Next Time I Take The Canoe

So my husband and I had an appointment in downtown Denver today, about a half hour from our house according to Mapquest. When you come to Denver you find out that "everything is a half hour from everywhere else", and apparently Mapquest has bought into that too. Yes, really.

But naturally since there's traffic you have to add a good twenty minutes at bare minimum to the Mapquest directions, so it ended being about fifty minutes there. A half hour, plus traffic.

While we were in our appointment, the storm struck. A severe storm, that dropped more than two inches of rain in less than an hour. We were lucky enough (or not) to get out of our appointment at the height of the rain.  Since the truck was parked right around the corner from the entrance we decided to run for it. It was heavy rain, but it didn't look too bad. We aren't afraid of a little wet. Halfway across the lot (which was about a thirty foot stretch from door to truck) I stepped in a wash of water up to my ankles. The parking lot was flat, with no dips in the asphalt. It was just a river running across it. Three steps later and a gust of wind blew a wall of water sideways over my entire body. I couldn't have been wetter unless I had jumped in a pool.

That was the start. Out in the street it was bad, and it got worse. Traffic was bumper to bumper and half drowned. It was moving at less than 5MPH. At first it was just us and everyone else trying to survive the drumming rain. Then, someone's car overheated in the lane ahead of us. We shifted to the right and crawled on. Then, someone else's car just stalled in the middle of the street. We shifted again and crawled on.

It took us an hour and a half to make two miles, and in the last bit of those two miles, the police blocked off two of the three lanes because a huge lake had swallowed half the block. There was uprooted bushes, bricks and loads of dirt everywhere. I've seen street flooding before, or thought I had, until this. Luckily we were in the truck, but at times I was doubtful we could even make it in that.

Yes that guy is up to his knees in water.

Did I mention we still had our kids to pick up from their day camp? We were nearly an hour late, but luckily the counselors were having their weekly staff meeting and were cool with it.

Apologies for the blur, it was a camera phone and we were moving, just a bit. That's two swamped lanes of road, looking across to the house. The police blocked off this stretch.

Even after we made it on to the highway we saw a stalled semi in the middle lane, a stalled van a guy was trying to roll off to the side with help, and another two or three cars to the sides with hazards on. It was a wet war zone out there.

Thankfully we all made it home in one piece, a little waterlogged and stressed out, but otherwise safe. The flash flood warnings coming from the Weather Channel app all helpfully said DON'T DROWN. Y' think?

Anyone know how to build an ark?

And There's Gonna Be Fireworks...

I just adore fireworks. There's something about the combination of loud, booming sounds and sudden, brilliant colors against a dark sky that is just thrilling and awe-inspiring to me. I always see something different, I'm always hoping for more and bigger, and I'm always disappointed just a little when the show ends.

I've never been to a large city's fireworks show...Boston, New York, etc., although I've seen them on TV. I can appreciate the magnitude of the show and the symphony playing in time with the fireworks is an amazing thing. But it's better in person, when you're sitting on a blanket under the open sky, and dazzling blooms of fire open up right over your head.

From the time I was really small my sister and I had the luck of having a local fireworks show happen every year in the park right across the street from my grandparents' house. Every year we'd set up our blanket between the trees, staking out a great spot and rubbing in the bug repellent, and yelling with delight at each boom and flash of light. These days you need a chair, and you need to aggressively defend your stretch of sidewalk or you're liable to get a car trying to park in front of you and cut off your view. The park fills to overflowing with excited families and vendors selling garishly blinking necklaces and toys. But even these kid-attracting bits of flashing plastic pale under the extravagant colors and noise of the fireworks show. They've even started playing John Philips Sousa marches during the show now, which adds even more fun as far as I'm concerned. I love a good loud marching song, but they're odd and out of place unless you're in a big parade, or watching fireworks. Then it's so perfect I practically get goosebumps.

I haven't always been able to make it to local fireworks shows when I haven't been back East. But when I can hear the thumps of the blasts going off I'm liable to run from window to window, or out of the house into the street, looking for the colored fire in the sky.

As a teenager I spent a few Independence Days on the beach with my father and other "adults", setting off illegal fireworks. We had to be careful the police beach patrol didn't catch us in the act; one year the owner of said fireworks, (a huge amount of them too) spent weeks wiring all of them with slow match to large plywood boards. At zero hour the three boards were hustled out to the beach, just above the waterline, set down, and one end was lit. Oh the cops showed up pretty quickly alright, but what they found was a series of fireworks wired together and a bunch of cheering and hollering adults standing well back enjoying the show. No one in the act, no one to arrest.

We didn't always plan it so well. One year, absorbed with lighting off buzz-bombs (a personal favorite), my father and I were unaware of the beach patrol walking right up behind us. Oops. I had the lighting stick in my hand, and then a flashlight in my face, but they didn't arrest me ( I think I looked too young to bother with), they arrested my father right in front of me. They even slapped him in handcuffs, which was interesting to a seventeen-year-old who had never seen an arrest up close. My stepmother was not pleased at having to bail him out of jail, but my father and I giggled like idiots over it later. What we learned from that was: do not alert said beach patrol by "testing" a ginormous string of firecrackers longer than most people are tall in broad daylight before the main event. It tells them where to come looking at dusk later.

I have instilled a love of fireworks into my kids. They yell and cheer for the biggest blasts and groan with disappointment when it's over. Last year they got to sit in the same place I used to when I was a kid; across the street in grandma's yard. This year we're far from my family on the East Coast and we'll be watching the local show. But I know we'll all be doing the same thing, miles apart. Enjoying the tattooing of the evening sky with fire, celebrating our freedom.

Happy Independence Day.

Summer Sizzle

The summer solstice passed nine days ago, and yet it didn't feel like summer to me until this week, with three days that were so hot that I carried a bottle of water with me in the car just to go to the grocery store (it's a ten-minute trip).

The kids are at summer day camp, and they picked this week, out of sheer luck, to have their "Swim Week" theme. Three days of outdoor swimming at various water parks. My youngest picked up a sunburn on the first day, another herald of true summer for me. It just doesn't feel like the season yet until that familiar sting of roasted flesh zaps me between the shoulder blades or whenever I wrinkle the skin of my nose. Yes, I know sunburns are bad. My family carries 50+ SPF sunscreen and uses it liberally. The camp counselors couldn't get my youngest to get out of the water enough the first day to be able to slather him with enough lotion, so he got burnt on the shoulders. But the next day he was out every fifteen minutes for more, so his sunburn didn't get worse. I've also been covering him with aloe after-sun gel when he gets home, which he loves. Hopefully he won't be leaving little bits of skin all over when the burn begins to peel.

I am amazed at what my sister and I did as teenagers, when going to the beach. First of all, thirty years ago (ouch) there was no SPF 50+. I think I remember the top SPF at 10. Maybe 15 in the latter part of the 80's. But did we use that? Oh hell no. 10 was for rookies. I remember buying a mahogany-colored translucent bottle of "deep tanning oil". SPF? A mere 2. Nothing to get in the way of a good, dark tan. This stuff was oil. No whiteness to it at all. It was like rubbing the cooking oil on a turkey before shoving it into a roasting hot oven. And we roasted, oh yes.

We never got sunburns bad enough to blister, but they were definitely pink to red, and warm water on it made it sting like crazy. Aloe gel was nice and soothing, and so was Noxema cream. And then came the peeling. The trick was to see who could get the longest unbroken strip off themselves before it ripped. Gross right? It should have been, but it had the same fascination for us as covering your hands in a thin layer of glue, letting it dry, and then peeling that off (What? You've never done that? You missed out).

I never remember burning as a kid. Maybe once, when I was six. And it was pink for a day, then turned brown. As kids we were brown before the summer was a week old. And not even a blush of pink the rest of the summer. As I got older, I noticed I burned more, and worse. So the SPF rating began to climb on the lotions I bought, until now I use SPF 50+, and reapply it often if I'm out for long. Has the sun gotten brighter? Hotter? I don't think so, although some might argue with me. My theory is that, as kids, we were in and out of the house constantly as soon as it was warm enough. I was 12 before the video game craze really started, so I had years of entertaining myself outdoors before the lure of a candy-colored screen and a difficult level kept me in. This constant inside-outside (Stop slamming the screen door! Stay in or out!) allowed my skin, and that of my sister and cousins, to slowly acclimate and darken, so that little sunscreen was necessary unless we were spending a day at the beach. Even then we only needed SPF 6 or 8.

I imagine my string of mid-level sunburns will come to haunt me some day, making me regret that ridiculous deep tanning oil. But I will forever associate that familiar sting with true summer, even as I try to never feel it again.

Summer summer summer....

A Matter of Taste

Where do we get our liking for particular foods from? This question popped into my head after a discussion tonight with my husband, in which our kids' eating habits came up.

I frequently say I got my sweet tooth from my maternal grandfather. He gave it to my mother, who gave it to me. All three of us could certainly pack away the pastries, ice cream and chocolate (and, maddeningly, stay relatively thin).

I also love raviolis and pizza, spicy foods, and foods of different cultures; Mexican, Chinese, Indian. Yes I realize "chinese" food in America is American Chinese and not "real" Chinese food. But you will never get me to eat chicken feet or jellyfish. Eating that stuff is just Not Right.

Where do these individual likes and dislikes come from? My kids have a very narrow roster of what they will eat, although they have surprised me on occasion. Chicken nuggets, pizza, hot dogs, all make their list. Nasty stuff. My eldest adores pasta but the youngest hates it. My youngest inhales fresh fruit but the eldest rolls his eyes at you in reproach if you so much as mention there are fresh strawberries in the fridge. They both love ice cream, and will even pass up cake for it.

A strong case can be made for environment certainly. You will eat what you're offered, if you're hungry enough (except chicken feet and jellyfish). If Mom and Dad continually present you with foods they like, eventually you come to accept at least some of them in your own diet. But then you go out and try something completely off their radar and find you love it, and end up incorporating it as a staple. Where did that come from?

Mom and Dad's willingness to offer you new things all the time, if they did, probably influenced how open you are (or not) to trying new things. My Dad is somewhat of a foodie and so we tried a lot of things, usually after he "tested" it first. My Mother is an excellent cook but tends to stick to her tried and true, which admittedly are yummy but don't go too exotic except for an extra dash of chili powder now and then. So on the one hand I had food adventures, and on the other I had a large array of comfort foods to fall back on when the adventuring got tiresome.

I've recently been trying to mix it up in the kitchen, if only so I don't have to cook three different meals all the time. This is mostly for the benefit of the kids. They are both Aspergians and so trying new things sometimes comes hard to them. But they have shocked me with what they will eat. I got the youngest to eat homemade chicken soup, to in fact gobble it down and admit it was much better than canned. The eldest is more about texture than taste, but he floored me when I had him try crab legs and he inhaled them (expensive taste, but it was worth it). So I do have hope that eventually the chicken nuggets and hot dogs will become boring and they will come to love some of the things I do, that my parents loved, and their parents before them.

Especially if I stop buying chicken nuggets and hot dogs. Do you know what those things are made of??? (Hint: You're told what hot dogs are made of in The Great Outdoors. Go watch it.)

My Dad is Cool

I apologize for the sporadic nature of my blog posts lately. Not all days have been good and so I don't feel the need to burden anyone with that right now. Perhaps later I will feel freer to share more, but right now the issues are too sensitive to go into.

I missed New England and my father on Father's Day quite strongly. I called him and lingered on the phone long past my usual conversations with him, striving to capture some of that "home" feeling I had last year when I visited in the summer. He didn't mind, he never does.

I inherited certain traits from my father that I am quite proud of. He gave me his love for books and a voracious reading capacity. He is a Stephen King fanatic and I also inherited that; I borrowed The Stand from him one summer as a teenager and read it in five days. It's nearly a thousand-page book but I couldn't put it down. Most of Stephen King's novels have that effect on me, and I believe it's his writing style as much as his story. I just have to see what's going to happen next, whether it's an ordinary trip to the store or an epic battle with a sneaky monster. Just like my Dad, I have piles of books in my room, both read and unread. The last time I visited I saw a square pile of books next to his bed that was nearly the size of the bed itself, which caused me to burst out laughing. Moving is a trial of strength for both of us, because we don't like to give away books.

I am a patient and methodical (sometimes maddeningly so) researcher of almost everything, especially if I'm about to purchase something. I will go on the 'net, read magazine articles, visit several stores and question other people before I even begin to decide I might want to buy something. The bigger the price tag the longer the research. This too is a trait my Dad has and which I know I learned from watching him do it.

I enjoy all kinds of music, because I was exposed to all kinds through aha! my Dad. As a teenager I was surprised but delighted when he insisted on listening to the "progressive" (the 80's name for Alternative) rock station on drives anywhere and at home, and entertained going to P.I.L. concerts with me, even if only briefly. P.I.L. stands for Public Image Limited, a band fronted by former Sex Pistols band member Johnny Lydon (a.k.a Johnny Rotten). My sister was not overly into 80's rock at the time but that was ok as well since he loved to play oldies but goodies from the 60's and 70's as well. The Doors and Pink Floyd rocked right along with Duran Duran and O.M.D. in our house. It was a teenager's dream. We were getting told to turn it up, not turn it down.

Of course since we both loved Stephen King we both loved horror movies. One summer we spent renting every horror movie the local video store had in stock. This was before chain stores drove the mom-n-pops out of business. We even rented an extremely low-budget slasher flick made by college students called "Driller Killer" and yes it was as bad as its name. We didn't care, we ate popcorn and laughed through all of it. I still love B-movie horror flicks to this day, but I see them less often because its less fun having no one to watch them with, and my husband isn't a fan, for which I don't really blame him. He does like Bruce Campbell and Evil Dead though, so that's major points in my book.

I believe, like my Dad, that home life and getting regular breaks from work is important, important enough to look for that description on any company's website before I consider them. "We foster a good work-life balance". Great, then you're for me. If I can shut off my cell phone and not answer my home phone on the weekends or whenever my days off are and not get grumped at for it, I will work as hard as I can for you the rest of the week. Work's all well and good, but family time is absolutely essential.

He gave me his love for digging in the dirt, making things grow, and then eating the fruits (or vegetables) of his labors in some truly great food. I still have a way to go when it comes to harvesting bumper crops like he does, but I'm learning. I can't not try to grow things each spring, even if they don't do well. I remember my father's garden, and hope mine can be like that too someday.

Thanks for the things you gave and showed me Dad. I wouldn't be me without you.

Somebody Hold That Cloud For Me

One of the first things I noticed when I moved to Colorado was that the sky seemed much bigger than it was back East. It's not that there are less houses around me than before; I live in a cul-de sac and there are houses surrounding us on all sides. There are about the same number of trees. I can only think it must be because the land is much flatter, although I don't notice tremendous hills when I'm back East (except Cataract Street. Awesomely fun to go 80 up and down that street, and it is aptly named. Or, it was until the cops had the DPW fill in all the roller-coaster dips in the street that made it fun. Boo. Thanks to my aunt for taking me and my sister down Cataract Street at a frightening speed in her sports car, when we were but kids. Whee!). It's a mystery.

As I may have mentioned before I have never seen clouds like I've seen them here, and today was a spectacular example. Brilliant blue sky, huge white clouds across the entire expanse, and an amazing wind that would have had Dorothy putting on her red sparkly shoes and grabbing up Toto. Sure, sure, blue sky, clouds, big deal, right? Except these were worthy of painting. Worthy of a slightly surreal Maxfield Parrish painting or an epic Howard Pyle illustration. If there was less wind. Any canvas of a decent size to represent would have become a kite in short order, even attached to an easel. What's a landscape painter with an itchy paintbrush to do? Ah, the digital camera. Perfect. I don't always carry it, but when I see clouds like I did today, I try to snap at least a few shots. Blow it up and print it out on decent paper and there's your reference.

So what did Parrish and Pyle do without digital cameras? I'm not sure, but the results are still awe-inspiring decades later. Just keep painting, just keep painting....

Unexpectednesses

I am a person that likes nice surprises. Like for instance if you go raiding the cookie jar at night fully expecting it to be empty and surprise! there are three Oreos left, just what you needed to shush the craving. Perfection. As you can tell the surprise doesn't need to be big or elaborate.

Today I got three.

Surprise number one: After a doctor's appointment, my husband steered the truck over to a place I rarely go anymore, both because it's a fair distance from me and because I have been unemployed since the end of March.  The rather massive yarn store in the slightly seedy section of town! I am usually overwhelmed when I go in, even if I have a list. Today I was told to go in and just enjoy myself. I had no list. Imagine a five year old in Willy Wonka's chocolate factory, and you'll be close to where I was today. But I am proud to say I restrained myself and settled for some screaming orange yarn for some secret projects, and some white and purple sock yarn for Rockies socks. Oh, and a set of metal double pointed needles for those socks, since I snap the bamboo ones with the abandon of a kung fu champion chopping through boards. Extreme knitting, rawr!

Surprise number two: Lunch at an out of the way Mexican restaurant I've been wanting to try. They have artwork by Frieda Kahlo all over the walls. Just by the look of the place I knew it could be good. I was not disappointed, and unlike everything else I've eaten this week it did not make my stomach rebel. Not even the chili rellenos. Yum! The "spicy" stuff wasn't as spicy as I can tolerate, but I let that slide this time. Next time we'll see what kind of fire they can put on. This place is much closer to home than the yarn store. There could be some real danger of money-suckage here, although the prices are excellent.

Surprise number three: My Bruins won the Stanley Cup tonight, after thirty-nine years without it. I was four years old in 1972, and I can barely remember the cup ceremony. Oh yes, my parents were watching, so I was watching. And I was watching tonight as they played hard and held aloft that Cup, well-deserved. As a New England girl born and raised, the circle has come round for all my teams now so I have nothing more to complain about in the sports department. I think I might even be able to forgive Bill Buckner now.

I'll think about that one a little bit more.