Market Days

   Janet's annual garage sale takes weeks of preparation.  First Janet cleans out her garage to make space for the merchandise.  Then her daughter and her mother and her sister and her friend Donna the antique picker all sort thought their households and storage areas to choose items to sell.  They make lots of trips to our cul-de-sac in order to store things in Janet's garage.  Judy and I add a few giveaways  to  the pile.  Janet and Donna spend hours pricing the jewelry and clothes and furniture.
    The night before the big opening, Robert and and Rob and Randy gather to set up tables and string tarps over them.  We hear laughing on into the wee hours as Janet and Donna finished up the pricing.  The early birds come very early, so this year  I headed over with my coffee to help a little and to grab my choice find:  a tent for Maxine to play in when she visits.

Janet's garage sale

     For three days Janet's mother Wauneta sat at the cash box.  One of her elderly friends spent an afternoon sitting there with her.   Janet's sister came and went, her husband and in- laws brought supplies and food, and Kelli and Donna talked to customers.  For Judy and me, there was always someone next door to visit with, anytime of day or evening.
     I hooted with laughter when Janet told me that she never made money on her garage sale.   Between the cost of advertising and the price of the pizza and drinks she feeds everybody each day, she just about breaks even.  "Why do you do it?"  I asked
    "It's a social thing," Janet insisted.

Jumble of donations

     The following weekend I worked at the church rummage sale, this year dubbed the Pink Elephant Bazaar.  This sale also took weeks of preparation by 40 or 50 people. We sorted and priced mounds of donations and displayed them by category.   We had a children's room and a room full of clothing all on hangers and a vintage and Christmas room.  Outside along the sidewalk  were stations for furniture, household items, and books.    As Bob Smith wheeled a donated toilet onto the sidewalk he joked, "We aim to please, and please aim."

Marion working at bazaar

     I find big events with lots of stuff confusing, so I asked the organizers to give me one simple job.    I stuck to the book sale.  I watched in awe  as Sheila and the other leaders made it all work.  Sheila,  who was a Keno runner in Las Vegas in a former life, circulated with her money belt to make sure everybody had just enough cash for change and not too much extra.  Alanya, the collector, kept an eye out for shoplifters.  The men of the church  were poised to move things on request. They became a well-oiled machine during the breakdown and clean up phase on Saturday.

Katie with kids' stuff

    As I struggled to keep the books upright and the customers' money straight, I ran the old screed about stuff through my head.  Just look at all this junk!  Who needs it?  Obviously, we didn't.  We work and work to keep our houses clear...  at this point I remembered the bag for Goodwill that my mother kept in her front hall closet.  She would try to pass the bags off on her five daughters.  The top of the bag would have things we might be interested in--dishes, scarves, blouses, etc--but we each learned to feel the bottom of the bag first.  My mother would try to sneak in books that way.  "No books, Mom, I don't need any more books!"..We work so hard to keep our houses clear, and still it accumulates!  Think of all the cheap female labor it took to produce these things, and all the free female labor it takes to pass them on!

Book sale

      I took a break from my inner rant to help a young woman who was exclaiming over a sewing book from 1972, with clear instructions and stylish black-and-white illustrations.  I looked at a copy of Cowboy Small with a grandmother, and reminisced with her about how much we loved to read it to our children.  I steered a big man who was interested in the Gnostic gospels to a book by Elaine Pagels. 
    Then I remembered  the quilt on our bed, the portable crib for the baby, the pinball game, the Disney Princess puzzle book for Maxine's visit, all bought at the rummage sale over the years.  OK, maybe these sales are one good way to recycle, to help people find useful objects at a low price.  But all that hauling and moving and cleaning!  Surely there's a more efficient way?  There must be a better way to raise money for the church...
    In the  evening people streamed from six  directions to the hill in back of the old Carnegie Library across the street from the rummage sale.  They set up their lawn chairs and blankets and broke out their picnics.  A band played oldies and bluegrass. There was free barbecue for the teens who help at the library, along with just a few speeches.  Children  scampered through the fountain as the sky turned pink in the west.
    I thought about market days in old Europe, and farm families who drove their wagons into town on Saturdays.  I know how important it is to me to leave the house sometime every day  beginning in  September, when the daylight  changes angles and no longer shines into our windows.  Honey and chocolate, stamps and coffee filters, dahlias and bacon rolls, all pull me  into the groceries and flower stands and bakeries to shop.  It is a social thing, and thank goodness for it.

   

Maxine in Milwaukie

To the stars

Twinkletoes

In the tent

     Lovely dancing Maxine bounded into the airport waiting room in her blinking sneakers, hugged me hard, and then skipped off to climb in the play area.  Courtney finished feeding the baby and David kissed us all.  Then we headed home.  We needed two cars for all of us and all the equipment, so our friend Donna drove Judy and Courtney and half the stuff to our house in her station wagon.  David joked with chagrin about trading in his vintage BMW for a minivan.

Story time

     Thanks to Judy and to Rose, who had visited before we took off for Seattle, the  house was ready for children.  Rose the geometry teacher had figured out how to put the crib together.  She created a toy and craft corner for Maxine.  We put a tent in the yard and got bubbles ready to blow and put sheets and a princess pillowcase on the air mattress.  A special shelf held  the 37 picture books I was eager to read aloud.  Maxine liked Cinder Edna enough to ask for it twice, and Princess Smartypants three times.  Her favorite by far was The Seven Chinese Sisters, in which each of six sisters uses her unique talent to rescue baby Seventh Sister from the skinny, hungry dragon.

Simone and fire

     These Texas people were cold during our Oregon mornings.   Simone lay on her quilt in front of the first fire she had seen.  By this time she had begun to turn over, to reach for things, and to make raspberries with her mouth instead of sticking out her tongue.  Such changes in less than a week!

Betsy and Simone

     Betsy and Les  came to meet Maxine and Simone.  Betsy held the baby while Les  talked Olympic drugging with David and science with Courtney.
   On Saturday afternoon David and Courtney's friends came up from Corvallis and Salem.  We sat on the deck for hours drinking wine and eating cheese and salami  and stuffed shells  and peach cobbler.

Busy always

Playground

   Throughout the weekend, Maxine played and drew and decorated and pretended. She rode her scooter around the neighborhood, and ate an apple picked right off the tree. She was entranced with the bluegrass music at the Milwaukie Farmer's market, while her father  bought bratwurst and berries and beets and wine and dahlias.  She then played for a long time with a little boy named Leo on the climbing structures at the Waldorf School.  Courtney remarked that Maxine, following Will Rogers,  never met a kid she didn't like.

David and Simone

     What a joy it was to be all together in our house, with Simone gurgling and Maxine directing us all in her games and David  and  Courtney talking and laughing with us around the table.  Judy noticed that Simone seems especially contented with David.
   Monday, the day they left, came all to soon.  That morning Maxine and I were quiet and sad together for a while.  She told me she will think of me when she plays with Lightie, the little yellow toy I gave her.  I handed  her a little Hello Kitty notebook that snaps shut, and told her it was partly a calendar.  "Does it have games on it?"  she asked politely.  What a horse-and- buggy grandma I am!

Maxine ready to go

John Jacob ready to go

     Judy gave Maxine a furry backpack with a special doll carrier attached to the back. Maxine carefully strapped her bear John Jacob into the backpack, shrugged it onto her shoulders, and left for the airport.
    I will see Maxine and Simone again in October.  If I didn't have that trip to Texas to look forward to, I would be bereft.

    

Simone in Seattle

Simone

  Courtney had a three-day meeting at the University of Washington in Seattle last week.  Judy and I took care of  Simone while Courtney was at her sessions.

      We drove to Seattle on Tuesday, and Judy met Simone for the first time.  Simone is a sociable, contented baby.  She coos and babbles, smiles and sticks out her tongue ten different ways.  She likes to be walked and jiggled and hummed to. She made a delicious bundle in our arms.

Josh and Simone

     On Wednesday we took Simone  to visit  my niece Jessamy and her family in Edmunds.  When we arrived, Megan and Jamie were waiting eagerly to meet their new second cousin.  My sister Rose was there, ready to hold the baby.  Her husband  John showed Judy the photos from his week-long hike counting marmots in the Olympics.

Flying with Mommy

      Simone, at three months, is just beginning to take a bottle.  If conditions are  right and she is not too frantically  hungry, she can be jollied into taking a tiny bit of milk and playing around with it in her mouth.  Mostly, she just waits for her mother.  It worked on Wednesday at Jessamy's when Rose persuaded her to sip a little.  That, and lots of attention from Josh, Megan, and Jamie,  kept the baby happy until Courtney arrived for dinner.
     On Thursday Simone was having nothing to do with the bottle.  Judy and I took her to explore  the university bookstore,  using the motion of the car and then the stroller to keep her comforted.  At noon and at three Judy's intuitive radar helped us to find the Atmospheric Sciences building on campus.  We carried the baby up to the sixth floor so Courtney could nurse Simone during breaks in the meetings.

Agua Verde cafe and paddle club

   Courtney's colleagues from the Dynamo project in the Maldives were eager to meet Simone, "the Dynamo baby."  I was happy to see them again.  I had the chance to introduce Judy to  Chuck, who bought us dinner our first night at Gan,  to Deanna, who shopped for scarves with me, to Bob, Courtneys' advisor, and to  Scott Ellis, whose smile always cheered me up.

Happy grandmother

    We ate dinner on Thursday evening at a combination Mexican restaurant/kayak club on Portage Bay.  I love the light in Seattle, the way it plays  on the hills and the big bodies of water. The evening light was especially fine as Simone sat in her infant seat on the table and we feasted on sweet potato enchiladas.
     It occurred to me that, if we were following the traditional instead of the modern  timetable for childbearing, Courtney would be the grandmother.  Judy and I would be sitting by the fire somewhere, missing all this action.

     When Courtney returned from her meetings around noon on Friday, we began our mad dash to:  feed the baby, change the baby, pack the car, check out of the hotel, fill up and return Courtney's rental car, maneuver through the Tacoma traffic, and drive fast but unobtrusively to  the Portland airport in time  to meet David and Maxine's plane.  We made it with 5 minutes to spare. We were ready for the second half of our joyful adventure, when both Maxine and Simone, along with their parents, would spend the weekend at our house.

Happy grandmother

  
  

Good Men

Rob with Jamie

Paul with Charlie and Sam

Nick with Mary Catherine

John and bubble blowers

   When I called my son Paul the other day, he was out fishing with his sons . He paused in our conversation to help Sammy bait a hook. "Good man, " I thought.  Meanwhile next door, Randy was bringing raspberries to his mother-in-law, and patiently driving his wife's grandmother home.  I thought again,"Good man. "  That afternoon I watched a crew of husbands work together to help break down  and dismantle the  rummage sale that the church ladies had toiled over for days.  Good men all, having a fine time supporting the women's project.

Les and Guin

Ernie and Jamie

    What makes a good man?  Polonius and Kipling tell us about personal qualities,  Jimmy Carter shows us about service, and thousands of successful men contribute to the remaking of the world toward peace and plenty.  I, however, find the goodness of men in the way they work with the women and children in their lives.

Jacob and Lucy

     At the beach, John and Paul ran the newspaper delivery crew, and Ernie took the kids out golfing.   Once, when Jacob was stirring and stirring his seafood risotto,  little Lucy held up her arms to him, "Hi, Daddy."  Jacob turned off the pot and went to play with Lucy.

Jeremy and Nora

     Does it take long years of refinement in the fire of family life to make a good man?  My friend Sheila thinks it's a matter of discrimination and  selection. You have to choose a good one.

John with his mother

David and Maxine

Good man in training

          Next weekend, Maxine will be here visiting.  Maxine is four, and she loves princesses and fairy tales.  We have princess sheets for her, and a Disney princess picture book complete with puzzles.   I have also found feminist fairy tale books.  In CinderEdna, for instance, Cinder Edna runs a cleaning business on the side, uses the proceeds to put her ball gown on layaway, and takes a bus to the ball wearing her loafers, which are more comfortable than glass slippers.   In Princess Smartypants, the heroine puts her suitors through a series of impossible challenges.  I want to be sure that Maxine knows:  You can tell who is a prince and who is not. Don't kiss that frog!

Stranger on a train

Mail car

    The 8:15 AM Amtrak train to Newark was crowded.  I searched three cars for a seat, and finally sat down next to a harmless-looking young woman with totes and duffel bags at her feet.  Trains have lots of legroom, but I am used to planes.  I read my New Yorker for a while, all the time airplane-seat vigilant that she did not spill over into my space.  At some point we started to talk, probably beginning with "Where are you headed?"
   She was going to Trenton to visit a college roommate.  Just returned last week from a year in Norway, where she taught elementary school.  She taught for a year in Minneapolis before that.  Have I heard of Teach For America?
    How did she get to Norway?  Well, it was a Fulbright. I asked her lots of questions about Norway.  She told me that one way they deal with the dark winters is to dim the lights, light lots  of votive candles, and knit.    She was struck with her Norwegian friends' conviction that Americans live with a constant undercurrent of panic.
     And what will she do next year?   Go to graduate school in Boston.  Where in Boston? Harvard.  Her face was bright. She's interested in educational policy.  How can schools of education  track their graduates after 5 or 10 years to find out what in works and what doesn't in teacher training?  The schools could then modify their programs.  It doesn't happen much now, she said.   Then she asked me, "Who was your favorite teacher, and why?" She was genuinely curious, interested in my experience and in me.

     We talked  through Baltimore, Aberdeen, Wilmington, and Philadelphia.  She told me a story that both puzzled and gratified her.  A former boyfriend, whom she had not seen in 5 years, called her to apologize for "being asleep, not being aware"  while they were together.  She didn't remember him that way, but was surprised and pleased that he sought her out to tell her what he had discovered.    "I hope I don't fall asleep anytime in my life,"  she said.  "That seems like an important thing."
     "Oh, you won't"  I insisted with all the assurance of my years. "When you are old and limited, it's the crucial thing, not to fall asleep, but you won't.  You've got it."
    We said good-bye.  I didn't ask her name,  just waved to her as she lugged her  bags off the train in Trenton.

Why we do it

Laughing Vonnie

Shirley with me and Judy

Our cottage

    Every year at Rehoboth the women of my generation get together at a restaurant for a women's breakfast out.  This year my sister Eileen suggested that the nine of us  meet  on Judy's and my porch, since there would be no husbands or children to inhibit us, and no impatient wait staff to hurry us out.  What a great free time we had!

Stephen with Jack and Charlie

   We milled about and ate too many pastries while  Shirley and Chris told stories that had us hooting with laughter.  After an hour or so, we went over coming events  next summer:  a bike ride across Iowa, a commitment ceremony, quadruplet graduation party, bar exam, conferences, the start of school, maybe a wedding.  We agreed on dates for beach weeks in both Manzanita, Oregon and Rehoboth, Delaware for 2013, and for Rehoboth in 2014.  It was efficient and much more fun than trying to come to consensus by e-mail.

Don's four will graduate

     After they left I got to thinking about the next generation.    What fine people they are, and what good matches they are making.

Laura and Zack

Bianca leading dancing

Lemonade stand

       Judy will tell you how daunting it is for a quiet person to  jump into the Sullivan/Armstrong beach life.  Bridget, Jacob's wife, tells about the first time she went to dinner with all of us at the Big Fish Grill.  She gamely picked a crab for the first time, aware that we were all watching her.  Cliff, Abby's boyfriend, tells about joining  the card game Diablo.   He was so excited by one move that when he sat down, the chair broke underneath him.

Second cousins

Happy with Paul

Josh following Ernie's golf instructions

     The suitors and newlyweds pitch right in with activities for the children.   Stephen, Julia's husband, spent hours with Jack in the water. Bianca led  the dancing. Cliff played with Sammy on the beach.  Luke showed the boys photos of his trip to Tanzania.    Everyone patronized  Jack and Charlie's  lemonade stand.
They can all   look to the example of  my fine brothers-in-law: John, who  leads the newspaper delivery, and Saint Ernie, who organized a miniature golfing expedition for all of the kids.

Abby with Lucy

Visiting

    We arrived  at Vonnie's house in Maryland a few days before we needed to go to the beach at Rehoboth.  Judy, who had done well without supplemental oxygen on the cross-country flight, still needed to use those days for recovery.   I used them for visiting.

Mary and new barn

Jeremy's woodshop with Shep

        John Bridge programmed his GPS to help me get to Mary and Jeremys' farm in southern Pennsylvania.  As I drove though the rolling  hills in Vonnie and Ernie's luxurious Toyota Avalon, I felt confident that I wouldn't miss my turn, thanks to that GPS.   I was eager to see what changes my friends had made to their place in the last few years.

         Their new barn is a work of art.  Jeremy has his woodshop on the first floor, and space for beekeeping  classes on the second.  He was putting the finishing touches on a beehive-shaped sandbox for grandson Owen's second birthday.  Mary planned to paint chickens on it.    Jeremy showed me the  fairy playhouse that he had cut  throughout a weeping cherry tree for granddaughter Norah.

Mary and Carol

Happy

      We ate lunch in their gazebo, looking out at  the flowers and fishpond.  Hummingbird moths were working the blossoms, and  a breeze was blowing the corn in a neighboring field. Old friends Rita and Carol  joined us.  Mary served  white beets, cucumbers in yoghurt and cabbage salad, all from her garden, along with chicken salad and berries.  I soaked up the beauty of the place and laughed with the friends of my heart.
     The next day I took the Amtrak train to Newark, and from there a taxi to my Aunt Sister's house in Rutherford.  Aunt Sister, at 90, still changes her slipcovers, curtains, and bedspreads every spring and fall.  I climbed onto her step ladder while she stood on a hassock to put the living room valance in place above her picture window.
       My Uncle Flurry and his wife Marie came over to drive us to a nearby diner.  The smart, sassy waitress swore she remembered me from last year, and flirted mightily with Uncle Flurry.  We ate omelets and BLTs and drank diner coffee.  Uncle Flurry, who at age 80 has been losing weight, struggled to finish his grilled cheese sandwich.  He is a genial, sociable man, an Irish tenor who  sings and tells funny stories at wedding receptions.  At lunch he seemed to be  turned inward, to  be cracking jokes by effort of will.  He said  summing-up pronouncements to me, like, "You've raised two fine boys;  they are both good men."

Aunt Sister and Uncle Flurry

     To get back to Aunt Sister's house Uncle Flurry drove warily while Aunt Sister and Marie shouted back and forth and guessed at what each other was saying.  Aunt Sis asked that we stop at her church. She has been telling me by phone about the renovations to the church, how the entrance is now around the corner, how beautiful the new wing is.  Uncle Flurry elected to stay in the car, but said to me as I got out to see the building, "Don't forget to make a wish. You're supposed to make a wish  every time you go into a new church."
     The new church has a large anteroom, plenty of space for gathering and chatting .   Aunt Sis pointed to a statue on our right, with  tall votive candles burning in front of it.  "I have Donal and Mary and Helen and Eileen over there," she said.
    Then, gesturing  to the statue and candles on our left, "I have Flurry and Marie over there, because they have been so sick.  That's St. Jude, you know."
       In the sanctuary she pointed out the stained glass windows that were brought over  from the old church, and the stations of the cross.  "Helen and I decorated one of the stations, I forget which one."
       Aunt Sister does not often mix up words, and I was confused.  "How did you decorate it?"  I asked.
     "I mean donate,"  she said.
      I made my wish:  I hoped that I could find some way to express my gratitude.