A Local Tourist?

“Boston is an oasis in the desert, a place where the larger proportion of people are loving, rational and happy.”

---Julia Ward Howe

Boston is the center of the universe. Now, before you get your map of the solar system out, and start telling me that it’s not even a blip in the vastness of space, zip it. Writers, historians, statesmen, and just regular Massholes have been waxing poetic about Boston for centuries. Ben Franklin was born here. John F. Kennedy was born here and, my personal favorite Bostonian/Vulcan, Leonard Nimoy, was born and raised in Boston. Both of my parents were born in the city, one in Charlestown and one in Dorchester. Even if we didn’t have so many accomplished natives, the city is a true jewel; there simply isn’t another place like it anywhere.

First of all, sports. No, Tom Brady isn’t getting a ring this year, and the Red Sox are in the dog house currently with a shameful controversy that never should have happened, but the Bruins are in first place in the Atlantic Division. The Celtics? Well, they’re struggling, but you name a team after the Irish, and of course, they will know struggles. Even when we aren’t racking up the trophies, we are behind our teams, 100%. Except you, Cora. Tell your story walking, off you go, get along now, we don’t need the likes of you.

Last week, friends of mine were in Boston for a conference so we made time to have dinner in the city. There are about a gazillion good restaurants in the city, but we chose the North End because it’s got everything you could want. Colorful residents, charming shops, amazing food, (cannoli anyone?), and beautiful architecture. There’s an energy that defines each Boston neighborhood, but the North End, well, it’s just special. The small streets, quaint alleyways, and tiny grocery stores that carry 150 different kinds of cheese make it magical, for me at least. It’s January, so the night was freezing cold, with a wicked wind off the harbor, but so what?

Walking from my office, just as the sun was setting, gave the city that deep blue glow that only happens on crystal clear nights. The skyscrapers of downtown seem to stand watch over the North End’s brownstones, while the light from restaurant signs and tiny apartments spills out on to the sidewalk. Inside cafes and bars, it seemed everyone was raising a glass, breaking bread, and reveling in their community. Sure, many of them had trucked in from the suburbs because there was a Bruins home game at the Garden, just around the corner, but they were part of the city, for a night anyway.

My friends arrived and couldn’t wait to tell me about their week. They’d been here before, but this time got the chance to wander through some of the more local sights. I congratulated them on finding the best local bakery because while the tourists always head for that very famous pastry shop with the celebrity pictures, they managed to find the tiny corner place, with the good bread and the homemade ricotta pie. We toasted with prosecco and gorged on delicious pasta and seafood, snugged into a tiny place with a view out to the hustle and bustle of Hanover Street. 

Getting to show friends even a little bit of my city, and share a meal is quite something. I became a bit of a tourist myself if one can do that in their own city. On the way back to the train I was snapping photos of the red glow of the Pizzeria Regina sign, the streetlights over the Saint Leonard’s Peace Garden and the silhouette of Paul Revere on his horse. I grew up going to Boston all the time with my father when he’d go to work and I was bored at home. I’ve been by these spots, and so many others, thousands of times. Why is that when you live somewhere, you become so used to what’s around you, that you almost don’t even notice what a gift these places are? How does it happen that we can overlook such a phenomenal environment?

For me, I’m going to make it a point to spend more time exploring my own city and surroundings. Shop local is a real concept, and I do that whenever I can, but maybe we should also look local? Really look around, even when you’re somewhere you’ve been a hundred times before. Put some fresh eyes on the old haunts, and they become new again. Of course, some things never change. As I turned a corner, I heard a burst of car horns and a woman with a wicked Boston accent screeching at a driver, suggesting he perform an act I’m fairly sure is anatomically impossible. God, I love my city. Home is where the heart is, so while I don’t live inside the city limits? Oh, oh, Boston, you’re my home.

The Making of a Minimalist

“Being messy is not hereditary, nor is it related to lack of time.”

---Marie Kondo

Ok, so there’s what being messy isn’t, but what about what it is? I would argue that being messy is about a whole lot of issues, including but not limited to genetics, time, aptitude, motivation, comfort levels, and so much more. We would all be minimalists if it was easy to figure out why we aren’t. For that matter, we would all be geniuses if we only knew how to better reach people in education. We’d all be a perfect size six, toned and healthy if we truly understood food, fitness, and nutrition. 

And so on, and so on. For every problem we have to fix, the solutions are an individual as we are. If you do a search for books about organization and cleaning up, in about a nanosecond you get 20,000 results from Google and Amazon. Marie Kondo is the current darling of the home organization space, but she isn’t the only one talking about it.

I read her book. While it’s hard to argue with success, since she has helped so many people, for me, deciding what sparked joy and whether or not my jeans and socks are really happy in the cramped bottom drawer of my dresser left me too much in my head and not enough in the process. Someone told me once that his mother always said, “The best cleaning tool is a garbage bag” and honestly, she’s right. Sometimes you just have to haul butt and go at it, rather than picking up every last knick knack or pair of shoes, trying to decide how you feel about them.

That was the challenge recently at my house. My daughter decided to become a minimalist. You’d have to know her to know why that sent me into a fit of laughter so hard I nearly needed a new pair of pants. The girl owns 27 pairs of black leggings, all of which she swears are different, but I can’t tell a Lulu from a Nike Dri-Fit so what do I know? You want to talk socks? She could outfit a family of centipedes. Add in framed pictures of friends, cheer bows, Alex and Ani bracelets, hair scrunchies, and water bottles of every shape and size and you get the picture. I’m not sure one can be both a VSCO girl and a minimalist, but either way, her room was a disaster.

I turned to a dear friend, who has the ability to design spaces, to take input on what someone wants from a room and turn it into a real haven. She knew to ask my daughter questions like “Where do you think is the best place for your beauty gear and tools?” and “What spot works best for your pictures so you can see them easily?” The questions I was asking were more like, “Mother of God, Devin, how did this happen to your room, did a Viking horde stomp through here while I was out?

She started by getting rid of the old kiddy bed with its Dora the Explorer stickers, and putting in a new wrought iron daybed (thank you Buy Nothing Marblehead!) and from there it became about setting a scene. Sure, there was trash to be tossed, old clothes to be donated, and a major dusting and vacuuming effort, but having someone who can visualize efficiency and order is invaluable. I wouldn’t know efficiency and order if they jumped into my lap and called me Mommy.

 Within a matter of hours, the room was a calm oasis of neatly stored clothing, pictures of friends, and precious mementos. There was also a huge pile of garbage bags all ready for the trash or the donation box. There are still enough pairs of leggings for an entire yoga class, but they are stored neatly. They may or may not be experiencing joy; I forgot to actually ask or consider that, but it’s not even my room and I’m ecstatic. Watching this effort unfold, it struck me that it’s about more than just dust and clutter. It’s about how we want to live and, sorry Marie, for me at least, figuring that out is going to take more than your book of magic joy. Eventually I will get there. Maybe.

Still, it was a start. Now that I have a secret weapon of someone who knows the hot mess that I am (and will likely always be) perhaps there will be some forward progress in bringing order to at least a few parts of my life, like my desk or my kitchen. Of course, we are all happier when we operate in an orderly environment, that is hardly news. Getting there is different for us all though. I will be stocking up on garbage bags though, and I will try to make a dent in some of the disorder.

Weather the Weather....

“Whether the weather be fine

Or whether the weather be not,

Whether the weather be cold

Or whether the weather be hot,

We'll weather the weather

Whatever the weather,

Whether we like it or not.”

----Anonymous, British poem

The poem above was part of the vocal exercises the cast would do to practice British accents at rehearsals for the production of “A Christmas Carol” that was just performed in the Jeremiah Lee Mansion. It worked for that, but it’s also a much lovelier way of saying, “Suck it up, Buttercup.”

Photo courtesy of Ramsay Hoguet via All Marblehead Happenings Facebook

 

It’s normally this time of year that I start to kvetch about the weather. It’s cold. Yes, I get that we live in New England and it’s December and it’s supposed to be cold. Of course, I could live somewhere else, maybe, but this is home. Still, the other morning when I got up in the dark and came home in the dark, it was cold enough to test my frosticles. Or something. It’s about now that I start bargaining with the universe, thinking, “Well, OK, cold is fine, but no snow, OK? I promise I won’t complain about the cold, if there’s no snow.” As if somehow, I had the power to negotiate weather terms with Mother Nature. Every year though, it happens. We’ve yet to have a major dumping of snow (maybe the universe is listening to me?) so that’s good, but it’s coming; it will happen sooner or later.

 Last weekend, a friend came to town, driving down from her home in Vermont. In December. Yet it didn’t snow there, here, or anywhere in between, which was a welcome change. More than a few times, trips have been cancelled because of snow. On one journey I made up to VT, it seemed that all was clear; until Bolton Flats. Bolton Flats is a weather anomaly, a small area where a rogue snow squall can blow up out of nowhere. It went from cold, crisp and sunny, to white out blizzard conditions in a matter of minutes. As the highway curved around the Green Mountains, there was a pile up of more than a dozen cars and one semi, which was sideways across the road, with the cab firmly embedded in a tree. Bumpers were hanging off cars, fenders were bent, but no injuries, thankfully. Whether we like it not, there will be always be some kind of weather mucking up plans.

My son’s scout master used to say that the weather doesn’t determine what they do, only what they wear. Easy for him to say, scouts are always prepared. I can’t get through a winter without losing one glove from every pair I own and going arse over teakettle into a snow bank because my bootlaces came undone. Boy Scouts go hiking in this weather, some of them sleep in tents, in the snow! I need twelve extra blankets, thick socks, five loaves of bread, three gallons of milk, and a hot toddy every time the weather report even mentions snow.

But the poem is correct, and not just about the weather. There are so many things happening in the world right now, and most people are unhappy about much of it. Regardless of which side of an issue you take, it’s not always going to go your way, and there will be outcomes you can’t change. Then what? Sit in a corner and complain about it? That’s hardly the best use of your time. Sometimes, you just have to weather the weather, even if it’s raining down trouble, and you’re stepping in puddles of incompetence and attitude wherever you go. There has never been a winter that didn’t, eventually, give way to spring and better days. For now, the sun, when it does make an appearance through the grey clouds, is coming up later and going down earlier, giving us too much darkness and not nearly enough daylight. It will turn though, and then we can complain about the mud, or the rain. Summer will come and for many it will be too hot, or too humid, or not hot and humid enough. The ocean will be too cold, the sun will be too strong, and at least one BBQ will be rained out. And so it goes. Mother Nature can be a real Princess Crankypants sometimes, but it’s our job to weather it.  Suck it up, Buttercup.