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A Rallying Cry

July 14, 2024 by mountainmornings

It was a Saturday like any other weekend day. Bob and I took a very early walk around the greenway before the unbearable heat of the day. Then I jumped in the pool to do my exercises and the Bride joined me with the Grands. Later, I made plans to get together with a friend and was washing up the dinner dishes – which is to say the dishwasher was going as I cleaned my ancient wok. It was nearly 100 degrees in Nashville yesterday. I’d just returned from rinsing and refilling the birdbath with fresh cold water when I stopped to sit down and catch my breath.

Something was amiss on CNN. My muted TV had a video on repeat, red hats and shirts ducking, black suits encircling the speaker like crows with wings outstretched..

The family text chain began almost immidiately, from Cali to TN, we all registered our disbelief. Was it just fireworks, a stunt by a reality TV star gone wrong? How could this be happening, again? Finally, the Rocker sent us an X interview from an ER doc on the scene – it was very real. One person was shot dead, and Mr T was injured, clipped by a bullet to his ear.

We don’t really know much more this morning. It was a 20 year old, with an assault rifle on a roof. I don’t need to know the name of the shooter, or his motivation, as I’ve said countless times before. Like most mass shooters, it was a young man with a gun. The media will interview his friends and his family and they will say he was always different, bullied, shy, didn’t like women… and so on. All the usual tropes. Except this obviously troubled individual lived in the USA where we have 120 guns per 100 people on the street. He lived in a country where the right to bear arms is a given, and no number of school shootings can change that.

We Americans sacrifice our children on the altar of freedom.

I’ve lived through JFK, MLK and RFK’s assasinations. I remember when Reagan was shot – nobody blamed the other party for these horrendous acts of violence. And yet, the Speaker of the House this morning mentions that our President said, “it’s time to put Trump in a bullseye” to some of his donors. FOX news is all about blaming Democratic rhetoric for the assassination attempt yesterday, when in reality, a man with an AR15 can show up anywhere he pleases – at a shopping mall, at a school, at a Vegas concert. He could walk into a church or a synagogue.

What did Mr T say as he was escorted off the stage at his rally, once the Secret Service found his shoes? “FIGHT!”

What are we fighting each other for Mr T? Tell me why hanging your VP seemed like just another option for your followers? Pumping your fist in defiance is noteworthy, but will it help unite our country? Everyone will get behind you now, calling for an end to “political” violence, and the need to tone down our speech. And this is just my humble opinion, but what if you and Joe decided to ban assault weapons forever? Now would be the time to do something magnanimous, something tangible for the people you want to lead.

Who is willing to give up the baby, rather than have it be torn apart?  

 

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The Grandmother Hypothesis

July 9, 2024 by mountainmornings

My daughter called me yesterday to rave about a new book she’s reading, it’s all about menopause! My immediate thought was, why is she reading about menopause, and then I came to my senses. My little girl is rapidly approaching this phase of life, and like everything else she does, the Bride will gather all the evidence-based information she can find before she plots her course through peri to post-menopause with the utmost care. And this book, “The Menopause Manifesto” by Jen Gunter, MD, begins at the beginning.

What do we humans have in common with killer whales? Homo Sapiens (and Japanese aphids btw) are among the very few females in the animal kingdom to live well beyond childbearing age. Why? Well some researchers have studied this phenomena – after all, evolutionarily speaking once you’re finished reproducing, you’re finished. But women can live half their lives in their golden years; and according to Darwin’s theory there’s a good reason.

“The first hard evidence for the grandmother hypothesis was gathered by Kristen Hawkes, an anthropologist at the University of Utah who was studying the Hadza people, a group of hunter-gatherers in northern Tanzania. Hawkes was struck by “how productive these old ladies were” at foraging for food, and she later documented how their help allowed mothers to have more children.” https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/02/07/692088371/living-near-your-grandmother-hasevolutionarybenefits#:~:text=If%20being%20close%20to%20grandma,same%20parish%20as%20their%20mother.

Pretty simple right? The grandmothers know which mushrooms are poisonous; how to treat mastitis in a nursing mother; where to dig for water. They can also simply watch over their grandchildren so that fewer wander off into the rainforest. But what about today? Factoring in birth control and hormone replacement therapy (HRT), is the modern Grandma still as useful as her predecessor?

The Flapper taught me how to wash a newborn’s head, how to gently nudge a baby to sleep during the night and not let them sleep all day, how to stay calm in the midst of it all. She ordered a dryer and had it installed because she didn’t want me hanging diapers out in the sun, like she had to so many years ago. She told me how my brother Michael started coming into this world while she was hanging out the wash. How my sister Kay had to run through backyards to fetch the doctor, running through our neighbor’s laundry.

“You are in your perfect place,” my Mother told me time and time again. A mantra I repeat to myself, and to my children and grandchildren. The Flapper embraced Buddhism in her later years. I often wished she didn’t live in Wayzata, MN, I longed for her every single day… the Mother I lost when I was 10 months old and found again when I was the Love Bug’s age.

But there was Great Grandma Ada to the rescue. Once we moved from the Berkshires back to NJ, Bob’s Mother took on the role of Supreme Grandchild Spoiler and Snuggler. She fed the Bride her first solid food, chopped liver, and she encouraged the Rocker to explore and expand his horizons. I remember when he was five and played the violin on her deck for all her friends! They fed the ducks in the park, went swimming in her pool, and accompanied us to the Big Apple Circus every year.

It’s good to know I have a purpose according to the Grandmother Hypothesis. Of course, I’ve always known that loving and caring for my babies was the one thing that mattered most, my one raison d’etre. Now that we live only two houses away, I try not to be too intrusive, but I love it when the Grands just stroll in without knocking. “Hiya Nana!” they say.

“Are you ready for breakfast number two?” I ask after a big hug.

It’s too late for me to take HRT for my osteoporosis, but if you’re in your forties and wondering about it, here’s a good place to start – https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/menopause/in-depth/hormone-therapy/art-20046372

I am the luckiest Grandmother in the world!

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Nana Camp

July 2, 2024 by mountainmornings

There are no day camps this week for the Grands. No sailing, Taylor Swift, or pottery camps. Plus, on July 1, all the brand-spanking-new doctors have started their rounds, and so the Groom has a lot of teaching to do in the MICU, and the Bride gets to explain how to write a prescription to an intern. It can be taxing, and so I cook dinner for six people just in case they get home in time. On July 4, we’ll be relaxing by our dear neighbor’s pool while the “little doctors,” as Grandma Ada called them, save lives.

This Fourth will be the 75th anniversary, if you want to call it that, of the Flapper’s car accident. Dr Jim has been doing some soul searching around the event that left our Nana, Mother, and Sister lying bloodied and comatose on the side of the road. He was only seven years old, and so it was up to him to tell the police their names and where they lived. It is an early memory, but not his first. That was the day, earlier that Year of Living Dangerously, when our Father returned from the hospital after brain surgery, his head wrapped in bandages.

Sometimes I wonder what memories our Grands will keep with them. I’ll bet they will remember their parents coming home from their hospitals during the pandemic and having to shower before a hug. Will they remember seeing the David in Florence? Or will they remember a feeling of ease, an all encompassing feeling that everything will be alright when they arrive at Nana Camp? That it’s not all action and adventure all the time. Sometimes we bake muffins with abandon, or we swim in the pool. Sometimes we take field trips to museums and then we watch Jeopardy! There’s a rhythm to life in this house, and my grilled cheese sandwiches often hit the mark.

Today the Bride is home and so we are off duty. I try not to think about the recent SCOTUS decisions. Like the presidential debate/debacle, I put those thoughts into the “things I cannot change” basket. I can put the basket in a river and let the water flow through it, or I can unpack the basket on the riverbank and perseverate about our time and place in history. I’m not a Monday night MSNBC type. It’s hard to imagine changing course so close to an election, and I know Joe Biden.

Like my birth family, Irish Catholics from Scranton, PA, he will never give up. When the going gets tough and all. Like the Flapper telling her doctors she’ll not only walk again, she’ll dance on their graves. We come from a strong line of strong, smart women forged by coal miners. I’ll bet Dr Jill has ancestors just as tough and resilient. We need a Democrat in the White House now more than ever, so I’ll be voting accordingly.

Have a safe and uneventful Fourth of July. Steer clear of the naysayers and knee-jerkers. Look at the long view. America is still that beautiful shining city, our democracy cannot topple over!

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Bird Facts

June 24, 2024 by mountainmornings

“Bird” is simply working class (UK) slang for a woman. It’s not pejorative, but it’s not respectful or flattering either.

The Groom has developed a funny habit. Whenever he gets an advert text message, he texts back a random bird fact! Usually it’s a bot and he immediately stumps it. But sometimes it’s a human, and sometimes there’s a tacit recognition, a glimmer of humanity between the sender and the sendee. I wanted to tell him all about the crows making a racket next to my pool PT this morning, but then I remembered the family drove to Memphis at dawn..

They are being interviewed for Global Entry passports: “Global Entry is a U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) program that allows expedited clearance for pre-approved, low-risk travelers upon arrival in the United States. Members enter the United States by accessing the Global Entry processing technology at selected airports.” https://www.cbp.gov/travel/trusted-traveler-programs/global-entry

When we flew British Air to Italy, we breezed right through TSA checkpoints while the kids had to wait in long lines. It’s definitely worth the effort to apply for Global Entry if you fly out of the country. You feel a tiny bit royal coming back to the US. Being an avid Anglophile, I was delighted to be served “Coronation” tea sandwiches on board. I didn’t even mind being called, “Mum” by the flight attendants. When the pictures of Taylor Swift hit social media over the weekend, smiling with the Prince of Wales and his two oldest bairn, I was positively gobsmacked.

Then today I read (cue the lights) that Travis Kelce picked Tay Tay up like a bird on a London stage and carried the Queen to her throne chair.

The Love Bug had a fantastic week at Taylor Swift camp. She made a gorgeous tee shirt, lots of bead bracelets, and dove deep into the Swiftie phenom. I’m sure Yale will be offering the definitive course on Taylor soon enough.

Well, we’re all wilting aren’t we? Bob and I walked to the Farmer’s Market on Saturday for the first fresh garlic and barely made it home. It’s less than a mile, half up a gentle hill, but the heat index got me. Not so much the temperature, which was mid 90s, it’s the “real feel” as Aunt Kay calls it; a combo of humidity in the air and the subjective, apparent temperature we perceive. That was at least three digits! Nashville has been experiencing the same heat dome as everyone else, only I guess it’s pretty normal for us, except…

“It’s not even July yet people!”

The Pumpkin enjoyed robot camp too, and I’m just happy the camps were indoors during this heat spell. Naturally I’ve been keeping the Pumpkin’s bird bath refreshed twice daily. I love watching our robins, yes I believe these two are our babies recently hatched above the patio, indulging in water aerobics and taking a drink every now and then.

Yesterday I stood by the window marveling at our bird’s ingenuity and determination to get a berry. Bob covered the blackberry bush with mesh this year, hoping we’d actually have a harvest, but the birds have outsmarted us. The robin jumped up on a lawn light, squared off, and then hovered for a few seconds whilst plucking a berry through the mesh! This went on for quite awhile. I didn’t know a robin could impersonate a hummingbird. There’s another bird fact for you!

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Dearest Gentle Reader

June 17, 2024 by mountainmornings

Good Morning! Spoiler Alert about Bridgerton – the jig is up!

We now know who Lady Whistledown is and that Pen gets her man. Amidst all the lies and deceit, love wins! And all the while I’m thinking this Bridgerton husband, fresh off his European tour bedding as many French women as he could find, will surely be giving his new bride an STD of some sort. Why must reality cozy up with a SIX minute sex scene? Maybe when you raise your children during the AIDs crisis, pragmatism kicks in.

I wonder what future generations will say about this time – climate change is a chronic, existential crisis; European elections are tilting to the Right; and America is debating the rules of a debate between a nice guy named Joe from PA, and a delusional, twice-impeached felon named Don! Could Bridgerton be the escape we all need? After all, in the end three new babies are born to fathers who will presumably mend their wicked ways.

Yesterday we celebrated Father’s Day with lunch and a movie, “Inside Out 2.” Temps were in the mid 90s so air-conditioning was an essential part of the plan. As we were walking out, the Love Bug asked me what emotion I liked best? “Ennui,” i said. I thought she should have had a bigger part. I also loved how Joy put Anxiety in a recliner with a cup of tea! Then the Bride said she loved Ennui also, and did we notice she was French? Mais OUI! The Pumpkin wanted to know what Ennui was, and while throwing out our candy boxes at the back of the theatre, I attempted an explanation.

Like the flat, bluish-gray animated character said, she is bored but rarely boring. She was distanced, lethargic like a noodle always lounging around. It’s fascinating that Ennui always had a phone in her hand. While the main character, Riley, is trying to fit in with her peers, all of her “old” emotions are literally bottled up in a jar! Could Hollywood be telling us that suppressing our emotions never works? Notice that Envy, a new emotion for Riley, is kinda cute with sparkly eyes and without a phone in her hand; maybe teens are not so envious of their friends’ social media feeds?

Another Spoiler Alert: Ennui joins Joy to save Riley! Key the eye-rolling, the shrug, the insidious “FINE!”

The good news is that Inside Out 2 is the number one, record breaking film of the year so far. “Pixar’s Inside Out 2 has broken box office records over the weekend as it brought in an estimated $295m (£232.6m) around the world.That makes it the strongest global opening by an animated film of all time, parent company Disney said. In North America, ticket sales hit about $155m, dethroning Dune: Part Two as the holder of this year’s top box office opening weekend.” https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cd114gg38xpo

Hooray! People are getting out, going back to the movies with candy and popcorn, even if it is an animation. I tried watching “Poor Thing” on the plane back from Heathrow, but it just wasn’t sitting well. I turned it off after she killed the toad. I remember the Flapper idolizing Veronica Lake, and Greta Garbo. Garbo’s “I vant to be alone,” was the synthesis of Ennui, and very much like Lady Whistledown. A smart woman, who’s been overlooked and underappreciated with a biting wit and a poison pen. We all need a break from the constant noise! Not the cicadas, those are gone thankfully; the pings and dings of our phones, the podcasts and songs in our ears, the stories we tell ourselves in order to soldier on.

It’s spending time alone, getting to know ourselves, listening to our intuition, that will help teens forge an identity. Ennui is never bored with herself! On the wall is a picture of my Foster Father Jim when he was in the Navy. He’s looking over The Love Bug on ProCreate; we like to get creative in the Snug!

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Disconnected

June 11, 2024 by mountainmornings

As we approached the medieval city of Pietrasanta last week, I was surprised to see a giant sculpture of a teddy bear laying down outside of a church with a knife through his heart. Marco and Claudio had told us this place has long been a haven for artists – from Paul Klee and Joan Miro to Henry Moore and Fernando Botero. But I had no idea the exhibit we were about to see, including large busts of cherubic angels with their mouths taped shut inside the deconsecrated church , was by a sculptor connected to the Jersey Shore, Rachel Lee Hovnanian!

“Hovnanian’s “Poor Teddy in Repose” sculpture shares a powerful message. “Poor Teddy is a reflection on the ways in which childhood playtime has changed in the contemporary era,” Hovnanian shares about her work. “Children are no longer interested in teddy bears and other tangible toys – the smartphone seems to have eclipsed all other toys as the ultimate pass-time for children, a knife to the heart for Teddy.”…Hovnanian goes on to share that her choice of raw material – bronze – was deliberate. “It emphasizes the industrialization and commercialization of childhood,” she explains.” https://www.forbes.com/sites/janehanson/2024/05/28/how-one-artist-is-using-teddy-bears-and-angels-to-redefine-the-way-we-communicate/

It was a July day in 2002 when Hovnanian’s 15 year old son, Alton, drowned in his jet ski-type watercraft in the Navesink River. Word spread quickly in our Rumson-Fair Haven community, Hovnanian Enterprises was the number one building firm in the state. Alton was taken to my husband Bob’s ER in Red Bank, NJ. I had friends who were good friends with the boy’s grandmother. His grandfather, Kevork, was an Armenian immigrant from Iraq when he started his company.

Now the silent angels stared down at me, more menacing. I felt a chill inside the dark vestibule of the Complesso di Sant Agostino, maybe it was my fever? We turned a corner only to find another gigantic, lonely teddy bear surrounded by floating, electric plugs that looked like the tentacles of an octopus. The Love Bug said it made her feel sad, and we talked about the meaning of art. The Rocker told me the artist herself was in the next room.

It was an accident that night when Alton plowed into a moored sailboat. The Rocker was 17 and had just graduated high school, we were packing him up for college; while Rachel was burying her son instead of sending him off to high school. Luckily, I had stopped writing for the local newspaper the year before. And here we were, in Tuscany, in a room with another Poor Teddy having a solo tea party.

When we arrived home, I handed over my iPad to the Bug for her Design Camp. She is an artist like her Aunt Kiki! You see, I thought I would be the Nana with a basket for devices by the door; that Grands would be required to drop their screens and connect IRL. This was my fantasy. But instead, I am the wild Nana who says “Anything Goes” when the kids come to our house. My daughter and her Groom said “NO” to screens until thirteen!

At first, we went along with their Luddite ways. I hated to see a toddler in a stroller clutching an iPad while sucking a pacifier! But lately, social media seems to have creeped into the Grands’ lives nonetheless. After all, mostly all of her friends have either a cell phone, a tablet or a smart watch. While we were walking through the ancient streets of Pietrasanta, I noticed the Love Bug, who will turn 12 this summer, doing a little dance move of her own here and there. I asked her where she learned it.

“Oh, it’s on TikTok,” she said. “All my friends are doing it.”

Poor Teddy

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Buona Sera

June 3, 2024 by mountainmornings

We are finally here in Italy, touring the country again with Marco and Claudio, but this time from their home in Viareggio. We awaken to church bells and cafe Americano in the garden. Flowers are blooming amid buzzing Vespas and even the sidewalks are arranged like quilts. A baby girl, Bianca, was born next door the day before we arrived and so her front door is festooned with pink ribbon.

We stroll just a few blocks to the Ligurian Sea where the sand is not too hot, yet. Only the Pumpkin has jumped in the gentle waves. We visit ancient cities and discover small, Bronze Age statues of people in a province of Lucca. Castle walls surround this whole town in Tuscany, as if to say we value every one of our people, not just royalty. Art is everywhere.

Did you know that because of the Spanish Inquisition (1478-1834), Jews brought the tomato to Italy?

Of course we are learning to cook the traditional food. Yesterday we made green lasagna noodles with two different sauces – a Bolognese and a Bechamel. The grands are enjoying the desserts, tiramisu and bignes, like profiteroles only better. Today Bob and I finally ordered a pizza for lunch on the Promenade, but it was like no other with fresh prosciutto and funghi.

If I were to define happiness, it would be now, this time with my whole family. Watching the Bug fill tiny ravioli while the Pumpkin works the dough through a pasta machine. Sitting on the sofa with Pietro, the truffle/rescue dog, and discussing design with Kiki over an Aperol. Walking in the rain with the Bride and Groom, and suddenly the Rocker takes my hand.

And Bob, forever mi amore, celebrating today our 45th Wedding Anniversary by doing laundry and caring for me. This cold I brought with me has turned into an infection. It’s OK. It’s life, I guess even this virus wants to survive in this beautiful country.

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Compelling Speech

May 27, 2024 by mountainmornings

There is a movement afoot in our country that is downright dangerous. A friend recently told me that silence is best, whenever Israel and Hamas and college protestors might come up in polite conversation. But as I’ve said before countless times like a mantra – it is silence and indifference that led to the Holocaust. At first with small things, like where Jews could go to school, and later with bigger things like where Jews could live and finally sending Jews off to “work camps.” It doesn’t happen all at once, genocide is a big word that begins slowly, with small changes in rules and regulations.

Between packing today for our twice Covid-Osteoporosis-delayed Italy trip, I happened to read about PEN America cancelling our country’s highest literary award ceremony. Why? Half of the participants dropped out of the running because they wanted PEN members to sign a petition stating that Israel was committing genocide in Gaza. And an anonymous group on X has created a spreadsheet, titled “Is Your Fav Author a Zionist?” complete with color-coded categories like “pro-Israel/Zionist!”

“Over the past several months, a litmus test has emerged across wide swaths of the literary world effectively excluding Jews from full participation unless they denounce Israel. This phenomenon has been unfolding in progressive spaces (academia, politics, cultural organizations) for quite some time. That it has now hit the rarefied, highbrow realm of publishing — where Jewish Americans have made enormous contributions and the vitality of which depends on intellectual pluralism and free expression — is particularly alarming… Compelling speech — which is ultimately what PEN’s critics are demanding of it — is the tactic of commissars, not writers in a free society. Censorship, thought policing and bullying are antithetical to the spirit of literature, which is best understood as an intimate conversation between the author and individual readers.” https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/27/opinion/publishing-literary-antisemitism.html

Compelling a literary society to speak in a certain way, to denounce a whole group of people, (and believe me at least 80% of Jewish Americans believe Israel has a right to exist, which makes us Zionists I guess) is using the same playbook as banning books IMHO. There have been over 4,000 book bans in schools in just the first half of this year! Parents, going to a public School Board meeting to try and weave their ideology or religious views into the curriculum, are misguided at best and malicious at worst. Our Founding Fathers would roll over in their graves because our very liberty is dependent on separation of church and state.

Of course being able to speak and write what’s on your mind presumes we live in a free society. But do we? Over 339 writers are being held in jails around the world, mostly in China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam. In this country, an ex-President can denigrate a judge’s family without being thrown in jail, he can mock reporters with cerebral palsy and talk about grabbing women by their privates. Nothing happens. In fact, he just might get re-elected. But when a comic, say Kathy Griffin, put a bloody picture of T’s head on social media, she was investigated by the DOJ and the FBI and was cancelled. Still, the twice impeached ex-Prez can call for a bloody rebellion…and that’s his free speech I guess.

This morning Bob only scooped five cicadas out of the pool, instead of 50, so maybe we’re over the hump? They should be gone by the time we return from Italy. Last week, Bob and I attended a 6th Grade debate in the halls of the TN Capitol; Hamas and Israel didn’t come up. But I was proud to hear these 12 year olds discuss AI and gun control. Our future Activists are bright and engaging, compelling even, and gave me hope. If only we could start a middle school through high school for Palestinians and Israelis.

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Ear Bug

May 21, 2024 by mountainmornings

There is a constant buzzing in my ears. Inside the house, it’s manageable; outside it’s another story. Shall I start from the beginning?

The Bride and Groom had scheduled a trip and we were all IN to be working grandparents… and granddog parents of course. Then it hit me – a sore throat. Why is it that ever since the pandemic, getting a common cold feels like a death sentence? I tried to keep my distance from the Grands – we ordered pizza for dinner – Bob did the driving – dog walking was passed down to the Bug and the Pumpkin. The problem is, Maple, the black/mix/killer/rescue dog, is on one mission and one mission only: she is single-mindedly determined to

Eat as Many Cicadas in One Walk as She Can Find!

“Ewwww Nana,” my granddaughter said, “she ate two cicadas while they were mating! and I could hear them screaming.” If that’s not a Hitchcock film in the making…

I tried to make light of the Bug’s budding fear of bugs. After all, I’ve picked hundreds of ticks off of dogs and children (and myself) over the years, and they can find some pretty strange places to burrow. I was proud of the baby Bride when we moved back to NJ because she was the only one of her friends who would pick up a daddy longlegs. We were country people, people!

But here we are, living in a semi-genteel southern city that has been attacked by cicadas. Granted they don’t bite, or transmit a horrible disease, still they are dang ugly, and LOUD. Their chorus is around 100 decibels in TN, akin to a Harley only not as nice. We still have our old windows in our new cottage so I can hear them humming all day. It’s like I have chronic tinnitus, with a cold to boot. When I venture outside to water the garden, the trees are shimmering with them and the noise is no joke.

I’ve swept the patio, picked them out of my new patio poufs, and we’ve been in charge of the neighbor’s pool while they are away which means Bob is routinely skimming around 50 dead cicadas every day from their filter. But the last straw was on Sunday when I was swimming with the Grands. I sent Bob home with the kiddos so I could finish my water exercises. I was so deeply grateful to be back in the pool, the water was warm and the sun was shining after a week of rain.

As I was getting out of the pool, feeling the weight of gravity return, a cicada flew right into my right ear!

It was screeching to get out. I was screaming for it to get out and banging the other side of my head. Somehow I knew not to put my finger inside my ear, I guess some medical knowledge does rub off? I grabbed my towel and ran into the street not caring what anyone might think of this wet haired swim suited crazy banshee woman. But in the few minutes it took to run across the street and find Bob, it must have flown out. After a quick investigation with an otoscope, I was pronounced cicada free!

Last night the adult children returned, and now we must pack for our next trip to Italy! I wonder if they have cicadas in Tuscany?

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Campus Woes

May 14, 2024 by mountainmornings

My brother, Dr Jim, reminded me that our Father graduated from Columbia’s Pharmacy School back in the 1930s. I knew that Jim was a Columbia alum before heading to Vietnam, and found out that Bob’s cousin was set to graduate from its School of Social Work! We first met Zoe when she was born in Rumson, and now she’s a beautiful young woman about to embark on her career. Only she asked her parents not to come to her graduation, beause she didn’t think it would be safe.

This is what it’s like to be Jewish today.

Graduations across the country are being rescheduled and cancelled all together. Why? Well, it’s complicated and quite simple, a contradiction to be sure. Israel is fighting a deadly enemy at its border… and Palestinians deserve to live freely. We are all adult enough to hold these two constructs in our minds. But there are biblical grudges and terrorist power plays. The extremists on both sides are destroying the dream of two states.

What if a terrorist group took over Mexico? What would we do? Never mind: “Organized crime groups are turning Mexico’s elections into a literal battleground, making the campaign this year one of the deadliest in the country’s modern history. More than two dozen candidates have been killed leading up to the June 2 vote; hundreds have dropped out of the race. More than 400 have asked the federal government for security details. The campaign of intimidation and assassination is putting democracy itself at risk.” https://wapo.st/4bCae1Y

MORE THAN 24 CANDIDATES ARE DEAD? I had no idea; and yet here, right here in these United States, we have a candidate who rambles on about a serial killer at a rally, postulated he could get away with murder on Park Avenue, and most likely considered hanging his vice-president if it meant he could stay in office. I Just. Don’t. Get It. And granted, i’m not watching the Manhattan trial of Mr T, I’d rather watch paint dry. Because right on schedule, our robin babies graduated to the backyard!

It was the day after a night of tornado warnings – a beautiful, cool sunshiny morning.

There was mild whooping and clapping as our birds flew the nest. Bob and I watched the first baby robin, perching on the edge, take off right into our maple tree! I was expecting a gentle flapping of wings with a soft landing in my begonias. But it was a flawless finish for the alpha robin. I immediately called the Bride and listened to the whole family ohhh and ahhh. And as we were busy kvelling, the second baby flew all the way out to our back fence, landed on the grass and promptly hopped up into Bob’s raised bed of vegetables.

It was 7 am and I hadn’t even had a cup of coffee. And I really needed that first cup because I’d been sleeping with one eye open. The last, smallest robin was still sitting in the corner, crying for his mama. We watched her return with a worm, or maybe it was a cicada, and she must have had ‘the talk’ with him because she didn’t come back. Over the course of the morning, we noticed the baby move closer to the far edge, but we gave up our post by the back door and went on with our day. We noticed our empty nest around lunchtime, and we vowed to keep the Little Emperor away for awhile.

I thought to myself, “Now we are empty-nesters again.” The week before the flash flood warnings and tornado sightings, I’d been waking almost every night to check on the robin’s nest. One night I thought i heard an owl. Another night, gigantic squirrels were bowling on the patio’s tin roof! I was returning to that sleep-deprived delirium of bringing home a newborn.

I read that Jerry Seinfeld spoke at Duke’s graduation on Sunday, Bob and the Bride’s alma mater. The comedian who joked about ‘nothing’ seems to have found his voice. Only a couple dozen students walked out of the stadium when he appeared, out of 7,000. They rose and left peacefully, because Jerry has the audacity to support Israel, to proudly declare his Jewishness. This is part of what he said to the Duke Class of 2024:

“Whatever you’re doing, I don’t care if it’s your job, your hobby, a relationship, getting a reservation at M Sushi,” he said. “Make an effort. Just pure, stupid, no-real-idea-what-I’m-doing-here effort. Effort always yields a positive value, even if the outcome of the effort is absolute failure of the desired result. This is a rule of life. Just swing the bat and pray is not a bad approach to a lot of things… also fall in love, not just with people, but anything and everything.”

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