The Other Side of the Ocean

I'll post in a few hours. First, some sleep.

I tell friends burdened with caring for young children – at some point you and they will be independent of each other and I guess that’s a good thing (sniffle)…


Independence Day. The Fourth of July and I have been trying to find a celebratory middle ground for years. While I truly appreciate the historic events that lead to the day’s glory, I’m not quite sure how we should conduct ourselves now to show our respect. And I say this not only as a newcomer to this country.


When the kids were little, we could have wound red, white and blue streamers around their bikes and had them join the neighborhood parade of little tykes doing the same, but I could never work up enthusiasm for the project. It seemed far and removed from the congressional approval of a document centuries ago.

Besides, whatever fun elements may have been had in biking with dozens of honking kids around the block, evaporated in a sea of mosquitoes and hot sticky air.


When holiday pomp eludes me, I compensate by cooking. I once made a splendid Fourth of July tart with “white” crème patisserie, blueberries and strawberries, and that worked, until someone noted that it was an excellent French tart.

Grilling was okay for a while, but now I live in a condo and frankly, there’s no one worth grilling for. I can’t see Ed taking enthusiastically to flipping seared meats of fish on a Weber. A llittle reminiscent of this kind of set up:





Last year, I decided to prolong my stay in France until the day after the Fourth of July. Expats in Paris tend not to put red white and blue streamers into their velos and so the holiday came and went and I relaxed.


But this year, I am looking the Fourth squarely in the eye. I’m in DC, with my two independent daughters.


We start the day with Washington’s newest kick – tangy yogurt. Mine’s with star fruit. In celeration of stars.













We take the metro and we people watch. The subway car has the pulse of the Fourth. I'm mesmerized.





In Alexandria, we get off and head for the Potomac. We rent bikes and take the trail to Washington’s estate at Mt. Vernon. Along the river.





In the days of George W (oh, surely you know I mean Washington!), this same path must have felt swampy and wet. Now, it weaves over and under bridges, past recreational parks, through well tended woods.





Still, it’s a lovely stretch of green space.





Closer to the city, families spread blankets, light up the Weber, slice up the watermelon. It’s hot and there is a threat of storms, but no one seems to mind. A park of relaxed faces. In spite of it all, in spite of what takes place in this place of government, there is this: a day to sit on a blanket and watch the children drip juice on their ernest young faces.



The city and the Fourth – it’s all interconnected. I see people carrying brochures which explain how and where to celebrate it. The Metro is rerouted, schedules are changed. On the Mall there is a swelling mass that comes from every corner of the country, and from across the ocean, on a strong Euro and weak dollar. To see what all the fuss is about.






We avoid the crowds. We go to our own corner, our own rooftop and watch, enraptured. So beautiful.























































It's easier then, on the rooftop, watching the fireworks, isn't it? It makes sense, right?

This evening I’m off. Flying the blue skies, heading east. Daughterland.

I leave you with a blue flower from my balcony. Or… is it purple?

A law seminar on the Capitol Square placed me downtown this morning. Done by noon, I head for the Wednesday off-the-Square market.

Nostalgia. I used to live here. I was, until last year, a downtown returnee. This market was my market. I know you – a vendor greets me. Or, your face… your name, hmm… from l'Etoile... give me a minute now… I forgive him, especially since I cannot remember his either.





Move out and names scatter and fizzle.

I run into one of the owners of l’Etoile Restaurant, where I used to moonlight. The Square is being taken over by a developer, she tells me. Ah – the threat of the overzealous developer. L’Etoile is wary. Ed, with a developer hovering by his land, threatening to put in rows and rows of houses, is equally uneasy. Me, I want the developer to hurry up and finish the work next to my condo. The site of the future Whole Foods has been a Hole in the Ground for a year now.

Our lives are made crazy by developers.

In the meantime, the Farmers Market is thriving. I buy strawberries and nibble through the box as I walk up and down the two rows of stalls.





I turn toward the lake. I like this walk – a common one for me not too far back. From Monona Terrace, down John Nolan Drive.





Our skyline. Madison. Pretty, even if forever changing her face. The Capitol, with its golden statue (sculpted by the same artist who gave us the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC) and white dome creates stability. To an extent.





At the lakeside, I get caught up in watching swallows. Ever try to photograph a swallow in motion? It has to be the most skittish bird ever. Dart, glide, swoop, never predictable, changing directions, your friend for a nanosecond, then off elsewhere. (Like downtown Madison?)





I get so engrossed in watching these birds, and the fishing boat inching toward the skyline, and the big boat collecting lake algae (seems daunting; okay, honestly – hopeless), and so I don’t notice the sky. Suddenly I am getting wet. The lake is getting wet too, but it doesn’t mind. I mind.





I find a tree, but then hear rumble. Thunder. A cyclist, seeking the same cover, asks me: are you a visitor here? (Oh, that big camera!) Time to move on. I walk briskly to the Washington Hotel Café on Lakeside. There, I order a double shot latte and I look at a book of photos of old Madison. Of a time when the downtown buzzed with people not with cars, and when the train station was packed with travelers on their way to Chicago and beyond.

No trains now. No station. Lots of cars. And developers.


At my condo, someone has delivered a wonderfully fresh and crusty baguette. A gift from Max (of Stella’s), the number one vendor at the Farmers Market. Oh, Max! Oh Madison!





UPDATE: the comment tells it all. In our little town, the early get rich, the dallying get white bread. The vendor in the photo is indeed Bill. It all comes back. His wee little tomatoes later in the season are to die for. As for Max's (Stella's Bakery) baguette: I am on a campaign to make these available daily, to all of us, somewhere in town. I pledge 300 halves per year, on the conservative side. Tonight, Ed and I consumed, no, devoured one in its entirety. It's not 100% like what it may be elsewhere, but it is pretty darn close and it is superb and that's all that matters. Thanks to the fantastically knowledgeable delivery boy (Barry)!

Remember the beginning of spring? Such hope! Entire houses could be built in a month! A field can be planted, then harvested!

So where are we at now?

The farmed fields next to Ed’s place are doing well enough. They seem green. Stuff’s growing.









The writer’s shed is a different story.

The old shed came down.
The wood was disposed of. Some was sold, some was burned.
The metal pieces were recycled.
The plans for the new shed were drawn. (And rerawn. And redrawn.)
The windows and doors were purchased. (What agony!)
The building helper (that would be Amos) was selected to, well, help. For a sum.
The insulation was purchased. (A terrifying ordeal.)
The land was cleared.
The trenches were dug.
The cables were buried.
The permit was obtained.
The siding and roof were ordered.
The landfill was purchased and dumped. (Anxiety!)

And now the issues begin to out-pace the progress.

The retaining wall holding together the eastern edge of the shed has to be reinforced.
The slope was created, but the cemented posts could not be dug in.
One digging machine failed. (Who knew that it was alergic to clay?)
A heftier digging machine failed as well. (You ask why? I cannot answer that.)
The guy with an even heftier digging truck never got back to us.
Amos stopped returning phone calls.
The mosquitoes wage war against us.

And still, we continue. I said this before: Ed has the patience of the world. It's a good antidote to spunk and haste. (I admit it. These are my bedfellows.)

I mean, it could not have been easy for the farmers next door either. Every day, late into the evening, they are out there, mosquito war and clay soil notwithstanding, working. Father and daughter. And just about every other combination of family member you can imagine.

You have to feel warm about this town. How many of you, out there in distant lands (sniff!), can lay claim to this scene on your way to pick up a cup of espresso?

Two deer, necking, in a field of corn… (go on, click on it for a close up if you don't believe me)





And then another: a deer, looking at me from behind.





It was a beautiful day. (Even though the mosquitoes were way too bloodstarved and the drill that Ed rented for the shed still did not have the force to make, well, holes…)


We watch the farmers spin their webs for the stalks that would soon give them the crop they so need.





Beloved Madison. It’s a tough place for the grumps.

What makes a day that? Not monstrously difficult, not high on anxiety, not any of that. But disagreeable.

I have a habit of eating a regular breakfast. So regular is it that I have been made fun of just on the issue of its never wavering content: granola, with berries and a café crème at the side. In good weather, I will eat this outside. In bad weather, I will eat it at the table, with all appended formality.

What can I say about a day where I wake up at sunrise, but do not get to this routine until well after noon?

Disagreeable.

There are good moments. I talk to all sorts of good people who are in less saucy states – including my dad (in Poland) whose birthday it is today. Happy birthday, tatek! (He doesn’t key in to the Internet; in this one way, my parents are alike: neither likes nor reads Ocean)

At dusk, I have no photo, no story, no mindset for a post. Ed comes over. We talk about dinner in between snarky comments about how difficult the other one is theoretically capable of being (you’re a handful gets tossed around for emphasis). Finally, we settle on an online recipe that promises health, fulfillment and cost effectiveness. We go to the grocery store. Still, no clue as to a post or photo.

On our way back, we turn toward the condo and to the right of the road, we come across … what, a Brittany sailor? A Normandy wind surfer? What? I am flooded with memories…





He’s clearly practicing. Ed, get closer, please, get closer!

I think we freak him out, spinning there, behind him, in the Department of Transportation parking lot in Ed’s old and rusty Geo… I try to convey greetings and good cheer, but any words shouted from the Geo tumble into nothingness.




We come back to the condo, Ed and I, and I fix the recipe for our simple meal. Ed watches the Last of the Samurai and I think how at one point I may have found it a fascinating movie.

A brilliant Saturday morning. Buoyant. Blazing with sunshine. The Westside Community Market is totally about summer foods and flowers. And the merchants? All grateful grins and wistful gazes.













It was a good morning.

After that? Well, there was the matter of the earth drill and it's incapacity (earth drills like only certain type of earth).

More. There was the matter of impending storms.





…that quickly passed.

Ed offered to buy me a cup of coffee and that was lovely. In an American parking lot sort of way.






Did I say basic? Our next stop was a discount store. Where you were supposed to be excited by the … leftovers.





I wasn’t. I sat in Ed’s pick up truck and tried not to pay attention to the (dented) scenery before me.






Back at the condo, people gathered on the roof to see if they could catch the biggest firework display in the Midwest, some miles north of us. Rhythm and Booms. I passed. But I did light my own stick of cold fire out on the balcony to see if it would remind me of childhood times. It didn’t.

Preoccupied. Ed is contemplating how to reinforce the retaining wall at the eastern edge of the writer’s shed. I try to follow his reasoning on this, but I confess to being only slightly capable of distinguishing between earth rods and anchors. If truth be told, I want only this much: that the project not become too difficult for Ed and that whatever we choose to do will be effective, so that the shed does not sink down into the ground, with me in it.

Meanwhile, I’m thinking about my summer class already, knowing that before it begins (in three weeks) a lot will happen, but the combination of events is yet undetermined.

And I’m starting work on a Fall art show which will include (gulp) some Ocean photos. Selecting proper ones is impossible. I visit one artist’s display and I read how her camera just flies into click mode and she is then astonished and pleasantly surprised at what comes out. Me, I am with hope when I click and profoundly disgusted thereafter.

And before I know it, it’s evening. I bike to the library to pick out some background noise (meaning bad DVDs) for the late night. I pass the Community Garden where a mom weeds and a little girl waits.




I can’t decide whether at the moment, I feel more like the mom, or the little girl.

Longtime readers may associate the phrase with my favorite eating places. Today, it has double meaning here, on Ocean.

I left my office to take a look at the Union Terrace by the lake. Rumor had it that the lake stank (from a build up of algae for all the known high water reasons). So much so, that biking along its shore (my route home) would be down there with driving through New Jersey.

Imagine my surprise then when I found the Terrace by the lake chock full of people. And they weren’t choking. They were eating and drinking – a lovely scene that puts the Terrace up there with your favorite café-brasserie. Outdoor tables, mildly alcoholic beverages, lunch foods, by the fairly fresh waters of Lake Mendota…




But the food! Chips? Buns with an unpleasant surprise? I’ll forgive the honey toned beverage – I know it to be yummy Wisconsin beer, with a hint of hop and touch of malt, etc. And I guess I understand the love of brats. It is an acquired taste and people do acquire it.








Sigh.

You could argue that brats in white buns (and they are very white, once you get past the paper thin outside "crust") are no more grossly fatty than a baguette with Brie de Mieux, butter, tomato and arugula.

Still, I crave the latter.

But hey, let’s get some can do spirit here! You want that sandwich, woman, go make it!

I try. No Brie Mieux at Whole Foods, but a nice goat milk cousin of it is equally pleasing. No shortage of tomatoes or arugula. Let’s skip the butter. And finally… oh! Where is the good bread??

I remind myself that Ed takes pleasure in such uninspired things as tortillas and powdered refried beans. With raw onion. And so we take my dream-wiches, such as they are, to our ever friendly and accommodating café and settle in.





A few steps away, we come across yet another Dane County market – this one in wild little Fitchburg. (Truthfully, Fitchburg is not wild. Fitchburg is a no-town. A satellite of Madison, it has no core, no center, no downtown, no personality. But is does have a market. And it is the postal address of Ed’s farmette.) Nice! Tomatoes, peas, berries...





Max, the owner of Stella’s Bakery is also there.





Stella’s is the winner of the best vendor award at Madison’s Captiol Square farmers market. Max grins when I congratulate him. If I am the number one vendor of the number one market in the US, that makes me the number one vendor in the US, right?
Oh! I see baguettes! They’re warm, too. And they look promising: crusty on the outside, not too rotund...

Too late. Still… Tomorrow, can I get these at your store?
I no longer operate a store. Just farmers market sales and some wholesale stuff.
Okay. You sell at my Westside Community Market. I’ve seen you. Can I get your baguette there next Saturday?
No, I don’t bring baguettes there. Too much demand for other stuff.
Fine, then at the downtown market?
No, not there either.
Okay. I’ll get them here in Fitchburg.
Can’t guarantee it. Sometimes.
Next week, please?
Alright. Next week.

Bottom line: lake’s okay, Terrace is business as usual, and good baguettes continue to be elusive on this side of the ocean.

I never had much use for it. Perhaps because I recognized its shortcomings. It doesn’t push you to be a better person, I’d tell myself. It pushes you to feeling putrid about yourself and there are enough other forces doing just that, so you may as well kick guilt to the wayside.

But these days, now that I’m less anxious about keeping things rolling, both for my family and my career, guilt is pushing its way into my everyday.

Consider this, for just a wee small example:

Ed gets going on the shed project at dawn. A forecast of severe storms, along with the imminent (you never know) arrival of Amos, make him nervous. He is almost done with constructing the frame for the fill dirt. At sunrise, he gets to it. By noon, the first truck load of dirt is set to arrive.

I’m busy with my own chores, back in condo-land, which include a very pleasant stroll down to the Hilldale market. (Madison has a bunch of markets during the week – you just have to know where to find them.)











By noon, I can’t stand the guilt. Ed is being ravaged by mosquitoes, he’s been working on MY writer’s shed since 6, surely I should help. And I do.













So sprightly is our effort, that within an hour or two, we are ready for truckload of dirt number two.

Unfortunately, the truck with the second load gets stuck in Ed’s driveway. The load is heavy, the wheels sink into the chips and soil. It’s a no go. We try everything, including digging great basins around the tires, putting boards down, you name it. The tires spin deeper and deeper into the now completely damaged driveway.

The driver calls his company for help. Me? I leave to continue with my own chores. But without the light heart. I am consumed by guilt at so many levels, I can’t begin to spell them out.

One chore is to pick up a replacement plant for one that died (long and boring story). And as usual, I pick up an extra plant, because it’s just so pretty. But I load it into the car with guilt. Didn’t I just spend my salary on travel? And now a plant?

I guess there is value in beating up on yourself. It’s sort of like beating on a carpet to get the dust out. Besides, after you’re done with the guilt, you have such gorgeous flowers to enjoy on your condo balcony. That has to count for something.

Amos, the co-builder of the writer’s shed, calls early. I’m ready to get on it now. I have the materials you wanted.

Ooops. We’re not ready to have him tell us that the structure is (almost) up and ready to be transported here. Leveling land takes patience and although Ed is known worldwide for his patience, he doesn’t much care for mosquitoes. And there are many, tons in fact, right now. So leveling land has become a monstrous chore and I am no help at all. Compare my role to his:











We move into high gear. Ed puts on Deet and braves the bugs and I bike over with my work, staying mostly indoors.

And by the way, it is great biking weather. Mosquitoes can’t keep up with cyclists. And there are a lot of us enjoying the many super lovely bike trails around the city.

…and outside the city. This is the point 7.5 mile from my condo, on my way to Ed’s farmette (a mere 12 miles from my home, via bike trails). Shades of green!









At the farmette, I check on our various plantings and retire indoors. I mean, the audacity! When the Wisconsin mosquito starts hitting on the French lavender, you know that it’s time to close shop and retire indoors.





And still, Ed continues to build the foundation for the shed.
In the evening, Amos calls. You gotta love his pace. Which has slowed down again. I’m back to yesterday’s prediction: sometime this summer there will be some part of a writer’s shed, somewhere. You just can’t rush life. Or Amos.

Am I hiding? Avoiding Ocean maybe? No, not really. But it’s tempting. Like the nasturtium flower on my balcony. It’s sort of marginal. Shy all of a sudden. Letting the leaf shine and take credits.



Some days it’s good to just not say much of anything.

The sounds of a Sunday back home:

Mosquitoes. I’m at Ed’s farmette and the buzz is horrific. Maybe if I butchered some of the grasses and shrubs, where they wait before hitting on us, they’d be less pernicious?
I take the lawn mower out and hack away at the weeds and grasses at the site of the future writer’s shed. So, the sounds of Sunday include a lawnmower running wild over Ed’s property.

The tilling machine used by the Hmong farmers renting land just to the side of us. (Whom are they renting it from? Don’t know. The developer maybe? Because rumor has it that it’s only a matter of years if not months before these fields will turn into a subdivision.) Working hard on what traditionally is a day of rest. When the machine is quiet, you know they’re hitting the weeds by hand.





Ed’s saw: he’s cutting beams to create the contours for the shed. The area is cleared now. (I took down the last tree that was in the way this morning. Ed doesn’t have the heart to take down trees.) But it’s not level. Our “co-builder” Amos is threatening to deliver the frame of the shed in a matter of days (which I translate to mean sometime this summer) and the ground is still far from even.

If you listen carefully, you’ll hear Ed’s five-pund hammer pounding in posts. I’m at this moment taking a break from digging holes for more possibly-dead roses.





Coffee? Yes! The sound of the motorbike. Past fields of green, to a very pleasant place. Just down the road. Fields of green and skies of… increasingly, gray.





So pleasant is this pause that we never notice the darker clouds taking charge up above. We race back with sounds of thunder and drops of rain chasing us to the shed. (The finished one, the place where Ed hangs.)


Meanwhile, somewhere in Paris, by the River Marne, you will have heard forks and knives clanking against plates as people settle down to serious Sunday eating.

Followed by a river walk. Shades of green.

Like ours? Just a little bit?