Apr 21, 2024

Save a place for me

Posted by Lorianne under Life as Lorianne | Tags: , |
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In bloom

Last night, for the first time since my Mom died, I dreamed about both of my parents. We were watching the eclipse from the broad lawn outside a tall office building where I was employed, not either of the colleges where I work in real life.

As we were milling about, I ran into a neighbor and introduced him to a coworker who had the same name as his wife. My Mom and Dad mingled with the crowd of eclipse-watchers while I wandered off to look for crescent-shaped shadows on the sidewalks beneath a small patch of ornamental trees.

After the eclipse ended, my Mom, Dad, and I decided to walk to a nearby restaurant for an early dinner. I got a text saying either my Mom or Dad and I had to sign some important financial paperwork at CVS (?), but we figured we’d do it the next day since they’d probably be closed by the time we got there.

On the way to the restaurant, I got separated from my parents in the crowd of people leaving after the eclipse. Arriving at the restaurant alone, I found it packed with people, and my parents were nowhere to be found.

I claimed a table by the entrance to the restaurant and sat waiting, wondering if my Mom and Dad had gone to sign the paperwork without me. After spending almost an hour searching the faces of every customer entering or exiting the restaurant, I stood to leave.

As I gathered my things, I saw Mom and Dad sitting in a booth at the rear of the restaurant I hadn’t seen when I’d arrived. Before them were the empty plates of their finished meals, and at the end of the table was the untouched burger and fries they’d ordered for me.

 

Apr 19, 2024

Emergent

Posted by Lorianne under Flowers & plants | Tags: , |
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Daffodil field

Last month, J and I drove to Boylston, MA to see the annual orchid show at the New England Botanical Garden at Tower Hill. March orchids are hothouse flowers, cultivated to bloom indoors when the weather outside is harsh and inhospitable. Orchid shows are designed to give winter-weary New Englanders a respite from the season: a spot of color and warmth at a time when both are lacking.

Daffodils galore

Today, J and I returned to Tower Hill, but we didn’t set foot in the indoor conservatories. Instead, we headed straight to the daffodil field, where thousands of hardy flowers emerge every year, undaunted by the mood swings of so-called Spring. Both daffodils and tulips are bred to be ostentatious and obvious: there are no shrinking subtleties here. After months of relentless gray, we are as eager to be outside as perennials emerging from hibernation.

 

Apr 17, 2024

More to say than time to say it

Posted by Lorianne under Birds, Newton
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Norway maple in bloom

This morning while walking the dog, I saw a flicker fly across the street, just as I saw a flicker fly across Route 9 on yesterday morning’s commute. Today I also saw a pair of chipping sparrows foraging on someone’s lawn, and I heard a ruby-crowned kinglet singing. It’s one of my favorite bird songs: a bubbly tumble of rollicking notes, as if a tiny bird had more to say than time to say it.

 

Apr 15, 2024

Today is not that day

Posted by Lorianne under Good sports, Newton | Tags: |
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2024 Boston Marathon

This morning J and I watched the Boston Marathon from our usual spot on Commonwealth Avenue between Miles 18 and 19 here in Newton.

2024 Boston Marathon

Whereas last year’s race was cold and rainy, today’s weather has been mild and sunny: perfect for spectators, but verging on Too Hot for runners.

2024 Boston Marathon

J and I have been watching the Boston Marathon together since 2009, so every year we take the same assortment of photos.

2024 Boston Marathon

First, we watch the wheelchair runners race past, then we wait for the pace trucks that precede the elite men’s and women’s runners.

2024 Boston Marathon

Throughout our time clapping and cheering, we also see military marchers clad in camo, the usual assortment of police and first responders, and an endless parade of dog-walkers, parents shepherding children, and all sorts of sign-waving spectators.

2024 Boston Marathon

In Newton, the marathon is as much a parade, block party, and day in the park as it is an elite athletic event.

2024 Boston Marathon

Every year, I’m cheered by the spectacle of random folks cheering on friends, family, and random runners.

2024 Boston Marathon

If you run Boston in a shirt with your name on it, by God you’ll be greeted by 24.6 miles of random strangers yelling “Go, Brian!” and “Way to go, Jenna!”

2024 Boston Marathon

Boston is renowned for the passion of its sports fans, and on Marathon Monday, folks who spend the other 364 days screaming for the Celtics, Bruins, Red Sox, and Patriots will turn their fanaticism to elite runners and everyday Joes alike.

2024 Boston Marathon

This year, my eye was caught by a bold, brightly colored sign that said “There will come a day when you cannot do this. Today is not that day.”

2024 Boston Marathon

Perhaps because this is my first Marathon after my Mom died in December, this sign hit me like a barn door.

2024 Boston Marathon

For runners and spectators alike, there will come a day when we can’t do the things we currently take for granted: winter weather will drive us back inside, and old age, sickness, or death will stop us in our tracks.

2024 Boston Marathon

J and I have been walking to watch the Marathon together since 2009, but there will come a day when one or both of us are too old, too infirm, or too frail to do so. Today, however, is not that day.

2024 Boston Marathon

CLICK HERE to see all my photos from today’s Boston Marathon. Enjoy!

 

Apr 13, 2024

A day without work

Posted by Lorianne under Teaching & learning
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New hydrangea leaves

Last week when I arrived at class a little earlier than usual and most of the class was running late, the lone student present asked what I’d do if no students showed up. I chuckled and said the rest of class would arrive soon–and they did–but if absolutely nobody showed up, I’d read papers instead. There is, as the saying goes, no rest for the wicked.

I’m not sure my students–or anyone who doesn’t teach–realize that being a professor means there is always something to do. If you’re not in class actually teaching, you’re preparing to teach, or commenting on student essays, or answering emails. My student presumably thought that if students didn’t show up to class, I’d get the afternoon off, but that’s true only if sitting at a laptop reading and commenting on papers counts as “time off.”

I mention this not to complain about my work: every job has invisible labor, the things workers do that don’t get notice or acclaim, but are a necessary part of the job. For the most part, I enjoy the work I do: earlier this semester, this same student asked me what it’s like, honestly, to read and comment on piles of student writing, and I answered, honestly, that it’s not too bad if I have time to do it.

But the actual truth is this: during the semester, every weekend is a “working weekend.” Yes, I take time to walk the dog, write, and go to lunch with J, but at least part of every day is spent on teaching tasks. There’s no rest for the wicked, so it’s a good thing I like my job since during the semester I do something related to it every single day, weekends and holidays included.

When I lived in the Cambridge Zen Center, we read the Temple Rules once a week, including the dictum that a day without work is a day without eating. Since I like to eat, it’s a good thing I like to work as well.

 

Apr 11, 2024

The trail not taken

Posted by Lorianne under In a humdrum | Tags: |
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Lilac leaves

I have a recurring dream where I am hiking in a large park with a sprawling network of wooded trails. Before setting out, I study the trail map and decide to explore a far-flung corner I’ve never tried before, but first I walk to a nearby ravine where a river wends along a sandy shore, surrounded by moss-covered outcrops and the echoing calls of distant birds. Every time I revisit this dream, I wake before I leave the quiet cove, never venturing beyond the known path to deeper, more distant woods.

In last night’s version, the sky threatened rain as I set out to walk. Other hikers thronged the park’s visitor center, and another woman grabbed the last trail map ahead of me. After searing for more maps, I found a large, laminated one in a dusty closet, rolled up in a bird identification poster. I claimed the map but left the poster behind, rolling the map and tucking it inside my jacket, next to my heart.

As I set out toward the quiet cove, however, the paths outside the visitor center were unfamiliar and strange, branching into a meandering maze of well-trod trails. After arbitrarily choosing a direction to go, I came to an intersection where a huge red arrow on a sign the size of a barn door clearly pointed in the direction I shouldn’t go.

 

Apr 9, 2024

A sliver in the sky

Posted by Lorianne under Celestial signs | Tags: |
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Eclipse spotting

Yesterday I canceled my Babson classes and office hours so J and I could walk to our neighborhood little league field to watch the partial solar eclipse, just as we had in 2017.

Although we missed out on totality, there was enough coverage here–more than 90%–that the light turned weird–brazen and metallic, with too-sharp shadows and a dusk-darkened sky–and it got noticeably cooler, shifting from basking-warm to breezy-cool.

At peak coverage, the sun was nothing more than a sliver in the sky, grinning like a sideways smile.

 

Apr 7, 2024

Something more than money

Posted by Lorianne under Life as Lorianne | Tags: |
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Real estate documents

This morning my sisters and I spent some time texting back and forth. My sister in Ohio was going through some jewelry she’d taken from my Mom’s house before it sold–costume jewelry, not anything valuable–and she wanted to know if my sister and I wanted anything from the lot.

My sister in Floria claimed several pearl necklaces she remembered Mom wearing; I claimed a sunflower pin I think had originally been mine and a blue flowered pendant that might go with one of the dresses I wear. The rest will go to Goodwill along with so much of the rest of my Mom’s stuff.

This process of sorting through and divvying up my Mom’s things has been interesting because it points to the different ways people value things. None of the belongings in my Mom’s house are valuable in a monetary sense, but there are other kinds of value my sisters and I find in these objects.

My sister in Ohio, for example, recently mailed me the original real estate listing, buyer’s agreement, and mortgage from when my parents bought the house we just sold. These pieces of 45-year-old paperwork have no monetary value, but having them means something to me because they capture a moment when my parents were in their prime, moving from one house to a nicer one while expanding the number of rental units they managed. It was a moment of upward mobility, and I have the papers to prove it.

Another piece of paperwork my sister set aside for me is my Dad’s old Teamster union card and dues booklet. These, again, have no monetary value: my Dad retired years before he died, and any other person would have tossed these items long ago. But my Dad had kept both, so they, too, have sentimental value to me. They remind me of my Dad’s decades of back-breaking work as a truck driver: a working class job that enabled him to support my Mom, sisters, and me.

On paper, these pieces of paper are worthless. But in my hands and heart, they are tangible artifacts of my parents that mean something more than money.

 

Apr 6, 2024

Shook

Posted by Lorianne under Life as Lorianne | Tags: , |
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Almost daffodils

Yesterday was memorable on two counts. Yesterday morning, one of my sisters signed the paperwork on the sale of our Mom’s house, acting as power-of-attorney for me, my other sister, and both our spouses (in observance of Ohio’s archaic dower laws). At approximately 9:30 am, my sister texted to say the closing was done, so Mom and Dad’s old house–the house I’d grown up in–was officially sold.

Then, almost exactly an hour later as I sat writing, everything on my desk shook. I shrugged, figuring it was just a leftover gust of wind from this week’s nor’easter, until J emailed from the attic asking if I’d felt the tremor that had set the shelves in his office swaying.

A home closing and an East coast earthquake seem like disparate events, but as a writer–as a person perpetually prone to find meaning in things–I agree with Freud when he said there are no accidents. Selling my Mom’s house was a huge, earth-rattling milestone. In December, my Mom was freed from her body like a bird flown from a cage, and yesterday, just shy of four months after death, my sisters and I sold her coop.

My immediate reaction to the real estate closing was relief: it’s been a great worry to share ownership of a vacant house several states away. Every moment my Mom’s house stood empty, it was a financial liability I wanted to shake off. My immediate reaction to the earthquake, on the other hand, was mild bemusement. J and I felt an earthquake here at home in 2012, and before that, I’d felt quakes in Ohio, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire. The realization that the earth sometimes stirs and shifts underfoot isn’t exactly new.

Still, these coupled events seem symbolically linked. Sometime last night, I startled awake with a sudden realization that I’m homeless now. Obviously, this isn’t true, as I was sleeping in the house J and I own, but lying on the foggy edge of sleep, I felt unsettled and rootless, as if the earth had been torn from beneath me like a tablecloth snatched from a table.

For four months, I’ve been processing the realization that I no longer have parents; as Taylor Swift would say, “You’re on your own, kid.” Last night, I started to process the reality of having no parents and no more childhood home. They say you can’t go home again, and as of 9:30 yesterday morning, that is literally true.

Losing a parent, closing on one’s childhood home, and experiencing an earthquake have this in common: in each case, something you assumed to be stable, ever-present, and rock solid proves to be anything but. In the immediate aftermath of such upheaval, it’s natural to feel a little shook.

 

Apr 4, 2024

April fooled

Posted by Lorianne under How's the weather
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Sprouting day lily in snow

The wind is rattling the windows as yesterday’s nor’easter continues into today. There was a slick layer of slush on the driveway and a dense sludge of pelletized snow on the lawn when I took Roxy to the dog pen this morning, so we skipped today’s walk after she dutifully pooped and peed. Roxy doesn’t want to walk in this mess any more than I do.

On the ground, anything that was foolish enough to sprout is now blanketed in snow; on the trees, though, the wind is quickly clearing any sleet from buds and early blossoms.

 

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