Brown Bag in Burlington Vermont

Methodist Church, Shady NY

View from Fashion Avenue, Kingston, NY

Does it Bring You Joy?

What are the things you save? Over years, decades?  A current trend, Kon Mari, amasses believers who wish to “declutter”. The simple directive that will resolve your organizational chaos may be contained in the answer to the zen question you must say out loud as you hold each “thing” in your hand and ask...
“Does it bring me joy?”

“If you answer yes, you keep the item. If you hesitate or say no, you donate it or throw it out. It’s simple, it’s brilliant, and it’s something that's completely intuitive. You can spend a lot of time justifying how something might at some point be useful to you and therefore decide to keep it, but whether something brings you joy is an emotional question and one that can be answered almost instantly: If you feel joy or if you don’t feel joy: there's no need to make it more complicated than that.” Nataly Kogan, Living Happier blog

But...wait!  Is it that simple?

So what if I’ve saved that grass skirt, shoved in a plastic bag, nestled next to the 1980’s metallic silver rayon dickie (did I really ever wear that), at the bottom of the plastic bin, I think as I begin my journey into Kon Mari?

Does it bring me joy? Kind of, it does. And those darn doilies (someone spent so much time making them, how can I put them in the bag to Good Will?) or even that slinky, silky peach colored 1930’s negligee with matching tap pants, trimmed with fine lace and so slinky the seams would surely burst in abject disbelief were I to attempt to put one arm or leg in it. 

But that grass skirt, that green papery, rustle-y skirt, brought me joy that night of the “Once in Blue Moon Luau” event.  I’d conceived and planned and thrown myself and everyone around me into a tizzy  about the fundraiser for month and weeks and the days leading up to it. I close my eyes and still see the four Hula dancers who arrived in a green Subaru from Newburgh. Who ducked into the bathrooms to change clothes, coming out with skimpy tops and bare midriffs and flowered headbands and tropical flowered sarongs, with grass skirts over them.  I see the Polynesian food spread out and fragrant on the long tables under the tent. Remember how I’d had to talk David from the Little Bear into making the food for the event.  “We are Chinese, I don’t know Polynesian, don’t do Polynesian.”  He’d seemed insulted by my request. “But your food is all so good!  What about just the spare ribs, then some rice – just make the fried rice, and some other dish.  Can’t you just go heavy on the sweet ‘n sour sauce and call it Polynesian?  Please?”  I was secretly smitten with David, his handsome smooth features and sexy smile, his warm handshake.  He was always crisp in a pale blue or yellow oxford button down shirt, lean in his slacks,  a slight clean citrus scent as he greeted his customers with a smile and a “right this way please”.  We’d seen him countless Friday nights with our appetites craving the succulent shrimp dishes, the spicy sauces, the perfect, crisp vegetables that were unfailingly scrumptious every single time. David, who greeted and seated and said good bye when we left, was in contrast to our favorite waiter, who I called Humphrey Bogart, due to his pencil thin size and ever present slight scowl and brief nods.  David had given in to my begging about the catering job, with a hint of a small smile in his eyes. “Okay, okay,  I’ll do it, but only for you; don’t tell anybody, ruin my reputation.  Phht – Polynesian.” Our group, who’d worked so hard to pull off the event had eaten fried rice and spareribs for endless days afterwards, there was so much left over. 

That simple, dark green papery skirt that I’d worn over my Van Gogh Starry Night rayon slinky dress,  recalled the Tiki huts we constructed, the large plywood board with two cut-outs atop the sailor and the hula girl images Richard and I had painted for guests to have their photos taken. We had a Tiki bar, with a blue drink concoction that Julia invented, a Tattoo hut (removable of course), colorful leis for ecery guest, and the Beach Boys music blaring before and after the Hula girls Dance segment and leading us in a hula line dance. 

A hazy memory of me creeps forward, me swinging like a monkey around the poles of the tent at the end of the night when our cleanup crew was wrung out and sprawled in the folding chairs. That following Monday at the office, when young Hallsworth told me that he kept playing back in his mind how damn tired he was  at the end of that night and how had I gained more energy at the end of the evening, frenziedly dancing to the Beach boys “Surfin Safari” and “Surfin’ USA?”

Was it a success? Hell, no.  Turned out that the Blue Moon brought a heavy downpour a half hour before the event, then became a steady, soft rain that made the colored lights glow like traffic lights on a rainy avenue, but also made it a bit spongy underfoot.  By the time it turned to a gentle Irish mist, it was probably too late for guests to step out for the night. The hordes did not break down the freshly bushwhacked trail to that enchanting space by the Tannery Brook. The lights glowed, the people dribbled in, and all who came said it was breathtaking, exquisite, amazing what we’d created with the space. One of our board members said “I wish more people could see this.”  Yeah, me too.  But we lost money and the grass skirt got stashed away.

And David, that dear, sweet man, collapsed in the office of his daughter’s elementary school one afternoon the following year and was pronounced dead.  He was forty seven. Does that grass skirt bring me joy?  Oh yes.  

Writing on the Wall

I have a friend who writes on her bedroom wall. Her bedroom for this winter is the smallest in her house, used sometimes as her creative space, and so chosen for winter sleeping, because it costs less to heat. 

She says when she is getting tired reading, before she turns out the lights, when she is already in that noddy, sleepy state, when the head begins to drop, then snaps up wakeful and surprised, she says that the thoughts and poems and words she has written there carefully, in her small neat hand, in pencil, resemble lines like cracks in a sidewalk, or marbling in a tile floor.  Or ancient words on the walls of a cave.  She likes the look of it.

She knows she can tell me these things, but would not tell others.  “People would think I’ve lost it!”

I nod as we walk.  I am intrigued by her sincere revelation.  I think it is a brave, and only very slightly, screwy thing to do. I know her as a kind, patient, gentle soul who reflects deeply on matters at hand and human interactions.  She processes slowly, she has told me.  She likes to watch movies at least twice, and re-reads books for the same reasons.  “I get something new out of it the second time, something I missed when I first saw it or watched it.” She’s careful, thrifty, compassionate.  Introverted, her quiet presence can erupt in a loud laugh, head thrown back, at a funny story or a random one-liner.  I can make her laugh and I like to do it, like the see the zaniness that lies beneath the surface of the quietness.

My friend is not a person given to mindless neglect of property or possessions.  This nocturnal activity seems at odds with the person who lines her trunk, so as not to get it dirty, has a small rug on top of her car mat for the same reason.  She is meticulous and detail oriented; likes to make plans, but has been known to badger herself into spontaneity when an opportunity knocks.   Yet I think about the freedom that one would need to possess to write on their bedroom wall late at night, by lamplight.  It is freedom itself, to feel that freedom.

Ides of March

It was a breezy, cool-ish June afternoon in 2012, with a bonfire crackling in the side yard and smoke blowing every which way. I arrived at June and Dean’s for the memorial gathering and spotted Janice and her brother Wesley and lovely Linda, and the older woman Aila who used to volunteer to work on the archives donated from Alf the town historian, when we all worked together at the Guild.

June’s small fluffy dog Snickers, acquired not too long ago from the spca, romped around the woodsy yard, with obvious grand pride in his newly acquired digs. Dean went inside and came back out with a tribute tray of Dana's favorite beverages: a pitcher of Margaritas, and a bottle of Prosecco...we chose our favorites.  We toasted solemnly and clinked glasses.  Lovely Linda told of the last time she and I and Dana had gone to the Mexican restaurant for dinner and imbibed Margaritas, and upon leaving, I’d had to help both of them to the small red car, because of their respective dizziness and balance issues.  She made it sound festive and funny and there were a few chuckles around the fire.

June mentioned she'd put some sacrificial type offerings in the fire earlier (I hadn’t thought of that).  Then Janice reached for her purse and came out with a tiny Swiss flag on a toothpick, along with a picture of she and Dana, at the Matterhorn. She tossed both into the fire, not saying anything else about it.  She had traveled with Dana to Switzerland two years before, when Dana was still hiking and making her annual trek to Zermatt, a pilgrimage she’d continued for at least twenty years after her husband Malcolm died many years before. 

Other friends arrived: Rowena and Tom, Lawrence, Darlene, and an unknown gent with dark glasses, though it seemed way too late in the day for dark glasses and we were in the woods, so to speak.  And Ardith. Although it was cool enough for us all to don gloves and stand with arms folded over our collective chests, Ardith somehow was comfortable with no jacket at all, and her black curly wet hair – ah, youth. 

We stood (or alternately kept moving in circles) around the bonfire with our drinks, trying to avoid ingesting the smoke, and seeming to pair off a bit to tell “Dana” stories.  I think the talk around the fire was a bit fractured. I talked with Rowena, Tom talked with Dean, Ardith and Aila sat and talked, a paradim pairing of the youngest and the oldest present; June gave Wesley a tour of her garden,  Lawrence talked with….? Was it my imagination or were there some women studiously not talking with each other?  (This is only in retrospect).

Rowena shared with me what had gone on with Dana on the last day.  She had gone to see her and the doctor was there and gave her the report (she’d been put on a list of approved people to talk with) Dana had a perforated bowel; Rowena says casually, in that frank, intense way she has, well, she did have diverticulitis, but it also could have been the chemo, and the doctor told Dana he could perform the necessary surgery, or he could “make her comfortable.”  It was her choice.  Dana said “no surgery”, knowing what the surgery involved and that it would change nothing about her cancer, but give her additional complications.  Rowena said Dana was very clear about her choice.  After that, things went pretty quickly.  Rowena had other things to say, trite stuff, old stuff, about the Guild and Dana’s choices, and her not agreeing, but I didn’t really listen, and sort of drifted away, looking for another conversation.

We all went inside to eat and folks clustered in twos and threes in the warm, cluttered rooms, sharing their individual stories about Dana.  Then, Darlene called everyone’s attention, and she read much of the obituary that had appeared in the Woodstock Times about Dana. Lawrence said nothing, but I knew she had written the piece. Dana’s close friends Suzannah, Shirley, and Barbara were not there, and I wondered why not. I felt that it was particularly hard for Linda and of course Ardith, both of whom  were very constant and present supporters for Dana in the past year, Linda going with her to her chemo treatments, Ardith taking care of Dana’s cherished cats, with those Greek names I never could remember.  

I felt when I came home, that so much was unsaid, but maybe that is just the nature of it all.  Everyone has much to say, but it is hard and bittersweet to say it, or maybe we just want to keep the memories to ourselves. We knew different parts of Dana. That's how it is with people. She had such a broad spectrum of friends, and over a goodly period of time. It seemed a bit ironic, for she was not an overtly expressive or emotional person, but yet one knew where her devotions lay. She was a loyal friend, a very loyal friend, but sometimes one did not know why. Even in her last weeks alive, there was no real connecting in a very personal way, for me, anyway.  She seemed unable to ever get very personal except if there were too many vodkas or Margaritas. 

When June and Janice and Arlene and I saw her last on her birthday, the Ides of March, we had gathered at the Thompson House, a hospice.  We popped the champagne, we had bowls of M&M’s, her favorites, and we sang Happy Birthday.  Darlene told a great story from the old days  when she’d worked with Dana at the Hudson Valley Philharmonic, which involved a famous scheduled guest conductor, a missing limo and a pair of white gloves, and Dana added a few points that she felt Arlene missed, but mostly she just smiled and nodded at the remembrance, the telling of the story.  Dana loved a good story.  She lay back in her bed, propped against the wall, wearing her Cubs hat, with the word Cubs spelled out in hieroglyphics. The Cubs, Egyptian history, Switzerland, and her little red car with the license plate ALPS, those were Dana's favorite things. Happy Birthday Dana!                                      

Irony and the DEP

Life is strung with beads of irony, for us to adorn ourselves like so many embellishments.  Some of the beads are shiny, glossy, and replete with a positive glow.  Some appear dull, unpolished, misshapen, not pleasing, with their uncanny ability to be undecipherable. Ergo, some we will display and share, some we will bury or ignore.

I would call my encounter yesterday with the DEP policeman a fine example of irony.  After I was issued the summons for trespassing, and a date when I would have to appear in court, I called the encounter maddening, irritating, insulting, and downright stupid.  And oh yeah, why must DEP cops wear dark glasses?  Is it intimidation?  Arrogance?  It’s not about the glare of the sun on a bright day, I can tell  you that.   

I was full of Sunday morning sunshine and good intent as I drove over to the reservoir, just six miles from my home.  Driving slowly across the weir, reduced to one lane for several months, I enjoyed the sparkle of the reservoir’s water, the blurred surround of mountains that loomed soft and hazy.  Seeing the water so low, and the exposed bluestone and flat concrete pieces here and there reminded me of the NY Times article Watery Graves NY Times 2002 I’d just read, when the reservoir was so low, one could view stone building foundations and drinking wells.  All belonging to the “dozen bucolic hamlets” that were submerged there in 1913.  Hundreds of houses, thousands of people, plus stores, schools, post offices, churches, cemeteries and bodies displaced.

Recently I’ve delved heavily into the history of the reservoir; specifically, the displaced people who had built their homes there, raised families and farmed there, and then were forced to leave their homelands so that New York City could improve their water supply.  As an offshoot of genealogy research into my partner’s family, I’d unearthed more and more details, read through more and more tales of that time in Ulster County.  I found myself poring over census records until 1am, dragging myself to work the next day. Last year it was my own family history that I researched until the early morning  hours.  It is etched in my being, this needing to know, this curiosity about past lives and ancestors, and the footsteps taken in so many lives that led us to be where we are today.  Some say don’t live in the past.  I don’t think I live there, but I sure like to visit.  And I like fitting the puzzle pieces together.  But my ancestors, Irish immigrants, were easier to trace in a way; they landed in Manhattan and mostly stayed there, some branching to Brooklyn or Queens at some point.  And the streets in Manhattan had names long before streets or roads existed, per se, in Ulster County. I found addresses like “back road”, or “the corners”.  But the majority enumerated" didn’t even have that.

JR’s family, as it turns out, has lived in Ulster County for several generations.  They farmed, they quarried, they lived off the land.  I became addicted to the discovery – where did they come from, and how had they ended up in West Hurley?  Glenford?   It didn’t take long to realize that they had all been among the families that were displaced when the Ashokan Reservoir, the “last of the homemade dams”, was constructed.Which leads me back to the Ashokan Reservoir yesterday morning.  There is a certain Great Great Grandfather and his wife Sarah that I can find no death record for; also, one of their sons, Phillip.  It became a matter of principle that I find Phillip especially, for more than one reason.  I’d parked in the circular drive that is provided for folks who generally do their exercise thing across the reservoir on the macadam walkway.  In warmer weather, you can be inundated with fellow walkers and joggers, cyclists, roller bladers, and gaggles of angry geese, on occasion.  But no dogs allowed.  The walk is marked every ¼ mile as you go.  The view is spectacular, but it’s boring just walking along between two fences, in my opinion.  I like the woods.

Anyway, I walked down through the woods where I like to go, passing the No Trespassing signs and notices about how they are protecting the environment as I went. I was just going to get some better shots of the res from where the old boats are laying, chained up to trees for the winter.  Maybe score some driftwood, just enjoy the quiet.  My camera crapped out on me, as I lined up the perfect shot (to replace one I’d taken from the same spot last month that had been blurry).  I sat down on an overturned row boat and decided to channel Abram and Sarah and maybe Phillip; maybe they would tell me where to find their graves? 

The water has slight movement in a reservoir, did you now that?  From where I sat, across the ground littered with bluestone chunks and smooth rocks, I watched the tiny wave ripples gently moving back and forth.  I stared at the mountains and the houses high up on the hills over in Shokan.  They would not have been there in the late 1800’s.  I spoke to Sarah, believing in some sort of Mana y Mana...where are you?  How can I find you?  Where is Phillip? 

I got cold and turned to head back which is when I spotted the DEP SUV cruising by.  I ditched my smooth driftwood (no sense adding theft to trespassing I thought, chuckling) behind a tree and kept on walking back up through the woods.  The blond, crew-cutted, sun-glassed, polite officer (who looked like a sixteen year old) got out of his car and walked over to greet me.  “Afternoon Ma’am, nice day for a walk”, was the way it started.  I found it amusing that a geezer like me could possibly be in trouble for something as innocent as walking in the woods on a sunny day.  I even told him I was taking a photo of the place where my partner’s ancestors had once lived.  He was unimpressed.  “Do you have a recreational permit?”  I do not.  The conversation escalated to seeing my driver’s license and being told to wait while he went into his car to write out a summons.  I do believe the idling of his vehicle for 10 or 15 minutes was far more damaging to the environment than my walk in the woods.  I have a court date in March.  I have an option of applying online for a recreational permit.

So my latest bead of irony entails being forbidden to walk on the very grounds that were called home to the ancestors I’m looking for.  And so far, no luck in finding Phillip.