Special Status

Cheerleaders.  They were peppy goddesses.  I was awed by them in high school.   I watched them at basketball and football games, how they'd crouch so they wouldn't obstruct views of the game, their pleated skirts fanning out on the ground.

Varsity cheerleaders at my high school in 1968

Some of them were not only pretty and fun, but smart.  And popular.  How did they do it?

One of my new readers was a cheerleader at my high school. Now, of course, she is a regular person, but then she was a cheerleader.  In my mind, I can't get her out of uniform.

She says being a cheerleader worked against her with some people, that even in high school some kids blew her off and thought cheerleaders "were stereotypical boy crazy airheads, selfish brats."    I thought about this, and I realized that by the time I got to college, this status had lost its allure, and I looked down on them a bit.  Now, in this post-Title IX world, she says, "I think I'd try to earn a Varsity letter in a sport instead."   Whoa!  She's moved on.  I've still got her on a pedestal.

But this applies only to cheerleaders at Del Mar High School from 1964-68.  These days when I see the prancing, overly made-up, silcone-enhanced cheerleaders of professional sports, I think, oh, for God's sake!  Bimbos!  T&A!  And when I go to Cal games and see the pom-pom girls dancing around, I think,  get a life.  

But adolescence prevails in some cranny of my brain.  Odd.

Origin of a Quilt?

When we were in  England in  2009,  my cousin Clement and his wife took us to Down House, the home of Charles Darwin, in Kent.  This was  thrilling to Jerry, an evolutionary biologist, and fascinating to me and not only because of Darwin, although the exhibits were very good, and we saw the actual study where Darwin wrote "Origin of the Species."  What was riveting to me was our mode of transportation.

My cousin, who's known as Clem, is a fast, masterful, cranky driver.  He's the only person I know who actively fights with the GPS lady while driving at top speed down country lanes.

"That's bloody WRONG!"  he'd shout and go in the oppposite direction.  "She doesn't know what she's talking about."   Clem own numerous motorcycles, a "camper" (motorhome), and a "peoplemover" (van).  We were in the peoplemover.

"Darling," his wife May would say.  "I'm not sure that's the right direction."

"This way's shorter,"  he'd bellow,  and on we went.   His irreverence was thrilling (defying the Bossy Tart!). 

Clem having a rest

Yesterday I was reviewing this expedition, because I'm making a quilt that seems to be about scientific specimens.  I got out the English Heritage guidebook I bought at Down House, where the Darwins lived for 40 years (during which time he became an expert on barnacles, among other things).  The grounds are extensive, and Darwin used them as an open-air laboratory.  You can go into the greenhouses,  the extensive museum, and many rooms staged as they were when the family lived there.  Jerry looked at everything.  Clem pooped out.

 Finally, we  all met up in the tearoom, where Clem was re-caffeinated and prepped for the exciting ride home.

The rear of Down House,  Darwin's home for 40 years

A greenhouse, specimens, and a primitive microscope at Down House

A quilt about specimens?

Time for The New York Times

Yesterday, at loose ends, I escaped my house, not quite sure where I was going, and headed south.  I stopped Grocery Outlet, a cheesy store I don't like but which has very good prices. I bought seven boxes of Cheerios and seven jars of peanut butter and dropped them off at the Berkeley Food Pantry.

 Then I headed out Highway 13 to Montclair Village in the Oakland hills and bought a Starbuck's hot chocolate and the New York Times.  I read the  Times closely.  I found all kinds of news I don't see in the SF Chronicle and resolved to order a daily subscription, after years of resisting. 

I mentioned this today in e-mail to Chris Yee, a pal from high school.  He replied:

"Funny that you should mention the NYT. I've subscribed for years, along with the Chronicle and the Daily Review.  About 3 months ago, somebody began stealing our papers, sometimes one, sometimes two, sometimes all three.  I began to get truly crazy and got up sometimes at 5AM to get the papers because if they weren't gotten before 6 AM they would be gone. (Robin [his wife], of course, pointed out that this showed I had no real problems, if I was spending energy on something like this.)  Finally we got the deliverers to throw the newspapers directly on the porch and for the last month or so, no problem."

I just got this e-mail, and I was inexplicably cheered.   I, too, would get up to try to catch the thief (or better, have Jerry do it).   I , too,  am going to order the daily NY Times.  Newspaper-reading is going to take up more of my day,  but I seem to have the time.

Cupid May Not Be O.K.

From women friends I've talked to,  ages 23-60,  I've concluded that online dating is a very dicey business.   Here's my completely subjective report,  based solely on the experiences of heterosexual women:

1. A man may look at a woman's online photo, comment favorably on her profile, and then do nothing about it.

2. If you approach a man about getting together, he may respond.  Or not.  His preliminary interest may mean nothing.

3. After you write off a guy due to unresponsiveness, this person may materialize weeks later, say you should get together, and then disappear again.

4. You can do e-mail with a guy, lots of back and forth, but when you suggest getting together for coffee or a drink, he may never be able to find the time.

5. If you do meet, he may turn out to be considerably shorter than he indicated in his profile.  One friend took to asking  whether a guy was really the stated height and stressed that she is 5'7" and always wears 3-inch heels.  Was he as tall as that?  Or you may not care about height.  Most men, however, care about slim/slender/thin.

6. You may meet a man for a drink or coffee or lunch,  things may go very well, and you may never hear from him again.

7. You will likely spend hours analyzing what various e-mails, voicemails,  text  messages, and disappearances mean.

8. Some women do find good men through online dating.  I've heard of two cases.

9. The deck is stacked against women.   There are many more women than men looking online,  and one friend was told by a man that "it's like being in a candy store."

Sigh.  Even though  I'm not looking for someone, I'm ticked that men seem to have the advantage in this realm.   Women need resilient egos or frequent time-outs to endure the constant scanning and rejection.  I'd love to hear a man's side of this.

What to Do on a Rainy Saturday?

A.  Test an air mattress for leaks

The Big White Jail

That's what Harry Truman called the White House, and he was lucky enough to escape it for part of his presidency because a leg of his daughter's piano began sinking into the Red Room.  Engineers decided that the house was unsound, and the Trumans moved to Blair House while the White House was gutted and rebuilt.  Bummer, but at least the new White House had closets and air-conditioning.

The interior of the White House during the 1950 renovation

I've just finished "The Obamas," a book by New York Times journalist Jodi Kantor.  Based on her report,  I'd say the Obamas also think of the White House as the big white jail.  They can't go anywhere without a huge retinue, including a helicopter; they can't sit outside without snipers being posted on the roof;  they can't take their daughters to school because they'd cause traffic jams.  They can go to Camp David on weekends, but Obama turns out not to be an ourdoorsy kind of guy.  He likes the private plane and the valet service, but he's said that he's really looking forward to being an ex-President, after he wins the 2012 election (please, God).

I collect White House guidebooks from various administrations and also pore over books about the first ladies.   I've always had a fantasy about going there for an event, say a state dinner, when they need to balance a table with the addition of a liberal  woman of a certain age.  But of course, I'd want to go be invited upstairs for cocktails.  I want to see Michelle's new decor, the stylish taupe paint that's apparently replaced the sunny Nixon yellow.   But this book pretty much convinced me that I wouldn't want to live there.

Upstairs at the White House during Bush II.  The yellow on the walls was chosen by Pat Nixon. Michelle Obama replaced it with taupe.

Love is in the Air

Breakfast this morning with friends, two of whom announced at the end of the meal that they were engaged! They're 60!  Doesn't that give you hope?  All is not Romney and Rush and Syria and the San Francisco sheriff.

Arnold worked with me at UC Berkeley for about ten years.  Long-divorced, he met Alison three years ago.  She'd had a painful divorce.  A friend introduced them.

My friend Suzanne and I just about did high-fives across the table.   I felt that cry-with-happiness impulse, took a photo, and waved good-by. The wedding is September 22.   I'm definitely saving the date.

Alison and Arnold

How to Knit Up the Raveled Sleeve of Care

In other words--sorry, Shakespeare--how to sleep.

Sleep is the issue right now.  Getting to sleep, primarily.  I've had two doctors' appointments on the topic this week. Yesterday's was with a neurologist, who cheerfully and attentively listened to my lament and then dictated a strict protocol :

1. Go to bed at the same time every night
2. No TV or computer screen-watching within an hour-and-a-half of going to bed.
3. Dim the lights during that time
4. No heavy physical or mental exertion during that time.  Books on tape acceptable.
5. No reading in bed 
6. Listen to a hypnotherapy relaxation tape 5-6 minutes in another room before going to bed.
7. No lying in bed trying to get to sleep for more than 15-20 minutes; get up and repeat step 6. 
8. Do not use a clock to time the 15-20 minutes.
9. Write down all worries and spend 30-45 minutes a day immersed in them in the early afternoon.
10. No naps except between  2-4 pm and for only 30 minutes
11.  Do not even THINK of using the bed for other than for sleep, sex, and sickness
12. Consider going to a Cognitive Behavioral Therapist who specializes in insomnia

Reader, I was so desperate I did  #1-8  last night.  By God, it worked!  I had to get up after 20 minutes in bed, subjectively judged, and listen to 5-6  more minutes of the tape,  and then I went back to bed and slept.  It was a miracle!

Here's what Shakespeare really said.  Sadly, I learned these lines from watching "Rumpole of the Bailey," not from two Shakespeare classes in college.  I guess I wasn't old enough then to appreciate their wisdom-- I was always fighting sleep so I could get papers written.

"Sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleave of care,
The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
Chief nourisher in life's feast."

• William Shakespeare, Macbeth (1605), Act II, scene 2, line 36.

Breakfast with Ross

Wednesday's headline

This is how it goes around here:  Get up, read latest SF Chronicle article on Ross Mirkarimi, rant at hapless husband, and vow to MARCH IN THE STREETS if this man doesn't lose his job as Sheriff of San Francisco.  Repeat the next day.  Husband now assuming beleaguered expression upon entering kitchen.

For anyone who doesn't know:  The newly-elected sheriff manhandled his wife on New Year's Eve, leaving an impressive bruise on her upper arm.   A day later, she goes to a neighbor, tells her the story, shows the bruise, and  has the neighbor videotape it.  Three days later,  the neighbor goes to the police.  Ross Mirkarimi says it's a "private domestic matter," which drives your blogger sincerely insane.   In California, no domestic violence is a purely private matter.  It is a crime.  Even if the frightened wife pushes to have charges dropped.

It doesn't help that Mirkarimi is arrogant: he does't know the law.  Trumped-up tears after a plea bargain.  Jerry feels the wife should leave the country as soon as possible with her two-year old child, or "she'll end up like OJ's wife."  Direct quote.

And this morning:  The mayor of San Francisco has now suspended Mirkarimi without pay (sweet! Though have concerns re wife and child) while there's an ethics investigation.

Stay tuned.  At least you don't have to have breakfast with me.

A Gift from Ted Kooser

Heard Ted Kooser read this poem on PBS last night.


Daddy Longlegs
By Ted Kooser

Here, on fine long legs springy as steel,

a life rides, sealed in a small brown pill

that skims along over the basement floor

wrapped up in a simple obsession.

Eight legs reach out like the master ribs

of a web in which some thought is caught

dead center in its own small world,

a thought so far from the touch of things

that we can only guess at it.  If mine,

it would be the secret dream

of walking alone across the floor of my life

with an easy grace, and with love enough

to live on at the center of myself.


From Flying at Night Poems 1965-1985, by Ted Kooser

Defending Your Knees

Knee Defenders

The Sunday New York Times yielded this nugget in an article about comfort on planes called "How to Avoid That Cramped Seat."  You can buy a gadget called "The Knee Defender," which is described as "a set of plastic wedges that slip onto the legs of your tray table and physically prevent the seat in front of you from reclining." Oh, boy!

Several years ago,  Jerry and I sat behind a couple in Economy who immediately reclined their seats after take-off and left them reclined for a 7-hour flight from Paris to New York. By the time we got off the plane, we were crippled: our hips ached and our legs were so stiff we could barely stand.  I despised this selfish couple (and these days would speak up), and immediately began investigating frequent flyer miles so we could upgrade to Business Class.

But we still fly Economy on shorter flights, and sometimes it's hell.  People want what they want, with no thought to the people sitting behind them, who are then in the moral dilemma of screwing the people behind them.  I blame it all on the airlines, pitting passenger against passenger.

GadgetDuck, which sells this ingenious item, knows this.  They provide a courtesy card for the traveler whose seat is being blocked: "I realize this may be an inconvenience.  If so,  I hope you will complain to the  airline.  Maybe working together we can convince the airlines to provide enough space between rows so that people can recline their seats without banging into other passengers."

You can adjust the Knee Defender  to give the other passenger some reclining room.   And it's perfectly legal to use them (but would I?)  GadgetDuck.com for $19.95.

The Knee Defender at work.  You install it with the tray table lowered.

"Voices in Cloth" Quilt Show

Some of the fabric that came home with me

    Yesterday, the Craneway Pavillion was full of  people looking at quilts, buying from vendors, eating, or chatting with people they ran into.  I saw at least half of my world there yesterday,  people I hadn't seen in years, plus people from my pool class, from my former place of employment, and of course from my quilt group.

My friend Lin, who came with me, was introduced countless times as "my-friend- Lin-who-went-to-high-school-with-me," sometimes with "We reconnected with on Facebook" added.  She was very patient, I thought.  And appreciative of quilts, much more judicious in her appreciation of them than I was, noticing many details I missed.

Perhaps my favorite moment of the day was running into my pool chums, Anne and Valerie.  They reported that two women standing in front of one of my quilts commented that it was their favorite quilt.  Val, who is English, hastened to tell them,"We know the ah-tist!"  I loved that.

I didn't take as many photos as I would have liked to. Here are few, and some don't do justice to the quilts.   I've included my own two quilts, by special request from a reader, even though I've posted photos of them earlier.

The first four quilts  are from a Special Exhibit, "Ancestral Memories," quilts made by members of the African American Quilt Guild of Oakland.

Detail of  "From Slavery to the White House," by the Betty Shabazz Academy of San Francisco and the Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority

A view of most of "From Slavery to the White House", dress square at lower left

"All My Roads Lead Back to You," Alice Beasley. 
The quilter wrote, "A portrait of my mother as a saucy three-year old c. 1914 sitting on her father's knee."

Detail of "All My Roads Lead Back to You,"  the child's foot extending beyond the bottom edge of the quilt

"Mount Diablo" by Susan Fuller. I include this as an example of something I can't imagine being able to do, a representational landscape.

"Twig Salad" by Priscilla Read

"Cracker Two, by Rebecca Rohrkaste. The reds are actually less orange, and there's a beautiful and subtle variety of them.

"Free Fall" by Ann Rhode.  One of the few hand-quilted pieces I saw.

"Fresh Fruit" by Susan Fuller, a remarkably detailed and beautifully rendered representation of fruit

"Autumn Kaleidoscope" by Pepper Sbarbaro

And my own:

"Circles and Squares," designed and pieced by me; machine quilted by Angie Woolman

"Snowscape"
 Rebecca stepped in and hung this quilt lower after I took the photo. Also machine quilted by Angie Woolman

The Making of A Quilt Show

I've been a member of the East Bay Heritage Quilters for about 10 years, but this was the first time I've help set up the massive show they put on every other year, "Voices in Cloth," which happens this weekend.  Set-up volunteers (and you have to do some volunteer time somewhere, somehow, if you want to have a quilt in the show) had to be at the Craneway Pavillion, at the Richmond Marina, by 9 am on Friday.  This vast room was part of a Ford Plant  during World War II. The rain poured down.    Brooks Island, just off shore, was visible through the fog, and by afternoon, so was San Francisco. It's a spectacular setting.

Between 9 am and 2: 30 pm, this enormous room was transformed by many quilter-volunteers into a full-fledged quilt show ringed by numerous vendor booths. I went with friends from my quilt group, Rebecca and Ann, who are old hands at set-up, and became a member of Ann's team.

The Craneway Pavillion at 9 am

Ann fitting poles into stands

A forest of stands, ultimately enough for more than 200 quilts to be displayed

A mock-up of the show, showing the configuration of  the walls of quilts

Ann wearing her  Row Captain hat as we get  underway with setting up the stands and poles for our row

A fleet of ironing boards and an army of iron-ers worked on the muslin panels that hang behind each quilt

The ironed muslim panels hang from the poles, ready for quilts

Hanging  each quilt according to the master plan

By 2:30, most of the quilts were hung

Quilters even have colorful raincoats

Pool Party on Dry Land

Here's a look at the lunch party my pool exercise class had for our former instructor,  Kate.   Our classmate Anne allowed us to shove around furniture in her living and dining rooms  so that we could set up folding tables and chairs to seat 24.  Delicious, inventive food and spring flowers. 

Turns out we're quite a  fashionable lot when dry and dressed.  In ten years, we've never seen each other in anything but  swimsuits or jeans.

Rosemary pound cake with polenta and sour cream

Chicken salad adorned with nasturtiums

Brownies with penuche frosting

 One of two long tables

This is Olinda. At 86, she and her friend Kiyoko are the oldest members.

They brought sushi.

 

Emissaries from The Bulb

 I've been trying to write a post about three clients who showed up at the Berkeley Food Pantry on Monday.  This has not gone well, but somehow I can't not mention these people, so here it goes.

All three were from the homeless encampment at the Albany Bulb, a peninsula of landfill that pushes out into the Bay near I-80.  It used to belong to the Santa Fe Railroad, then it was a dump, and then it became part of  Eastshore State Park.  If you go  there for a walk, you'll find rebar, grafitti, urban art, exotic plants, dogwalkers,  and clusters of homeless people whom the City of Albany occasionally tries to evict.

This trio came as a group, two men and a woman.  They smelled bad, and they were loud.  One of the men stopped dead at the doorway and glared at us for some minutes,  which was so unnerving that Judy went and got a fellow volunteer, a sturdy young man, to stay in the room with us until we realized that the this client was so stoned he couldn't put a sentence together.

They took forever to get organized.  They unpacked and randomly re-packed their groceries.  They gossiped about other homeless people at the Bulb and whether the drinking water was any good.  The woman was especially loud and angry-sounding.  I just wanted them to go, and finally they did.  

Every draft of this post included comments about how inexcusably unfair life is, how their condition has nothing to do with being lazy or getting too many government entitlements (that's for you, Mitt, et al.),   how I feel guilty about having booked a cruise that day and for that matter having a much more comfortable life.  But it boils down to this:  I don't know where to begin to help them and I just wanted them to go.

Early Risers

Breakfast at La Note

Today we celebrated the anniversary of our first date, which we do every year,  usually with a lunch, which is what we did 36 years ago.  But lunch wasn't going to be convenient today, and I woke up very early and thought, what the hell, let's go out to breakfast.  Somewhere fun, somewhere French.

We drove through the streets of downtown Berkeley, which were pretty much deserted except for sad, muttering street people and the yellow-windbreaker city employees who keep an eye on them.  We were the first customers at  La Note restaurant.  Even the parking meters weren't up and about--no fee until 9 am.  Our waitress spoke with a French accent. The food was delicious.  We came home and booked a cruise to Alaska.

That's right.  Another trip, and another cruise.  Those who read my May 2011 trip blog know our disillusionment with cruises, but we want to look at glaciers and we don't want to drive and we want comfort and we want to be waited on.  Age and laziness, plus another glossy Oceania Cruise Line brochure, colluded.  We're booked for summer 2013.  There's a 2-for-1 deal and a half-price only deposit until March 31.

Besides, yesterday we spent all afternoon doing our taxes. Jerry's face tells the story.

Doing the taxes: Always an interlude of marital bliss

Taking to the Skies Again (and again)

 Kew Gardens,  London,  2008

Since 2006, when I overcame a post-9/11 aversion to flying,  we've been to Washington, D.C.,  New York City, Texas, Boston,  Arkansas,  London, Paris, Rome, Venice, the Cinque Terre (Italy), Monaco, Mississippi, Seattle, Quebec, the Hudson River Valley, Montreal, and Corfu. Oh, and Memphis, which has the National Civil Rights Museum, a must-see that should be on that list  floating around on the internet of "100 Things to See Before You Die."


It's all been memorable, and to  my mind, a firm slap on the face of mortality.  As in,  "Ha , ha, I managed to do that before the Big Eraser came down."

Travel takes money and, for us, a re-ordering of priorities. We have two bathrooms that need remodeling, a dated kitchen, and I drive a 16-year old car. Don't care.    By the time I was in my late fifties and Jerry was in his seventies, I thought, it's now or never.  I worry about every flight, but I go. 

What's next?  Chicago in May and Glacier National Park in August.  And May 2013 is shaping up to be a mega-trip: Boston, Switzerland (Alps), and England, including London, Oxford, and the moors of the West Country.

I made it to Paris by sheer luck when I was 9 (my parents won a Cadillac  they sold to finance the trip).  When I was 59, I made it back to Paris, a sentimental journey.  See photos below.  This was better than a Prius and granite countertops.

My sister and me in the Tuileries garden in Paris, overlooking the Place de la Concorde, 1959

Fifty years later in  approximately the same spot

And the Point Is?

I came across this in last week's Sunday New York Times Style Magazine:

 

Artist Nick Darmstaedter, 23, wears a Calvin Klein shirt ($195) and A.P.C. jeans ( $250).  (A.P.C. stands for "Atelier de Production et de Creation.")   He's in a co-op of young artists in Brooklyn, an art collective called "Still House." The conceit is that "the Brooklyn look cleans up cool."  I tried to find these jeans on the A.P.C. website to confirm their condition and their astounding price. No luck.

And here's another co-op member, Louis Eisner, wearing an Adam Kimmel jumpsuit, "price upon request," presumably because we would laugh outloud at the idea that a 23-year old artist could actually buy it.

Why marry struggling artist with boutique fashion?  These guys aren't working in these clothes!  It would be much more interesting to see what they're working on than what the Times has tricked them out in.

This silly concept's a winner, I guess, for the artists (publicity) and for the Times (a catchy idea for the magazine), but not for the rest of us who might want an inkling of reality.  And perhaps integrity.  Young artists struggle;  it is not a romantic and stylish life.  It's hard work.   And besides, show the 99% wearing what they can really afford to wear.  Please.

I'm always annoyed by this glossy magazine, which is occasionally bundled with the Sunday New York Times.   There was also a piece on Dustin Hoffman, a brief profile that mentioned his clothes (mostly gray).  An article by Suzy Menkes, fashion writer for the International Herald Tribune,  was entitled, "War, What Is It Good For: Combat on the Catwalk." My brain shut down on that one.  Reality, anyone?