Fall Colors!

Just a brief post to show everyone some of the fantastic colors that have been showing up on the trees of Boston. This fall we have been very lucky. Usually we will have colors for only a couple of days before we get a huge storm that blows all the leaves away and we are all sad in a world of bare trees.

I will begin with my two favorite sunsets beginning in August. The first is from the reservoir near our apartment. The second is the Charles River.

Next is a series of trees. The first is a lone yellow tree that looked lovely next to the pond in the Public Garden.


This is a cluster of trees from across the pond.

The island in the middle of the pond



This tree was a huge standout. Really the most colorful thing...


The leaves had fallen from the previous tree. It was like a field of flowers....

General Washington surrounded by all the colors.


There you have it folks. Autumn in Boston for your viewing pleasure.

Where the Wild Things Once Were...

Escapism. A term which aptly describes my ability to cope throughout life. Growing up as an only child, I used every silent moment to escape into an imagined world where my bedroom became my secret cottage in the forest, and my dolls were children I was bidden to protect. I never knew at the time if my behavior was normal, and I know now that it has never really left me.

"Where the Wild Things Are", a movie that came out today, reminded me that children need their imaginations to work through their real life issues. Imagination is about as complex as the human brain gets, yet as children it is the most natural thing, and therefore the best tool we have.

Max, the small boy who takes up the lead of the story, is a child who means well, but doesn't know how to control his emotions when things get frustrating for him. He takes out his anger in destruction rather than with words, and when he tries to talk he feels that no one listens to him. In order to deal with the problems he feels are occurring in his home, he flees into a world of imagination. In this world, the main players are strange looking beasts who live in a society fraught with its own problems. Max makes them believe that he has come to save them from their pain, and they all begin to live life as though there are no cares. However, when this attitude is taken things never really improve, but are instead shoved aside to be dealt with later. In his time with "The Wild Things," Max discovers that he is not strong enough to conquer so many problems, and that he needs help. This discovery leads to the decision to go home to his mother, who will be able to give him what he needs to move on from his hurt.

This movie made me remember so much about the simplicity of childhood thought. The human imagination has a tendency toward the ridiculous, and is riddled with non sequitur, and I was thrilled to see so many examples of this idea scattered throughout. Each oddity is dealt with in much the same way as any normal occurrence; that is to say nothing is questioned when it seems odd. The questions are directed at important issues which are universally understood and far more commonplace, which seems the most appropriate way to approach the inquisitive nature of a young boy. Young boys are experts at enforcing the laws of ridiculousness, but given the rulebook of real life, a slower process is taken to breaking down the stubborn barrier between reality and fiction.

Example: Give a boy a stick, and he may tell you it is a sword used to kill ghosts. Give the boy the same stick and tell him that he must use it to cook a hot dog over a fire so he will not go hungry. He is more likely to take the stick and wave it around in the fire to see what kind of shapes he can make with the smoke than to try cooking his hot dog. Then he may wonder later why he is hungry. The struggle he will face with feeling hungry may lead to frustration, then the angers brought by an empty belly, and eventually a parent to tell him that he should just cook his hot dog if he is so hungry. Simple right? Well, your simple is quite different from a child's simple. A child's simple is that the world should just work without having to do anything about it. Your simple is that if you try to add something to the world, it may work in your favor. All of this contrary to a child's simple, which seems incredibly complex from where we stand.

And here, at the end of my immediate thought process I am brought back to the first word of this entry. Escapism. This movie helped me to escape...but here I am afterward analyzing the hell out of it, and feeling compelled to take it much further. The older we get, the harder it is to stay out of reality, and that is considered normal and right. But I am often saddened by the knowledge that I am not what I once was, which in essence is a font of creativity. These days it is difficult to write a simple set of lyrics without struggling to see a world in poetry that is different from the room and the walls in front of me.

Lucky for us, Director Spike Jonze never grew up. Otherwise there never would have been such an amazingly powerful and incredibly accurate cinematic look into the dynamic world inside a child's mind.

Marriage: A very old institution

America has very few customs that stay solid and important, save for Marriage. In the last few years the news has been a-buzz regarding "safe-guarding the institution of Marriage." This simply means "let's keep it from consenting and loving adults if they don't follow our criteria." Terrible and cruel as I personally find this fact to be, it is true that Americans hardly have a single ceremony that is shared among all religions and that is taken so seriously, besides Marriage.

All soap operas have at least 15 weddings a month. The only thing more common on those shows is murder, and possibly resurrection.

Little girls dress up as brides and walk down their hallways to the cheers of their teddy bears. Little boys try very hard not to be involved. I myself would use one of my mother's slips as a veil on a regular basis.

Songs, movies, books, you-name-the-media-source, are filled with stories of weddings, divorces, unrequited love, etc. My point is...people are taught to want it very badly. I myself have always wanted to get married. The funny thing is...now I know for sure I am going to.

Yes, of course all of the people who read this blog already know: Jon and I are now engaged. Wait. That didn't feel right. Let me try that again....ahem. JON AND I ARE NOW ENGAGED!!! Much better.

The excitement is palpable, and everyone so far has been incredibly supportive and excited right along with us. Now I shall tell the story of this future institution's beginning.

Long early story short, we met in high school. I was 16 (a Junior) he was 17 (a Senior). After a year we didn't want to break up, and off he went to college, to begin our first year of long-distance relationship. Could have gone worse, I think. We could have broken up, and then where would we be? It was very hard for the two of us, being so young and full of dramatic hormones, but under the circumstances we really made the best of it.

Total we were apart in that way for about a year and a half. He switched schools, moved to Boston, made things a little harder. Gave me a promise ring. I moved to Boston soon after, and we suddenly had to learn how to be around each other on a regular basis again.

Now, nearly six years since the beginning, we are happy, generally healthy, Jon has a new job that is going to change everyone's attitudes for the better. The only thing that could have made this any better was to commit ourselves to each other for all to know and understand.

This weekend Jon had planned a secret trip. He had told me about the secret trip in advance. And I, not being an idiot, pretty much knew what was coming. We had talked about it some. I had shown him rings I liked. It was on the table.

The surprises revealed a weekend in Portsmouth, NH. We had never been there, and most of our vacations are in places like this: adorable towns with lots of cute shops, usually by the ocean. It was lovely. Our hotel was called The Ale House Inn, and couldn't have been cuter. The room was stuffed with amenities. The bed was super comfy, the TV was flat screened and high definitioned. Just adorable.

After walking around the town for a couple of hours, he led me to the place where we would be eating: The Dolphin Striker. It was a lovely restaurant, with an air of rustic charm. We were there early in the evening, so few people were headed to dinner just yet. It made for a perfect intimate setting.

Now the part you have all been waiting for (I know I digress, but this is MY engagement dammit): The waitress took our orders, and brought us our wine. Mine was Two Princes Riesling, his was a Chardonnay. Jon remarked that we didn't have anything to toast to yet, and proceeded to remove a ring box from his pocket. At that very moment the waitress came back and asked if we wanted lemon for our water...to which we hurriedly shooed her saying "no thank you!" As she left, he set the box on the table, looked me in the eyes and said "I have loved you for a very long time. Will you be my wife?"

I said I would think about it.

Pah! After six years of getting over being young and learning to live our lives together? No dude. I said "Yes! Of course!"

He slipped the ring on my finger, I shed a few tears. No one noticed. Very discreet. No "Oh my God! That couple over there just got engaged!!! Congratulations! Oh how romantic!" We had the moment just to ourselves. Later I asked the waitess to take a picture, and told her that we had just got engaged.
We left dinner, and were thrown into a crazy world of calling friends and relatives, telling the story over and over again, staying happy and excited all the while, hearing happy and excited reactions, and just generally releasing some pent up anxiety. When we had first discussed the possibility, fears had crossed my mind that our parents would not react favorably. Why? I don't know. They all love us both. It was just a fear, and now it is gone. They are all happy for us.

We concluded the evening by seeing the local production of Gypsy, and retired to our cute room, exhausted and happy. And now we are facebook gossip...or we were yesterday. The FB community is so fickle.

Disregard the lack of ring. This was before dinner.



My hand on his.


Ring in box.

If you are still reading I applaud you. I just had to get all the important bits down...though I certainly had things in this entry that were not important...but still fun.

Final tidbits:
Jon's mom congratulating me and then saying: "What do we do now? Panic?"
Jon's sister offering to get certified so she can perform the ceremony.
My parents' sweet reactions
My friend Jackie saying "Oh my God! I'm so excited for you two!" about thirty times before letting me speak.

It has been swell...needless to say. Now to start planning....the WEDDING! *dun dun dunnnnn*

The Trees Are Like My Cousins

I have been trying to get into photography. I don't have a fancy-big-impressive-looking camera, but I have been very intrigued by the quality of pictures I can get from my Olympus Stylus digital camera.

My most recent subjects have been plantlife that I see in Boston and elsewhere. I think this is because I have always been drawn to the interesting shapes that trees can make, probably due to my early introduction to nature, and my father's ongoing love of woodworking. Recently I had some time to kill, and decided to spend it wandering through the Boston Public Garden finding pretty things to document. Below are some of my favorite examples. Click to see a larger image.




There are several more that I quite like, but I think I will load the whole album onto facebook, so it can be viewed there. This is just a show of the ones I was especially proud of. Let me know which ones you like best!

EDIT: The larger images are huge. In case you already are not aware of this, if you are using Firefox you can zoom out by going to View, and then Zoom. From there you can find the keyboard shortcut if desired.

Subculture: Tourists

Mid-August = Limbo. School starts on September 8, so things are weird and stagnant at the moment. The one thing that really keeps me energized (and also takes all of my energy and throws it out the window) is my interaction with summer tourists. By this point it is a huge rarity when I am truly surprised by someone's behavior toward me, the lowly sales associate in the MFA gift shop. There are a few types of customers.

1. The Rich One: A person who is wealthy, drops money as often as possible, and likes to treat you like a member of their staff. For instance making you show a lot of things to them that are not easy to access or put away, or describing in detail what something is made of, how easy it is to break, and where exactly it was made.

2. The Overly Polite: The person who feels like they should consider the feelings of the sales associate, but in doing so makes it obvious that they are trying very hard to be polite in a situation that is not really in need of that much courtesy.

3. The Scientist: This person views the sales associate as a robot that they created for the purpose of being efficient, and should neither talk too much, or be regarded as anything other than a machine.

4. The Therapy Patient: Love this one. These people talk to you because they think it is your job to make them happy, like a therapist. While you have a line of customers coming from every which way, they will find a way to engage you in conversation and not let you out until you are up to HERE with their life complaints/hilarious anecdotes/artistic opinions.

There are certainly more, but these are the main ones that I encounter.

So to clarify: A sales associate is simply a person behind a desk selling you items. Let me emphasize PERSON. Not a member of your staff, a robot, or a therapist. I happen to like my job for the most part, and all in all the different types of customers keep me on my toes and interested. But I still like to be treated like a normal person every once in a while.

I happen to have a relatively good amount of knowledge about the things that we sell in the store, so I am happy to divulge, but there is a point when The Rich One has to figure out that nothing we have is going to satisfy their fantasy dreams of everything in a gift shop being of the best possibly quality (especially in this economy). We do what we can. If you don't like it either get over it, or go somewhere else.

Also the Overly Polite is not really a problem, just amusing. It becomes kind of a contest to see who can include the most "pleases" "thank-yous" "you're welcomes" "have a nice days" and so on. It is again a problem of feeling like I am not being treated like a normal human being though. If I was one of their work relations, friends etc, they would probably not be doing that.

"Yes, how may I help you?" was not programmed into me. "Are you a member of the museum?" certainly was. So I'll give that at least to the Scientist. Maybe it is just because I naturally smile at people as I pass them on the street that I am so fascinated by people who refuse to do the same. They go out of their way, it seems, to avoid friendly contact. All I can say to that is "What the hell are you doing shopping at Faneuil Hall??" This is the biggest tourist spot in Boston, meaning there are lots of people that must be encountered. Hmmm....

And ohhhh the Therapy Patient. My favorite example is from a week or two ago when a woman called me and asked about the exhibits on display in the museum. Before long by some weird twist in the planets I was being informed about her reaction to her brother's death, and how her mother never loved her right. Half an hour later I had NO WORDS and she finally thought it was a good time to end our session. I should have gotten her address. Then I could have sent her a bill.

Just stick to the Golden Rule people. Treat others as you want to be treated...Unless that is what you are already doing...in which case...oh man.

A night in the life.

The strange clarity that comes from being extremely tired is one that I battle with nightly. Or rather we battle, and then we settle down for a nice cup of tea, while asking each other why we had to be so at odds.

This clarity is the dimly lit, sepia colored world of little things that I love to look at, mixing with the unrelated thoughts of worlds of my imagining or recollection. The books I read, the websites I surf, the many many times I sit with nothing in my hands swimming and deciphering the coded oceans of my mind. My mind is a globe, a glowing orb, an anomalous sphere with depths uncharted and terrain undiscovered. How I wish so many nights that I could have a full understanding of this world within my skull.

Love is the strangest thing of all. The songs all tell me so. The poems. The films. Never did they tell me why. The why is the key. Key of See please. I see now that Love is the part that makes no sense. The noun is complete when it remains nameless, otherwise it becomes so fragmented and threadbare. L-O-V-E has so many limitations, rules, boundaries. Take away the word and there is no reason that we can't have it all.

And Oh how appropriate that the rain should begin to fall, splashing sound in my ears as everything else melts to a solid black somewhere behind my computer screen. The rain has stayed with me. It is like a guardian that I often try to push away. When I was younger I imagined that I was a rain goddess, willing the clouds to spill on me at my whim. I think now that I don't force my wishes anymore, the clouds are making up for all the times they disappointed me. Each and every time I hear that sensuous sound against the glass in my windows I imagine myself dancing in the drenching weather. Not one time do I oblige. Out of logic. Out of fear. Out of loneliness, poise, self-consciousness, loss of imagination, lack of destination, vanity.

When I close my eyes and remember my soul, I see the color purple.

The End of an Era - or - The Massacre of Boston

My Boston Culture updates from FOREVER ago were only the tip of the iceburg as far as this summer went for adventuring. For this I have Traci to thank. If it wasn't for her meticulously created, scribbled, rescribbled, revised, checked off, and crossed out list of things to do before she left Boston to move to LA, I would have been stuck twiddling my thumbs most of the time. The final list that the two of us completed looked something like this:

Boston Public Library tour
Walk around Boston Harbor
Institute of Contemporary Art
Lulu's Bake Shop
Isabella Stewart Gardener Museum
Harvard Square
Harvard Museum of Natural History
Bartley's Burger Cottage
Scooper Bowl
Museum of Science
The State House
Frozen Yogurt Excursions
Brunch Excursions
Becoming regulars at Busy Bee Diner
Touring Providence, RI
Picnic at the reservoir in our neighborhood
Pizza from Pino's
Christian Science Center Mapparium
of course Museum of Fine Arts

This list does not include the other adventures we had together during the spring such as the New England Aquarium, the amazing brownies we baked, learning that pigs in a blanket are better with cheese (what isn't?), adventuring in Ikea and numerous other things. It also doesn't include the many other things that were on her list that she completed without me. This woman was on fire. She had a fever. And the only way to cure it was more cow-bell.

One of the many reasons that all of this was made possible is that ALL of the museums we went to were attended FOR FREE due to the wonderful perk of working for the Museum of Fine Arts. I can't imagine how much more broke I would be if that wasn't the case.

Now we near her last day in Boston (T minus three days) and I can't help but sentimentally reflect that her presence has had a profound impact on my happiness this year, and I am going to sorely miss her. It is my goal, and I hope it will be hers, to make sure that I keep in touch with her as much as possible, because it is a rare person who has enough initiative to make so many wonderful experiences possible.

I leave you with this:




and this:




Yup. I spent my summer with this girl.