christmas

Yes, I know: it's over. It happened so fast. No sooner was it Thanksgiving than it was Christmas. Correction: it was the day after Christmas, and I was walking down the hill with Darling Daughter to make a few returns (all just part of the routine). Just to complicate matters, it was snowing. Or slushing. It may even have been raining at that point; this was a weird storm in the way it switched back and forth as the temperature kept fluctuating. It really wasn't much of a blizzard — not here, anyway — although the media would say otherwise (and, in all fairness, I don't know the definition of a blizzard, so who am I to say?). All I know is that it was storming sufficiently that the stores were closing faster than we could get there, and that was putting a real crimp in DD's & my shopping/returning plans. Everything about it (about this whole holiday season, if I'm being honest) seemed a bit off, a bit late, ill-timed, including the it's-over-and-yet-another-year-is-behind-us realization itself. Seriously, I was just beginning to notice assorted colorful wreaths and decorations and doorways (who won the Newport Doorway Contest, come to think of it?) and — wham — it was over, gone, done. Fortunately, the kids were on top of it, all of it; they held our whole little Christmas concept and semblance of tradition/history together. They made lists, wrapped gifts, filled stockings, thought about things long before the last minute and were just generally unbelievably thoughtful and organized. Super Son (now relaxing in warmer climes with Super Girlfriend) even endeavored to choose one his favorite images from the past year and have it enlarged in the coolest real-life wrap-around way, as he thought it'd be just the thing (for me). And it was. Of course, there are other things that might be just the thing in the larger (less self-indulgent) sense. They'd be – some would go so far as to say there's only one thing anyone wants as a gift around here – key ...

We're hoping for a green light, of course.

And Super Son may have chosen this particular pic to enlarge/preserve because it had to do, tangentially, with his favorite band. All I know is I can't believe (really, I can't) that it was a year ago, almost: that day in the sand.

strings

It's hard to know how or why one thought winds it way to another ... sometimes. Other times, it's not hard at all. Like the other night, when I was standing before the bow of an Oldport launch dressed in winter finery (the launch, not I) in the parking lot behind the Clarke Cooke House. It was all too easy to remember taking a launch (one of the older ones, probably Can Do), its driver dressed in summer finery, to a mooring. I remember marveling, as I always do, over the expertise of the too-young-to-be-expert driver taking us precisely where we needed to go — though I will admit to feeling puzzled and maybe even a tad unsure about the fancy shirt-tie-belt ensemble, as it was a departure from Oldport-in-Newport attire ...

timber

There are some seriously big ol' trees around town. And while I recognize that it's sometimes scary to have a big ol' tree looming over one's house — we've actually been in that situation and had to make the wrenchingly difficult decision of having a big ol' tree taken down before it fell down (on top of us) — it still gets me every time.

So, when I happened upon a traffic jam (relatively speaking) on Kay Street Friday morning, and I could see a crane looming overhead in the not-so-distant distance, I suspected the worst before turning around and driving the other way. At the end of the day, coming in the other direction on Kay, the crane was still at work, along with a few orange-clad men and several noisy pieces of equipment.

This was a seriously big ol' tree ... the kind whose absence changes the landscape (and skyscape) and you just know another will never re-grow in that spot in my or your or even our children's lifetimes.

And it reminded me in some strange backward way of the ritual chopping down of a Christmas tree, something Mr. Betty and I had done two weekends back under somewhat more joyous circumstances — despite flying solo, or duo, with no kids (or dog) in tow — at a farm across the bridges with several of its own noisy pieces of equipment, designed to make getting a tree in the house as easy and mess-free as possible.

So, why is it joyous?? Chopping down a tree?? So that it can stand, albeit decorated, and undergo the slow undeniable process of dying?? In the LIVING room?? It made me think twice about all those poor little less-than-shapely (thereby lucky) trees that never get tagged at the tree farm ...

And in the midst of that admittedly bah-humbug thought, as various on-lookers hung around watching the weathered-to-the-point-of-mushroomed tree disappearing segment by segment before our very eyes (it almost hurt) on Kay Street, and I was about to turn toward home feeling slightly shaky and wondering how in the world I was going to recover sufficiently to finish the chore (yes, it became a chore at some point) of decorating our own drying/dying tree, and that maybe in fact I'd delegate the job to Darling Daughter and Super Son who would both be home later that evening, I did a double-take upon noticing the name of the outfit who'd come to do the tree trimming (ahem, felling) honors ....

light

Oh, the weather outside is (I hate to say it) frightful. Or, more accurately (as I'm not afraid of wind and rain so much as depressed by it), dreadful. Maybe it'll snow soon; that'd be delightful (don't you think?). Meanwhile, I set off this evening in search of holiday cheer after seeing an intriguing light display from the Pell Bridge as Mr. Betty and I were headed back from yonder shores (being Warwick and Cranston), where we engaged in Round One of marginally-successful holiday shopping (gasp, we should have shopped locally, though in truth I did a fair amount of that yesterday). Anyway, right there beside the bridge (just to the North) is a decorated dock worth noticing (in my opinion). It wasn't until I'd figured out how to get there (it's a little tricky) and was standing looking right at it that I realized (ding!) it was in fact a likeness of the bridge. Some things (even obvious things) take an alarmingly long time to realize. And, after that, I figured I'd just keep going, in search of more holiday spirit, as it was otherwise so dis-spiriting in the wind and rain, especially after a comparatively beautiful day yesterday when (it's hard to believe now) I took a bike ride around Ocean Drive (in response to Mr. Betty's wise words: "Whenever you get a bike ride in December, it's a bonus). And, just past Hammersmith Farm, I happened upon a mother and child ...

seasons

As we were tying the Christmas tree onto the car roof this weekend, I was struck out of the clear blue sky (however that happens) by some sort of parallel ...

graffiti

How many times have I walked the Cliff Walk?? No clue: many times.
And how many times have I read or even noticed the graffiti?? Um, never.

Some of it's beyond comprehension, and I've never quite understood the motivation, and the context makes it even more puzzling, and maybe I didn't notice it on purpose (as it's easier to focus on all the pretty stuff, until/unless one adjusts one's notion of "pretty"). But some of it's not all bad .....

There's a message there (there^), however faded, that has to do with loyalty to a certain surf shop, the bend at Ruggles being a prime surf destination. But not today. Today, given calm-ish conditions, I saw just one lone paddler navigating the rocky shore with his back to the sea. Which doesn't seem like a great idea, if you ask me ...

oh

I ran out of the house and down the back steps this morning past an assortment of little pumpkins leftover from Halloween in a mad dash for an appointment with my hair guy (whom I've mentioned before). Seems I'm always running late. Not a lot; just a little. Just enough that I'm rushing ...

And later — on my way to the grocery store for one of those dubious-looking green smoothies (also mentioned at some point) via brick sidewalks (mentioned) along historic streetscapes (mentioned) beneath inexplicable wonders of architecture — I passed a guy sipping coffee (oft-mentioned) while riding a Segway (yep, mentioned).

Which made me think ...

Mr. Betty and I went to a wedding a few weeks back; that's always enough to make you/me/anyone think about all the so-called water under the bridge. And as we were waiting to move from one stage to the next — from the cocktail hour to the dinner table out at Ocean Cliff, overlooking the bay, toward the bridge, just past sunset — we picked up a party favor with our names on it that told us where to sit. I liked it: the party favor (not to mention the clear sense of direction). I even saved it — a little wooden schooner — and had every intention of hanging it on the Christmas tree a few weeks hence. But its fragile masts snapped in two in my too-small handbag before we made it home, and it'd be difficult to glue it together again ...

Both kids — Darling Daughter and Super Son — were home for Thanksgiving. It was a swell few days, though it really got me thinking about time (again), and how it's not so much a continuum as a series of stages. In hindsight, anyway. Each child is fixed in my mind in steps: the baby, the toddler, the school kid, the junior high kid, and so on, but I have no sense of their moving from one step to the next. They just leaped (leapt?), or that's how it seems now. Tick, tick, tick — it's really not a smooth motion. Predictable, maybe, as it goes in one direction only, but full of stops. Starts ...

Steps.

As I drew to the end of First Beach where I'd been walking on Saturday — unlike the walk I took Sunday from end-to-end-and-back-again at Second Beach with Darling Daughter before she headed back to school — I ran into that river/rivulet/stream/whatever down by the ABC (and I don't mean the alphabet) where there's ongoing construction having to do with unpleasant matters exacerbated by storm run-off. I didn't cross. In summer, I would have leapt (maybe) or waded (maybe), but not now. Not into cold water. Not with sneakered feet. Not that particular stream. I just stood for a minute or two looking at a flock of gulls on the other side doing nothing-much-except-whatever-gulls-do and who stood looking back at me but paying no heed as if they knew I wouldn't leap so they needn't bother flying away ...

Which reminded me of time again. And how it flies, ticks, slides — sometimes slowly, sometimes quickly — just like all that (can't believe I'm mentioning it again) water under the bridge. Although here, in this spot, with no bridge in sight, the flow was going in both directions, almost cycling around (how many times have I cycled around?), in and out, out and in, which strikes me as a vastly preferable way of looking at things ...

So when I got home after seeing my hair guy — back to this morning, i.e., back to where I started — the tiniest of the past-prime pumpkin collection that's been sitting above our back door for a month or two without incident appeared to have fallen from its perch and was lying askew, but intact, on the step.

In case you're wondering what in the world (!!) I'm talking about, click here and notice the date. In typical fashion, I remembered something (an anniversary of sorts) one day late ...

debris

I don't know why it struck me as odd to see leaves at First Beach on Saturday. Once they're cast off, leaves blow everywhere; it makes perfect sense that some would land in the water, then wash ashore ... right?? Still, it/they surprised me: maple shapes, oak shapes, easily and not-so-easily unidentifiable shapes. Probably because leaves are such land-based things, while clam shells and seaweed are such sea-based things. It was odd to see them in the same place — that's all. Commixed & commingled, as it were (are those really words: commixed & commingled? they look odd for whatever reason, as words sometimes do).

And it was odd to see a tennis ball in the foam — huh?? I imagine a dog had lost it, or failed to fetch it (too cold? too far out in the waves?), unless someone hit a really long shot from up the hill at the Tennis Hall of Fame.

Honestly, one never knows what one might see when one isn't looking ... both at the beach and later in town, as one attempts (unsuccessfully) to embrace the mood prescribed by the season that's all-too-suddenly upon us ...

Yeah, yeah: but it's so much easier to love the past ...