and would return in the evening and that the weather was warm enough that the eggs would still hatch, but who knows? After the second mourning dove nest on our porch this spring failed (I can’t remember if I wrote about that, but the babies disappeared soon after hatching) and the harrowing death of the starling nestlings last month, I need to believe they had a chance. Please don’t correct me if you are wise in the ways of robins. We got ice cream and a doughnut at the snack bar and then picked up produce, cheese, and more treats at the farm market and our trip to Butler’s was complete.

We watched the first two-thirds of The Secret World of Arriety that night, but I was too tired to finish it.

Red: Sunday, Urgent Care

Sunday, still sick, I finally broke down and made an appointment at urgent care. I was tested for covid, flu, and strep. (I had already tested negative for covid several days earlier at home.) I was seen quickly, which is why it was surprising that I ended up spending two and a half hours there, mostly waiting for the second provider after the first one administered the tests. I never did find out why it took so long, it didn’t seem very busy when I arrived or left, but maybe it was busy while I was sequestered in an exam room for hours with not much to do. That was on me. I considered bringing my laptop, my book club book, and/or the newspaper and I was sure I’d stashed the paper in my bag, but when I opened it, I found I had not. So, I paced and sat and looked at my phone and listened to podcasts and sometimes paced while listening to podcasts. Beth had driven me there and was waiting at a nearby Starbucks, so I was also sorry to have taken such a big chunk of her day.

Anyway, I tested negative for covid, flu, and strep, and based on physical exam and questions I didn’t seem to have a sinus infection or pneumonia either. I walked out with no clue what I did have and two prescriptions I didn’t intend to fill because they were for symptoms that had nearly abated (congestion and cough). So far, it’s a mystery with no solution, just red herrings.

Afterward

Those of us with jobs went back to work and everyone continued painting the fence and Noah pruned some tree branches that were in the way of painting. The first sunflower in our garden bloomed on Monday, followed by the first zinnia on Tuesday, and the second sunflower on Thursday.

After exchanging several messages with my primary care provider, I went into the office for another strep test on Thursday. The culture is supposed to be more accurate than the rapid strep test, but I won’t get the results until next week. I don’t even feel that sick beyond the sore throat, so under normal circumstances, I probably would have decided to ride it out and skip the second strep test. The only reason I went to urgent care is that I am going to see extended family soon, including my almost eighty-two-year-old mother and I thought it would be good to know, though as it turns out I will find after I see her, so the information will be less useful than it could be.

One more thing happened I want to mention. On Wednesday morning, ICE agents seized several people off my street, just a ten-minute walk from my house. I don’t know for sure, but given that there’s ongoing roadwork in that area, I’m guessing it was the road workers. I walked by the next day on my way to the Metro and noticed all the workers I could see were either black or white and, in our area, that’s not the normal demographic for work crews. It should have been a mix of black, white, and Latino guys. I don’t know what became of them, if they were released, or sent to detention facilities domestic or foreign. I don’t know if they left families behind. I do know I am not feeling very proud to be an American today.

All For The Love Of You

A Chronicle of Suburban Lesbian Family Life

Category Archives: Resistance

Every Phase of Us

A Very Nice Birthday

A Scary World

#FallBreak

All’s Well That Ends Well

Seven For September

Last Two Weeks

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The Seaside Reminds You

Red, White, and Blue