It's Marathon Day in Boston.   Himself and I and a group of running friends monitored the course for the 5K on Saturday, and also for the "Tribute Run" which followed.  Survivors of the bombing ran or walked, were carried or wheeled around a large block near the Finish Line in Copley Square.  It was eerie to be so close to them and to the sight of the tragedy on such a beautiful, sunny, uneventful day.  Family members and friends also participated.  Some ran, and many were too overcome to do much more than cry.  The older brother of Martin Richards ran in the kids' race, intense and determined with a sadder face than any little boy should have to wear.

But today is the big day.  Himself isn't running this year, although he is taking the day off since Marathon Monday is a high holy day in the Church of the Fleet Footed.  It should be an entirely joyful day, with wishes for "good luck" flying through the air on Face Book and high fives along the route from those cheering them on, but I'm not sure it will ever be just that again.  Last year's cloud hangs heavy over Boston today.  Our vulnerability is hanging out in the open for all to see, our mortality too noisy to be ignored.  Everyone has a story.  Everyone was there or almost there or knows someone who was there.  We all know someone who was hurt by this.  I discovered that the sister of one of the victims works in my office.  But on this beautiful spring day which still feels full of hope, thirty-six thousand runners will do what I've never been able to wrap my mind around.  They will run twenty-six point two miles (and may God help you if you leave out that "point two" because I'm told that's the hardest half of the race).  Some do it for fun.  Some do it for health.  Some do it to prove they can.  This year many do it in defiance of death.  The thing is, you can't defy death.  It's going to win every time.  But I think if anything positive has come out of last year's unthinkable sadness it is that some people pay more attention to life, knowing that it could be snatched away from them or someone they love in the blinking of an eye.  Boston pride has never been stronger and Boston hearts have never been more ambivalent.  We certainly didn't choose to be the center of all this sad attention, but here we are.  That's pretty much how life works.  You do what needs doing and you move on.

My hope for today is joy and excitement among the marathoners, with a minimum amount of work for the medical volunteers to cope with.  I hope for sunshine and PRs for everyone (that's "personal record" for the uninitiated).  Enjoy the cheers and the beers.  Most of all I hope for peace and for closure (such as it is or could ever be) because we as a city and a nation need to heal and get on with this very fleeting business of life.

It's happened again.  I made a political statement on Face Book that expressed my displeasure with every single Republican voting against equal wages for women.  The firestorm has begun.

Why can't I content myself to see pictures of cute kitty cats, or the eight-hundreth four year old singing her version of Disney's "Let It Go"?  I could take a picture of my dinner or find out which character I am from "The Wizard of Oz".  I could even take a "selfie" once I learn how to use my new phone.  Why the hell did I have to let the world know I'm a liberal Democrat?  I even had the nerve to say in the (nasty) conversation that followed that I liked President Obama.  Oh boy.

Feeling obliged to check in and totally castigate me are former friends from decades ago, family members, and people I don't even know.  Why am I not allowed to have my own opinion?  They seem quite vocal about theirs.  And I can't be the only one who thinks this way because, hey, he DID get elected.  All of this is beside the point.  I should know better by now.  People prowl the pages of the internet looking for something to pounce on.  You can sense the hand-rubbing, eye-sparking glee when someone stupid (like me) falls into their trap.  They don't call it "the web" for nothing.  I am the fly and they are the spiders and they're having a ball. 

Well, my vote cancels one of their votes.  That's some comfort.  But I think I'll stick to pictures of kitties for a while until they all calm down.

After the winter that made me wonder if my husband had secretly moved us to Greenland during the night, it was lovely to see the crocuses blooming here and there on the lawn of the Federal Reserve Bank in Boston on the Summer Street side, across the street from South Station.  They aren't in big, dramatic clumps.  They are lightly scattered and most people walk by without noticing them, but they are really delightful.  Last week all the flowers were yellow, which I'm beginning to think is some "crocus hierarchy" thing, since they come up first on my lawn, too.  This week we have purple, and a few scattered white (with a hint of purple stripes).  They are as cute as anything and I'm liking them a lot.

Here amid the concrete and steel of the Fed, surrounded by  metal posts set into the sidewalk to keep trucks from driving through the windows and grabbing the money (I guess...although someone could just have really lousy taste in statuary) are these humble little patches of color, like tufts on a hand-stitched quilt.

I make a point of checking on their progress every day since I feel that anything that grows downtown needs encouragement.  I try not to talk to them aloud (people don't understand) but I do smile at them every single time I pass them.  They won't last long.  They never do.  But while they are here I intend to enjoy them.

It's been a while since I've posted because I'm working full time these days in downtown Boston.   The commute is a little weird....people tied up in their technology, and sometimes offering me a seat because of my gray hair.  I always take it, of course.  One wants to encourage that sort of behavior.  Fifteen years is a long time, and I do find it takes longer than it used to getting myself out the door, but it's rather nice having a place to go and a reason to get dressed in the morning.
And as I've remarked before, that trek over the Fort Point Channel has been NASTY on some of the colder days.

But now that winter's back is broken and the crocuses are up on my front lawn, there are stirrings of life within me, and my bleak mood is starting to lift.  I've even started running again and in a moment of insanity signed up for a five mile race in May.  My goal is to finish it without looking up into the face of an EMT giving me oxygen or a priest giving me Last Rites.
 
Meanwhile, what started as putting away a few winter things turned into dragging out the silk flowers and bedecking the house with fake jonquils and forsythia.  The fleeces are headed to their summer grave in the attic and the boots won't be far behind.  I get to re-discover which clothes I saved from last year and which ones still fit me.  The joys of a bad memory, I will be surprised by at least a third of what I find.  It's like retail therapy only cheaper.

My birds are back, the days are getting longer, and I'm THIS close to opening a window.   April.  Bring it!

A good memory is the enemy of spring cleaning.  My intentions are so good as I start picking up a week (OK...a month's) worth of this that and the other.  I'm going to pitch!  I'm going to be ruthless!  And then my hand comes up with something given to me by someone dear who has left the roster and I'm caught up in a tornado of memories and feelings.  For example, the pictures on my piano all need a good cleaning.  I need to take them all off, then take off the lace runner on which they perch and give a good dusting and polishing to the top of the instrument.  Before replacing them on the freshly laundered lace I need to clean all the glass in the frames, right?  Wrong.  On the photograph of my very handsome and muscular elder brother I notice lipstick smudges, faint, but definitely there.  My mother used to kiss this photo every day for years.  Well, thinking about that and about her doesn't help my efficiency all that much, not to mention thinking about Wayne who died in a car crash at 22.

So off I go to the bedroom to tackle the closet.  Three whole blouses and two skirts actually hit the "give away" pile before I come across the silver scarf an old boyfriend gave to me when I was 21.  It still looks wonderful, which is more than I can say for the old beau whom I saw recently.  Thank you, Lord, for answering THAT prayer with a resounding "no"!  But the scarf sets me thinking about the senior prom and whatever happened to so-and-so, and somehow a half hour disappears and I need a cup of tea.

But reaching for a clean tea cup I find two screaming blue plastic cups with  bright yellow screw-on lids and am transported back to the days of my boys' childhood.  I remember buying these in Tesco's in North Wales when the kids were about 4 and 5.  Our host, Uncle Jim,  only had Waterford glasses, and the responsibility was too much for my nerves.  Now I'm missing my "babies" and Uncle Jim (in different ways, happily) but still missing them all.  Sherry is looking better than tea right about now, and although I should chuck it all and go to the gym, I'll probably just go take a nap.

And there, in a nutshell, is why when you come to my house, you have a 50/50 chance of sticking to the kitchen floor.  Ah well.  It's almost warm enough to open the windows.  I'll open the back door, too and let the wind just blow through!

Sometimes I feel at least a hundred years older than I really am.  For example, there are the aches and pains that follow shoveling.  There have been a lot of those lately, but I'm so tired of complaining about the snow that I don't even want to go there.  Maybe if I ignore the whole topic it will go away.

Then there's the issue of violent video games, texting, and the internet in general.  I'm such a Luddite.  I drive a standard shift car and use a fountain pen when I can get my hands on one.  I don't have a "smart phone", which I guess means I have a "stupid phone" but to tell you the truth, I don't care about that either as long as one of my sons gets back to me eventually (even with a text message).  I am Sick.To.Death. of watching everyone going through life "plugged in", ignoring their company at restaurants, their children at the playground, and the rest of the universe on the subway.  I don't care if it's a cell phone, an i Pad, or an e-book, shut them off once in a while and LOOK UP, PEOPLE!  There is a WORLD out here!

But what is making me feel old at the moment (besides my creaky right knee and the twenty...OK, thirty pounds I should shed) are the current nominees for the Academy Awards.  I went to see "The Wolf of Wall Street."  Good God.  If I had known going in what I was in for I would have worn a trench coat, a hat, and sunglasses.  I never thought of myself as a prude, but come on, guys!  If I wanted to watch porn I'd rent "Debbie Does Dallas" (which was funnier than I thought it would be, but then I'm remembering my 20's and there was a lot of wine involved).  But REALLY?  I don't care if "that's the way things are in the concrete jungle".  I don't care how "accurate" it is.  I couldn't wait to get out of the theater.  Last night we tried "American Hustle" which looked like "Bambi" in comparison.  OK, I didn't follow every plot twist, but that may have been due to the odd "nap-let" when my chin starts heading for my chest, but only for a moment.  Or two.

I've resisted watching "Downton Abbey", but I'm beginning to think it's time to re-think that.  Now where's my hat and my cup of Earl Grey?

OK.  We have had enough.  Really.  I don't remember any winter as long or as nasty as this one.  Then again, I don't remember where my car keys are.  The snow is one thing, but the frigid temperatures to which we've been subjected are downright cruel.  On the other hand, if one is an observant type, and I try to be, it has been oddly intriguing to watch how this winter is different from so many others.  Here I go, back across the bridge which spans the Fort Port Channel in Boston!

Besides the winds which once or twice threatened to sweep me to a chilly death over the side, the walk has been interesting for the last few weeks.  In the middle of the REALLY cold weather, on the days when I needed blueprints to get dressed, the channel started to freeze, but in such an interesting way.  One morning after the fifth day or so of silly temperatures I noticed what looked like pale gray water lily pads forming across the surface of the channel.  There they were, like flat islands of frosted glass.  By the time I was walking home the surface of the channel looked more like the skin of a giant reptile.  The water lilies had grown exponentially and had approached one another like the pieces of an enormous puzzle.  They weren't touching yet, and the water still outlined their various shapes, and the water under the bridge was still rippling, providing somewhere for the poor seagulls to float.  By the next morning the pieces had come together and formed ridges at their boundaries.  It looked like nothing so much as a pale gray map with no country names, rather the way I would imagine a pigeon with cataracts seeing the world if only he could fly high enough.

But enough of poetry and pigeons.  This ridiculous winter needs to get over itself.  It is wearing out everyone's nerves and patience.  Mittens are getting fuzzy and tired looking, the way knits do by  February.  The grit carried in on the bottom of boots is crunching on every floor and rug, no matter how many times one tries to keep ahead of it.  And under it all there is that nagging little feeling that perhaps we have stuck a dagger into the heart of Mother Earth and she is in her death throes.
Still I know that within a few weeks the snow will melt and that first brave crocus will stick its valiant little head about the rock hard ground.  The first one is always yellow, I don't know why.
What I do know is that I shall startle the new neighbors with my hand-clapping and whoops of joy.
And maybe a dance on the lawn, but I don't want to scare them away yet.

Forty-seven years ago today my childhood came to a screeching halt. My brother, then 22 and eight months back from Viet Nam, died in a car accident in Louisiana on his way back to the base. His car hit a patch of ice as he drove on an overpass, skidded into a tree, and that was that.

This is not a plea for sympathy.  We all face these things over the years.  My other brother died of lung cancer at 42, and my niece at 19 in another car accident, and I've lost more precious friends than I want to count right this minute.  Still, there is something about the first really close death that truly slams the door on the first chapter of one's life and starts the second.

Wayne's picture is on my piano, along with several other pictures of people I miss on a daily basis.  Wait.  That's not technically true.  Some days I get so immersed in the day to day trivia of laundry and subway rides and planning what's for supper that I guiltily admit I forget to think about them.  They have just become part of the fabric of my life.  The information about my brothers, my niece, and my friends has become a statistic about me, like the color of my eyes (hazel) and the color of my hair (silver..not gray, please) and my height (about which I will just say that my head and my feet are way too close together).  But on days like this, on anniversary dates, on birthdays (theirs and mine) I get sentimental and I open the floodgates of longing.  I miss their laughs, their voices, and all the years out of which I feel cheated.  It reminds me of the times I would re-read old love letters after the messy endings of relationships in order to tear the scab off the wound, to prove my loyalty by preventing my healing.

So today, "Big Brother", although you are forever one year older than my son is now, and almost forty years younger than I am today, I send a kiss heavenward and tear the scab off once again.  When I was fourteen you became the first member of what I think of as my "advance team", and you have been my constant reminder of how fragile and precious life can be.  It sometimes makes me over-protect your nephews, or try to, but all in all that's not such a bad legacy.

With love from your forever "Baby Sister".

The door was shut for weeks.  Through the bedroom wall I could hear the deep rumbling of male voices as friends chatted through the computer, and video games and life were discussed at length until the wee hours.  When I'd poke my head in for a good night kiss I was greeted with a chorus of cheery voices, although all I could see were cartoon figures on the screen, about to be annihilated by massive weaponry.

I can't complain about the mess in the room (mine is worse), and I have yet to figure out which pile of clothes is clean and which is on its way to the laundry.  That he can keep this straight continues to amaze me.  Somewhere under the books and backpacks, magazines and Sudoku puzzles, I vaguely remember a floor.

The door is open now.  Christmas is well and truly over and Son Number Two is back at college, immersed in Physics and fencing, girls and games.  Usually there is an attempt on my part to hold back the tears until he's gone through the gate at the airport, but I lost that battle this time, sobbing as though my heart would tear in two, and feeling guilty at the same time because I'm sure it upset him and because I have a friend whose son is fighting in Afghanistan, not going back for his second semester of sophomore year in Cleveland.

I'll go into the room eventually and just wash all the piles left behind since I can't figure out which is which.   I'll take the flannel sheets off his bed and replace them with linen since the next time he is home it will be spring and time to throw open the windows.  There are plans to surprise him with a couple of new shelves on the wall and perhaps the framed pictures to which he treated himself at the Comic Con convention, an event which I thought was the creation of "The Big Bang Theory" but it turns out it's real.  Meanwhile I pat the door each time I go by and whisper a little prayer for his safety and his happiness and his future.  He is still my baby, beard and rumbling voice and all, but he is becoming so much more, and I feel as though I have launched a wonderful rocket.  I wonder where it will land.

The tree is still up and the house still decorated.  We've had the first blizzard of the year, and the weather patterns in New England (and the world) seem to be having some sort of collective nervous fit.  At the moment the wind is howling outside like some large and very angry beast, and the prospect of venturing out to get to work is daunting to say the least.  I can manage the "onion" dressing routine of layer upon layer upon layer, but I am wondering if I'll be blown off the Fort Port Channel Bridge and into the water.  I haven't had the courage yet to look at the weather report.  Ah, winter in New England.

Worst of all, I can smell the end of winter break, and Son Number Two will be off on a plane on Saturday to get back to school.  Assuming that planes are flying on Saturday.  We can usually count on a snow storm or similar "snag" each time he gets near the airport.  Last night Himself said if the planes aren't flying we will spend the weekend driving him to Cleveland.  DRIVING him to Cleveland???  Uh.  OK.  Son Number One goes back next weekend, which means another road trip to New York, but that seems so much closer than it used to.

I'm not big on New Year's resolutions, as I've mentioned before.  I try (mostly in vain) to make every day better than the last.  I have joined with some friends, however, in a competition to lose the greatest percentage of body weight by March.  Money is always such a cute motivator. 

New Year's Eve found me at a bar with Himself.  OK, we were home by 9PM, but it still felt daring and I had two cosmopolitans.  Note to self:  two is the ABSOLUTE limit.  Somewhere near the bottom of the second glass I started getting some wonderful ideas about becoming a motivational speaker for middle school students and I was pretty excited about it.  I think I still am.  It certainly makes more sense than selling sequin-bedazzled sweaters at the mall.  The year is still in front of me like a freshly opened box of Crayola crayons, all pointy and tidy and bursting with promise.  Somewhere around June I seem to be peeling back the wrapper on a broken nub to get the rounded end to make a mark on the paper, and where does that "thing" come from that makes them scratchy?  You know, that invisible piece of whatever it is that feels like a tiny shard of glass?  But for right now, it's game on.  Bring it, 2014.  I've reached the age of "Hey, why not?" and you're in trouble now!

As usual, Christmas came and went and we all survived.  It wasn't the Hallmark Movie of the Week, and "the perfect life-changing present" (which doesn't exist) wasn't under the tree, but it was lovely in its own, quiet, and ever-changing way.  One sister and her husband and daughter and her friend made it for Christmas Eve and brought meatballs and cookies (two different dishes, you'll be relieved to hear).  The other sister has grown fearful of traveling in the dark and didn't feel brave enough to venture forth, and while I understand and sympathize with that, it also made me a little sad.  Nothing stays the same.  I have to keep reminding myself that it's not supposed to.

The presents from the boys were thoughtful and whimsical and required no help from Mom and Dad except for transportation to the mall.  Son Number One gave me a tee shirt which reads "Vassar College  - undefeated since 1861" and there's a football on it.  Well the school was all girls until 1969 and there never has been a football team, and I thought it was very funny.  He also gave me a book on how to make money from writing my blog.  A certain celebrity on the west coast will read that line and rub her hands in glee and shout "See!  I told you!" but we'll talk later, Susan.
Son Number Two gave me a New York Times Crossword a Day calendar and I'm really looking forward to using it.  I love crosswords, but never make time for them.  He also gave me a tee shirt.  This one is flaming red with the Wonder Woman logo on the front.  I've already worn it to work, prompting some rather interesting comments.

It's still hard to think of all the missing friends and family who have been here in years gone by.  An ornament recalls a face or a time, a picture on the piano grabs my eye, and my heart gives the same kind of twinge I'm getting used to from my knees, except it hurts more.  But, as with the knees, I acknowledge it, suck it up, and move on.  Nobody wants to hear about my aches.  As they say about the Virgin Mary, "I ponder all these things in my heart."

Himself is a gift all on his own.  In addition to Herculean struggles at cleaning the house in preparation for company, he has continued to toil away at bringing order to chaos in the days that have followed. It has been a trip down Memory Lane as his archeological dig has unearthed bits and pieces from the past that I have long forgotten.  I'm beginning to think there might actually be a cozy home under all the piles, and that might be the greatest present of all, along with the purchase for at least the tenth year in a row of "The Writer's Market", which assures me that he still believes in my dream.  Some years the binding is never cracked.  Other years there is a tentative dive into certain sections to see what the possibilities are.  But as Father Hugh used to say, back in the day when I thought I'd be alone and misunderstood forever, "The groundwork doesn't show until one day...."

So here's to Christmas miracles and Hallmark moments and learning to "go with the flow", which reminds me of another famous Father Hugh quote: "Don't push the river, kid.  It flows by itself."  I am only beginning to learn at 61 how much courage it takes to get on the raft and enjoy the ride.

We are now in full panic mode.  Not only are presents not all bought, several have not been thought of yet.  I spent all day yesterday driving to New York with a friend to pick up Son Number One (who proceeded to spend the night at a friend's house after I killed myself to get his sheets laundered and on the bed).  I'm working until 10 tonight and until 7:30 tomorrow.  The tree is neither bought nor up, and all in all my tummy is in knots. Ho, bleeping ho, ho.

It's not supposed to be this hard.  Where is the egg nog in front of the fire?  Where are the quiet moments watching old movies?  I feel like the man in the Stephen Leacock book who "jumped on his horse and rode off rapidly in all directions."  Christmas is running away with me.  Some of my friends start their preparations in August.  I hate them.  They have been wrapped for weeks and all they have to do now is go to the parties, or sit on a bench at the mall and laugh at everyone else.  Much as I love them, I've created a special circle in hell just for them.  They will pay.

Meanwhile there is a funeral this morning (not mine) and first things first.  It's a terrible time of year to lose a loved one, and my heart aches for the family.  I am a horrible human being, however, and spending more time than I should wondering if we really have to go to the "afters" and if we do, how quickly can we exit so we can get something else done.  This is not what Christmas is supposed to be.  This is not how we are supposed to live.  Yet every year I seem to get caught up in the Christmas Tornado.  Unfortunately, mine seems to land my tired posterior in Kansas more often than in Oz.

It's the morning after the first major snowstorm of the season in New England.  Luckily, it's Sunday, so most people have the luxury of being off the roads, which will give the towns the ability to have the roads in passable shape before very long.  What would paralyze Washington, D.C. for a week we turn around in hours.  Normally I do not like to awaken to the sound of heavy machinery, but after a storm the scrape of the plow blade outside my window is welcome music and somehow cozy.

Christmas shoppers are likely having fits at the inconvenience, but I am perfectly happy to sit here at nearly ten in the morning and contemplate what kind of eggs I feel like making.  There will be a fire in the fireplace soon because on most days we are never home to enjoy it.  Today Mother Nature has decreed that it really is time to do the decorating and list making and cocoa sipping.  No one is expecting me anywhere until four this afternoon when I will face the throngs at the mall, but as a salesperson, not a shopper.  My shopping is far from done, but I'll figure it out later.

Meanwhile, the wooden nativity set is on the mantle, and the stockings are hung.  The garlands are at least as far as the living room (although they are still in trash bags) and somewhere in here I just KNOW there is a vacuum cleaner head.  If not, I'll get the broom and worry about that later.  The coffee is perking in the kitchen, Himself gave me a good morning kiss to curl my toes, and my heart is getting ready to welcome the boys home this week.

Word came yesterday of the health problems of some very dear friends.  Monday will mean a trip to visit the hospital instead of to the store to buy what nobody needs.  People are what matter, and not just at Christmas.  My friends are all amazing, and I refer to them as my "F.B.C." or "Family By Choice".  Sometimes it takes a snowy day, some enforced "down time", and a bit of scary news to remind me of that.  I raise my cup of cocoa to you all.  Blessings on you!

The End of the World is coming, or as we call it in New England, "snow", and as usual the timing is less than optimal.  I haven't finished shopping, the Thanksgiving decorations aren't quite down, there is nothing Christmas-y up, and the toll of four jobs is wearing me out.  My fa-la-la could use a tuneup. 

I am finding myself nostalgic for all the missing faces this week.  I miss the people I love who have died this year.  I miss having little kids in the house (although I adore my big college hunks).  My Weight Watchers meeting wasn't a big spirit booster this morning, either.  And there is the ever present question: "Where the heck to begin????"  I'm hoping that shoveling some of the stuff out of the living room and putting up the creche on the mantel will make me feel a little more in touch with the season.  Assuming I can get to it at the back of my closet through the mountain of shoes and unidentifiable piles of stuff.  I long for order in my life, but that takes time and time seems to be the one thing out of which I find myself.  OK..I still enjoy the challenge of not ending the sentence with a preposition, but outside of that, I'm in a pretty pissy mood.

So it's off to find the outdoor lights and to put them up in 20 degree weather.  The boys will arrive this week, which always makes my heart glad.  I'm not in a dither over shopping this year, either.  I think it's time to down-scale that whole side of this holiday.  The greed and frenzy that precedes this celebration of the birth of the Son of God who never watched (or missed) a TV ad continues to confuse me.  When did all That become all this?

I just want to be together with my family and friends and still stay within my Weight Watchers Points Plus target.  Now THAT would be a Christmas miracle.

(And yes, one of the four jobs is as Mrs. Claus.)

I have "people rugs" today.  Every pillow in the house is being slept on except mine, and every room except the bathroom has a body in it.   Our British house guest is tucked into Son Number One's room for the week, while SNO and his two friends sleep on the floor and the couch in the den A.K.A. "The Pirate Room".   On the floor in front of the fireplace on an inflated mattress is the girlfriend of Son Number One who arrived last night.  Son Number Two is still asleep in his room, but about to be awakened to get to the airport in time for a flight back to school.  We even remembered to take the Christmas picture yesterday.  Both leaves are still in the table in the kitchen from Thanksgiving, and the dishwasher is getting a medal for work above and beyond the call of duty.  We had five loads yesterday and still aren't done.

They all leave today except for the Englishman, and the house will be quiet and haunted for a bit.  In three weeks my boys come back for more flight traumas and adventures and Christmas will be upon us.  I can't wait.

I have had no desire to go anywhere these last few days.  The mall holds no lure for me.  I am not panicking about buying stuff for Christmas.  I (and pretty much everyone else I know) have enough stuff and more.  The treasure of food, a warm house, healthy kids who feel free to invite their friends for holidays, knowing there will be chaos and mismatched plates and a warm welcome has already filled my heart to bursting.  There was an insane game of Pictionary for eight last night and laughter that shook the walls.  The idea of board games came from Son Number One, which surprised me.  For once there were no noses in computers or audio cords streaming down necks.  And when I gave up in exhaustion the game of "Lord of the Rings Risk" began and was going strong in the wee hours of the morning when I texted from upstairs to "keep it down, please".  Who needs an X-Box when you've got this?

I will start Christmas caroling tonight, which is probably a good thing since I'll need a bit of cheering up with my echoing house.  But what a privilege to be surrounded with all this wonderful noise for a few days.  My dear friend Flanagan was describing my home years ago to a mutual friend who now lives in California and hasn't met my clan except through letters and photos and e-mails.  He told her "If you scratch the walls in this house, the love oozes out."   Martha Stewart, eat your heart out!

I've been up since 4:30 this morning listening to the wind howl.  Son Number Two is flying home for Thanksgiving this morning in the middle of rain, wind, and thunder.  I've come to expect this.  There is never a trip to or from Ohio that is not fraught with peril.  If it isn't weather it's a missed connection.  If it isn't either of those it's the flu.  One way or another, that poor kid never catches a break.

He is a charmer, really.  He has a great smile, and a kind heart.  What he has done to annoy the Powers That Be is a complete mystery to me, but somewhere along the way he must have set them off.  I have a few days off from both jobs and will spend the weekend doing singing "gigs", four Masses, two funerals, and a Christmas tree lighting between now and Tuesday.  This is fun, and my preferred way to make money, although it won't pay the mortgage yet.  The best part is that it puts me (except for the tree lighting) in a place where I can dump my problem in God's lap and hope S/He doesn't stand up.  On second thought, I can (and do) do just that no matter where I am, but you know what I mean.

I once read, and I believe, that once you have a child it's like wearing your heart on the outside of your body for the rest of your life.  The vulnerability is painful.  There isn't a blessed thing I can do to protect them anymore except pray, and I do that, but I hold my breath until they are tucked into their beds, even if it's only while passing through from one place to another.  A dear friend from Wales has arrived bringing photos and gifts and memories of my other dear friend who passed away in February and after whom we named Son Number Two.  There is a picture of SNT at the age of about four, sitting on a high stool at the counter in the kitchen in Wales and laughing hysterically at something outrageous.  I'm sure it was a fart joke.  They usually were if they got that big a laugh.  He's a physics major now and doing very well, but he still hasn't lost that sense of joy and abandon. 

So, United Airlines, you'd better take care of the Joy Boy and get him home in time for turkey because Mom needs one more thing for which to be grateful, and that will be a beaut.

OK.  I'll admit it.  I'm beginning to panic just the tiniest bit.  Thanksgiving is less than two weeks away.  A week from Monday a friend arrives from Wales for a ten day visit.  On top of the two jobs I already have, I am starting to get some caroling "gigs".  And, as usual, I am less than a step ahead of the Board of Health when it comes to the house.
Now the good news is that our town has just instituted those huge trash bins for each home, one for trash, one for recycles.  They sit in the garage for most of the week, and we fill them with the odd little bag here and there, then roll them out to the street where the massive trucks load and dump them mechanically.  Our bins are almost empty, though, and for some reason this is bugging me.

It is becoming a challenge to try to fill those babies more every week.  Somehow, if I make this into a game it becomes easier to tidy up.  My Saturday morning will be split between piles of leaves (they pick them up anytime after 7:00AM, so the game there is  "How many bags can I fill before I hear the truck?") and how much can I fit into the new bins so it doesn't feel like a total waste of time for the poor sanitary engineers to lift them onto the truck.

It's amazing what you find you can live without.  What I used to consider treasures I now look at, shrug, and pitch in total confusion.  "Huh?"  I say to myself, "Why did I hang onto THIS?"  My hopes are high for the weekend.  My only current problem is that buried somewhere in the landfill which is my home is the head of the vacuum cleaner, and that's going to slow me down until it floats to the top.

The older I get the less I want around me, although you would certainly never guess that if you saw the house.  Himself says if we ever move, we are each allowed "one prayer mat, one saffron robe, and one rice bowl" and it sounds tempting.  To each piece of memorabilia (a polite word for "junk") there is a memory attached with a steel cable.  The monologue in my head goes like this:  "God, that's ugly.  But Mom gave it to me, so I can't throw it away."  Every so often I manage to grapple with the idea that the "present" is not "Mom" so I actually CAN throw it away, although I might take a picture of it before I do.  You get the idea.  Multiplied by three hundred items at a conservative estimate, and I've got some work to do.  The fun part is once in a while I unearth something I haven't seen or thought about in years, and it's like going shopping without spending any money (which is also how I viewed my bridal registry).  So now it's off to work at both jobs before plunging head first into the piles tomorrow.  I may not be seen again until spring.

The frenzy of baseball is over for another year.  The Halloween candy (thank God) is gone.  I have gone back to Weight Watchers to face the music (the song was not pretty) and it's time to get ready for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and another New England winter.  Oh, and the first anniversary of my mother's death, which appears to be a bigger and crankier bear than I was expecting to disturb in what looked like a quiet cave.

November is not my favorite month around here and it never has been.  December has Christmas, January has the freshness of a new year, as yet unspoiled by news headlines and personal tragedies.  February ...well there's not much you can say about February in New England except it's short.  But from March through May is gorgeous with flowers and longer days and hope, and the summers are the target of vacationers from all over the world, and our autumn displays are breathtaking.  But November....November sits there with its piles of leaves gathered around its feet and it reminds me of a few "mornings after the party" which I'd rather forget.  And now there has been a whole year of being a superannuated orphan and here it is again.  I'm not ready.

I am endlessly grateful that both my sons will be home for the holiday.  Son Number One has invited two friends for the feast, and his girlfriend will arrive the day after for a visit.  We have a priest friend flying in from England for the week, which will be a treat, and although I haven't yet counted the number that will be gathered around my table, it will certainly be well over a dozen.  We have a "cozy" (real estate code for "tiny") house with one bathroom.  I'm preparing an artistic sign for the bathroom door which will read "No Printed Material Allowed Beyond This Point" since we'll have eight people and one loo for several days.  I have told my son to warn his friends that we are much closer to the Weasly home from the Harry Potter series than we are to Downton Abbey.

Amid all this cheerful chaos are the memories of missing friends and families.  There were other Thanksgivings when the "other" English priest was here, the one after whom we named Son Number Two.  And while my father-in-law will bring the world's best pies (seriously), my mother-in-law will be in her own world in the nursing home where we will visit her, but not really.  There will be too many seats at the table which will feel empty, even though every chair will have an occupant.

Still, this is part of the lessons of aging.  Learning how to let go and keep present those we love is a delicate balancing act.  I'm getting fairly good at it, what with all the practice I've had, but that doesn't mean I have to like it.  

I am as thrilled as every other Bostonian that the Red Sox won the World Series, but I will not be at the "Rolling Rally" today as it snakes its way through town making traffic even less reasonable than usual.  Crowds have never been my thing.  The bombing in April at the Marathon didn't do anything to change that feeling, but it didn't make it any worse either.  I just don't like crowds and never have.  Sports crowds in particular make me nervous.  The euphoria over "WE WON!" turns some people into total idiots.  And by the way, "WE" did not win.  "We" sat at a bar, or on our couches or, if we were really lucky, in a seat at Fenway Park, and cheered the Sox.  The Sox won.

If Son Number One wasn't away at school I'm sure he would be there.  His girlfriend sent me a video of him at the very moment of the last out when the Common Room erupted in shouts and my son lost his mind.  It was a wonderful video, and I have never seen a happier face.  But this is the third time in his lifetime that he has seen this.  He doesn't get it.  My father (and many, many other people) went to their graves never having seen one win.  But we have always loved the Sox anyway.  Even (and maybe especially) when they were at the bottom of the barrel.  Opening Day at Fenway there were two jokes every year.  One: "There'll be no beer at Fenway this year because the Sox lost the Opener" and two, to be said as you were getting off the train to walk the block to the park before the game: "Wait 'til next year!"  We were fans, and as loving as the mother of the ugliest baby ever born.

But hooray for the Red Sox, whom I always love (is there a "Koji" doll available somewhere?) and for Big Papi, who could run for mayor of Boston and win, although he is not allowed to run for President.  It has been a wonderful season and a lot of fun.  And we are all looking forward to an extra hour's sleep this weekend because after last week, boy, do we need it!

Not every walk to work over the Fort Point Channel is a festival of brightly painted pianos and fascinating tourists.    Frequently I see homeless people sleeping on the benches that line the banks of the Channel.  There has been an art display on since spring which has put 17 extra and very artistic benches on the sides of the Channel, but the benches most people choose are the sturdy metal ones that have been there for a while. 
By the time I walk by in the morning most of the benches are empty, but often there will be what appears to be a pile of blankets on a bench.  Many of the people (the "lucky ones") have the thick scratchy blankets used by moving companies.  Some rest their heads on backpacks for pillows.  Some tie their shoes to their ankles so they can rest their feet without waking up permanently barefoot.  Not once in eight months has anyone asked me for spare change or the time of day.  Having survived the night they are trying to pull themselves together for the day.
The colder weather makes me worry.  There are always homeless people who will refuse to go to a shelter, like Boston's Pine Street Inn, because they are required to give up any weapons they have.  They would rather make it on their own, outside, and keep the ability to defend themselves.  They know the routine pretty well.  Saint Francis House opens with warmth and food early in the morning and gives them a caring place to be for the day.  The Boston Public Library offers shelter, too.  But as I sit here playing the game of "I won't put on the furnace until November 1" I find myself thinking of them more and more often.  Tonight we'll throw a log into the fireplace and heat the lavender scented neckwraps in the microwave.  We'll watch the Red Sox win or lose in St. Louis on our big screen television and consider it a tragedy if they don't even up the World Series.  And outside in the cold, men and women I do not know will be wondering if they will see the morning.

Every weekday morning when I come up out of the subway at South Station in Boston, there is at least a fifty-fifty chance of encountering a group of people staring at a map.  They have had their breakfasts at their hotels and are off to explore the city.  Some have just gotten off a bus or a train and are struggling to locate their hotels.  The look of awe and confusion is unmistakeable.  I just love coming to the rescue.

Long a fan of not listening to a thing my mother taught me, I talk to every stranger who will listen.  This morning I found two lovely English ladies inside the subway trying to get to the shopping district.  Upstairs was a foursome from Scotland on their way to the Freedom Trail.  While I am not so hot with maps myself, I do know my city, and can point and nod with the best of them.  What I hope I can also do is communicate my excitement at living in such an amazing place.  I do love Boston.  When Himself popped the question lo these many years ago I told him "fine".... as long as he was willing to leave New York and come back home.

New York is exciting, but it overwhelms me.  Ditto London, Paris, and a bunch of other world class cities which I have visited and found fascinating.  This is home.  The history of the place, the red bricks, the sports teams, all of it, are dearer to me than I used to realize.  And every now and then we have happy surprises like brightly painted pianos on the way to work, or AMAZING finishes to Patriots and Red Sox games on the very same night.

It's an eye-opener to be reminded that people travel to Boston from all over the world to see the sights which we take for granted.  On this Columbus Day the leaves are brilliant, the sun is shining and the air is cool.  And to top it off Son Number One will be home today for a few days of fall break.  How lucky can a girl get?  And who knows whom I'll meet on the way home?

Bears have the right idea.  As I lay in bed this morning at 6:30 in a completely darkened room, I realized that four months ago the sun would have been up for two hours already and I would be listening to the birds.  There might have been a tinge of resentment at being awake at 4:30 in the morning, but I still would have been loving the birds.  This morning not so much.  The room was cool, which might have something to do with the air conditioners still being in the windows here (ever the optimists, we) so I was enjoying the flannel sheets under the summer quilt.  Even I am not wuss enough to break out the down comforter in October.  But what did occur to me as I lay there was that it would be lovely to be a bear and sleep through the less appealing parts of the year after a gigantic pig-out in which I could, and clearly should, stuff my face with anything and everything I wanted before a long nap.  And we haven't even turned the clocks back.  And we're two months away from the shortest day of the year.   This is not going to get better soon.

It is necessary, therefore, to create our own light and joy and fun where possible.  At the moment there is an exhibit all around the City of Boston of 75 brightly and creatively painted pianos, all just sitting in public places daring you to sit down and show your stuff.  Some of the paintings are brilliant. Now I love music, but I will tell the world that I sing a whole lot better than I play piano.  I couldn't read a note of music until I was 52.  My then ten-year old Son Number Two was playing away with gusto and I stood and listened and said, "I've always wanted to be able to do that!"  He stopped playing, looked over his shoulder and said to me, "Well, you know, you're not dead yet," which I took as a challenge.  One eight-week high school evening course and eight years of private lessons later, I still feel as though someone gave me the Rosetta Stone as a birthday present.  It is so cool to make sense of all those squiggles.  So yesterday morning I made a copy of all three pages of "Bridge Over Troubled Water", slipped it into sheet protectors, and went to work.  

I left for work early, my mission in mind.  Every day I cross the Fort Port Channel on my way into my office, and I had discovered the day before that there were pianos on both sides of the bridge.  I discovered the first one when the most haunting music came out of nowhere to do gentle battle with the recorded Irish fife music from the Boston Tea Party Museum.  There, tucked around the corner on the near side of the bridge was a pretty young woman who had put down her briefcase and was causing the most delightful, lilting sounds to come forth from a brightly painted piano.  She didn't have a note in front of her.  It was all coming from her head.  I was suitably impressed.  When she had finished I applauded and asked what the gorgeous tune was.  "Oh, I was just "noodling" with something in my head," she answered.  I was in awe.

So there I was the next day, copied music in hand (because nothing stays in my head these days) and I plunked myself down at the same piano.  In copying the music I had cut off the chords from the top of two of the pages.  It took me a while to get settled.  My tote bag kept falling over.  The music kept slipping down and I had to tuck the edge of each page behind one of the brightly painted fish on the front.  Never mind.  I plowed through.  And when I finished I crossed the bridge and did it again in front of the Children's Museum. The piano there had a "Punch and Judy" theme, with a glass window in which were a Punch and a Judy doll. I was sorry to need the sheet music there, because I discovered to my child-like delight that when you hit the keys the hammers hit their strings and they moved.  Heaven.

My playing is sad, but I'm not.  I had a ball.  And I may leave for work early every day next week to find new pianos to play before (or after) work.  Maybe James Taylor....or Bill Staines.  Nothing fancy.  Maybe I'll just keep playing "Bridge Over Troubled Water" until it improves.  And now that I think of it, maybe it's just as well that I'm not a bear.

It started with cleaning a window.  Then it was four, and the curtains had to go in the wash.  Now the winter clothes are in the washing machine, the dishes are whirring in the dishwasher, and I've started reclaiming my elder son's room from the swamp for upcoming guests.  Hanging up the pile of (I think) clean clothes which he left on his bed before dashing back to college, I found two things which amazed me.  The first was that (after about half an hour) his closet still has a floor.  The second was The Red Cape.

Made from the skirt of a dress I adored and which I wish with all my heart (but not enough to exercise) would still fit me today, I cut and hand stitched this bright red wool cape, complete with cord ties.  It was originally part of a Bionic Bunny costume when Son Number One was about four years old.  It never actually got put away after that.  In a normal home the room off the kitchen would be the den.  There's a television, and DVDs, and a reasonably comfy couch.  In our home it is and has always been known as "The Pirate Room" from the days when Fisher Price cannon balls sailed across it day and (k)night.  There were castles and cannons, pirates and dragons all over the place.  These now reside in the attic waiting for the next generation.  I couldn't bear to give them away.  But there is still a coat rack in the corner of the room with a bowler hat, one of Himself's old suit coats, canes, and various other props for dress up.  If you ever need a quick costume, I am your "go to" girl.  The red cape hung on this hook for ages.  I haven't seen it in what feels like a century.

There it was, on the floor of the closet, buried under the Star Wars bath towel.  I had a vague memory of his having taken it to college with him last year for some really obscure costume, but I haven't given it much thought since them.  And here it is, like an old friend.  It heartens me that it's still part of his arsenal of "important stuff" which just doesn't get put away.  Ever.  Underneath that stubbly beard, deep voice, and swaggering gait, my baby is still in there someplace.  Hallelujah!  Like the dress that became a cape, it's all one piece.  We're all one piece.  We change and mutate, but it's still all in there, somewhere; our histories, our whimsies, our joys.  They're never really lost.  Sometimes you just have to move the Star Wars bath towel to find them.

It's not exactly a "lazy Sunday" today.  I still have a reading to do at Mass, and a house that looks as though there were no survivors in some sort of horrible grenade explosion.  The grass on the lawn could be braided, except it's too wet out there to attempt that, so mowing will have to wait for another day.  Or maybe it will be scything....  Still, after a week of doing both jobs from ten in the morning until ten at night, it is sheer heaven to sit here with my cup of tea and tap away.

It is now officially autumn, whether we like it or not.  Although after doing the research on how many Weight Watcher Points Plus are in a Dunkin Donuts pumpkin latte that is no longer one of the delights of the season for me, I'm still waiting for Harpoon's "Winter Warmer" to make its appearance on the shelves of my local "packie".  I can cope with this.

Closing out the registers at the boutique the other night, the three of us discovered our math skills were rusty at best, so in trying to figure out by what percentage we had increased our "UPT" or "units per transaction" I did the only sensible thing.  I called my Physics major in Cleveland who solved the problem in approximately twenty seconds.  It was a moment of humility and pride all at once.  I bow before the master.  I discovered a long time ago that I don't actually need to know anything.  I just have to be able to figure out whom to ask.

Tomorrow is a day off.  Neither job requires my attention.  The possibilities are making me giddy.  I was hoping to use the gift certificate for a massage, but they couldn't fit me in until next Tuesday.  Perhaps there is a "mani-pedi" in my decadent future.  More likely, I'll be up in the attic dragging down the winter clothes for a wash and getting the house ready for company which will be wending their way hither in October.  That suits me fine.  It's time for gathering in front of the fireplace with a good friend or two and a cup of cocoa (or a Winter Warmer) and taking stock of my blessings, which fortunately number much higher than the Weight Watchers Points Plus in a Dunkin Donuts pumpkin latte.

It's actually cool this morning, and although I feel as though I totally missed summer this year, I'm OK with that.  The sound of the school bus, the turning leaves, the ridiculous amount of fake foliage in my living room (it was time to put away the forsythia, I guess) make me long for pointy pencils and new composition books.  Why is September New Year for me?  I'm not even Jewish. But "Shanah Tovah" to those of you who are. 

The thought of shoveling does not excite me, but I can get more done in this weather.  Summer makes me lazy and cranky. Autumn fills me with unfounded optimism.  Possibilities seem endless.  Every day feels like a new chance to get it right.  In writing that I realize that every day is a new chance to "get it right".  Every day is New Year's.  So go out there and try to be kind to everyone you meet today.  Be their messenger/angel and see them.  Too many people are invisible; the cop on the corner, the guy at the newsstand, the signalman in the subway.  Let them know you see them.  Smile at them and wish them a great day.  Thank them for the job they do.  They will think you're nuts, but it will give you a warm, cozy feeling inside.  And on a day as cool as this, that's not a bad idea.