Four’s Flights

just got the news:  hip replacement surgery possibly the last week in November. Know I shouldn’t be, but am scared shitless.

😦

yes, I know I spelled Ahmadinejad’s name wrong, have probably done so five times already today at least and since am not sure how it’s FINALLY going to come out, will let them all lie where they are and become fertilizer.

🙂

 funny sometimes how things happen. I had one and a half days off (except for cleaning and five loads of laundry, of course) starting yesterday so dropped on into my doc’s office around noon and caught her in the doorway talking to a salesman. I ran up to her, grabbed her arm, stuck my car key in her side and said, “I have a key and I’m not afraid to use it” and tried to kidnap her for lunch. She laughed. Mondays are impossible — office is flooded with whingy people who’ve been sik all weekend. Maybe I’ll be able to kidnap her on Thursday. Okay, that part has nothing to do with anything.

   Still thought I was going to have the morning off before people check in at noon, so took it easy and went to meet F. for a quick bite at Sam’s  after he was finished with a late job — so far, so good (except, dismally, no-one there had any idea who  Ahmedinejab is or that he was blasted by that idiot at Columbia).

  One of the waitresses just happened to mention to our friend the bartender that one of her tables of people needed a place to stay as they were on their way to Texas (!!!) and had stayed in town too late to keep driving, so he asked me to give her my card, which I did. She gave it to them and they came to say hi at the bar, said they were so glad to find a place, they’d just be right over and were going to leave their dogs in the car overnight. Car??? No way. Needless to say they were over the moon to find we’re dog-friendly — what are the odds, just meeting dog friendly inn-keepers at a pizza restaurant at 9PM? Very sweet people, two tiny very weird but adorable mini-dogs, they came, they crashed, and I have popovers waiting for them.

Will have to hustle to get the room ready for the regularly scheduled guests today, but at least I don’t have to make a fancy lunch. So much for the day off!

    Speaking of lunch, am still hoping to kidnap Suzanne on Thursday and have a stepson who’s fisherman who just brought us a boatload of lobster tails. If anyone reads this blog and has a good recipe for lobster salad, please post it!

😀

Ma’am, do you need any home improvements? “Well,”   …. I stop and think. “Yes, indeed I do. Are you volunteering?”

She laughs, her spiel barely begun on its unwind mode. We have flooring, siding, and roofing materials. Do you want a finished basement?

   “I have a finished basement. Or rather, I HAD a finished basement. In fact, it’s all done being finished and is now my pottery studio. It gave up its high life as a finished basement for the artistic rewards of housing years of clay dust and buckets of (some slightly leaky) glazes, and I believe feels supremely unfinished at this stage in its life. Doubt you could persuade it to finish itself again — it has the superior air really useful places take on after a while. Freedom, ya know, artistic expression — very hard to give up once it’s been tasted.”

Undaunted, okay, a bit daunted by the off-course and slightly insane direction in which the conversation has been steered, she retools her smile and suggests roofing material. “Now there you have me, we have leaks. We’ve had the same leak in the kitchen on average four times a year since 1984. You’ll have to talk to my husband about that but he’s about two hours southeast of this place and his hearing isn’t all that good at such distances — he’s in charge of roofing materials.”

Well, but you live there too.

“Live there yes, good point! But roof repair there, not bloody likely. Me and my studio have airs to maintain, know what I mean?” Jeezuz, I’m 62 with a bum hip and TMJ issues — does she imagine I’m going to be clambering all over the roof tomorrow with a tool belt and nails fanning out of my mouth? I can still manage the vacuum cleaner and the mop, which puts me in the lucky department.

I move on down the line and listen as she readjusts her bewildered tone back to automatic pilot: Sir, are you in need of home improvement materials? I hear a laugh behind me as I check out.

A friend has asked, so here’s an update: On books, not a whole lot going on. Am still waiting or The Other Boleynn Girl on audio to show up at the library, having read the bracketing other two and loved them. In the meantime, F. loves the Donna Leon Venice detective novels mostly because they’re set in out favorite city.  I haven’t read one yet but am looking forward to them as have Venice-lust big time. Am still reading Middlesex, which I’m crazy about (not sure why though, apart from the fabulous language), and listening to Hanging Up (Delia Ephron) which I also love — very funny, touching, full of interesting characters and nifty dialogue. She must be related to Nora.

    Have figured out half the constant crippling headache lately (at least) is from TMJ so have bought a night-guard-kit to keep from clenching teeth. Must be angry or anxious or some combination of both, as I usually don’t have this problem until A Trip Looms. We have actually been talking about Africa, so maybe that’s it but I suspect not. Have been waking up every morning feeling terrible anxiety and depression, not wanting to “do” anything, slog through my days doing chores and hardly anything creative, which is very sapping, read a lot to escape reality, the usual chronic/clinical depression nonsense. Must begin seriously working out or am doomed again.

    It did feel good to drive to Riverhead and back on my own today, and  especially having accomplished a whole raft of tasks, very empowering. Going anywhere on my own is still so fraught. The gallery there that shows my work took 7 pots out of the ten I brought and she loves them which made me feel terrific.  A cistomer bought one while I was standing there making out the list — funny.  🙂  I took her four-year old boy out inot the alley, to the front window, so she could also look at jewelry and we had a lovely talk about what was going on in one of the marsh paintings in the window — almost forgot how much I love working with little kids. He was adorable, white-blond hair, gangly limbs, blue eyes, cheeky smile — so bright and articulate! He was sure there were plenty of fish in the marshes and started naming them, but was worried there might be sharks. I assured him sharks don’t much care for marshes, and he was happy about that.

   The mother was a pretty long haired dangly earringed new-age hippie complete with a  Guatemalan shawl enfolding a newish baby at her hip, also with gorgeous big eyes though brown, in this case —  a lithe young earth mother, full of breast milk and promise. For a moment I was almost taken back….

The whole thing made me immediately embark on a spending spree, of course.

    Got a load of nifty new underwear at Target, bright red appliqued bras and bikinis, a few blue/green polka dot ones — F. will like them — also four bright white cotton shower curtains: two for the shower, two for the windows, to replace the cut-work white lace ones I’ve grown tired of after looking at them since 1994. Got a couple of really weird resin palm-tree-shaped toothbrush holders for the guest bathrooms, very, VERY sixties-funky and nifty, along with a palm tree-decorated liquid soap dispenser. Got some neato eyeliner (looks like a magic marker) and some hair gel too, and about $75 dollars worth of socks from a company that bills its product as “the softest socks on earth” and they ARE!!!!! Half are for me, though it was Frank who asked for them — har. Also got two pair of high-top Reeboks on sale , the only trainers I can dance in, so that was good too. I managed to navigate the entire mall WITHOUT buying and consuming a cinnabon (!!!!) after observing that 99.9% of the shoppers I encountered were 10-80 pounds overweight (me included, though technically only 8 pounds over), with the remaining whatever % stick thin and obviously bulimic and/or anorexic. Maybe three people looked a normal weight. Americans — what a mess we are! Not only that, but SO badly dressed — embarrassing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Sloppy, baggy shorts and icky T-shirts — one woman was wearing men’s boxer shorts hiked up in the back and I will forbear describing the fat deposits. Almost made me lose my sushi. Have GOT to start dancing again every day!!!!! Don’t want that memory to become my mirror.

F. is fixing a part for a Hobart for a local restaurant and the sushi is almost gone. Nice day.

 This whole thing was pure luck. My friend S. met a guy on the Jitney on the way back from NYC one day and struck up a conversation. She told him about her nephew, just happened to mention he was interested in primatology, and this guy said he knew a young woman who was in  the research phase of setting up a primatology center out here. He gave S. her number, and they met and liked each other right away, and then the young woman (A.) told her she needed some farm land to build the primate center on and was busy writing grant proposals and whatnot and had already gotten the town to agree to it, so of course who did S. think of? You guessed it.

    So they both came over for tea and popovers and of course A. and I hit it off immediately. She loves the back five acres of the farm which is ringed by trees, a stretch of woods, and no neighbors, loves the dogs (especially Miss Moon who (whom?) she “got” right away), showed me her website and told us about her work teaching primates to use painting and photography for communication (she gives the chimps those little cheap cameras, they mostly take self-portraits<g>), and then F.  got into the act.

    He’s going to help her write up the proposal for her barn and enclosure and price everything out for her since she’s of course totally inexperienced in the building business and he’s a real expert, which will help her enormously even if it turns out we can’t use our farm for her. And then Frank’s niece (she’s the one living in the barn apartment who just got a puppy) came over to help figure out the legal/zoning stuff, since she’s one of the town attorneys, and I’m sitting there thinking What was the miracle that put us all in the same room on the same day together and it still makes my skin tingle!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And on top of that, she wants to use ME  for chimp-sitting and rehab duties, especially with the babies!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Have I died and gone to heaven, and not noticed?

She’s  incredibly smart — studied at Cambridge, was one of the twelve people out of hundreds of applicants chosen to work on the Durrell wildlife project in the Channel Islands,  has worked with primates all over the world, and she’s funny too — great sense of humor, even made F. laugh and he’s usually pretty reserved when it comes to laughing out loud. She described the trip she made up here from Florida last year bringing six chimps (in a car, in carseats!) to Bridgehampton (some fund raising thing or other) and then running with them on the beach. Hysterical. What a sight that must have been!!!!!!!

As for the Africa trip, looks as if Africa might be coming to me instead.

😀

when I saw Pavarotti sing  La Traviata I remember thinking “now I can die happy” — his voice, there really are no words in my adjectivebank for that voice. I know he was a jerk in a lot of ways, but omg that voice, effortless, soaring, so powerful, rich, and multi-hued ….. and for some reason it never occurred to me he could ever, ever, EVER die. He gives me major chills. I wonder if anyone will come along to fill those echoing empty shoes

Been a hustlin’ week, especially for someone recently turned very old. Last night, we even went out dancing in Amagansett, a place called Stephen Talkhouse, small, loud, lots of atmosphere, tons of F.s friends. Really good Irish band played, and we danced till almost midnight — hardly even felt like a 62 year old waiting for a hip replacement. In fact was shocked to find two guys cutting in, trying to grab a “dance”, until I realized they were soused (lol) which would go far toward an explanation.

   Went to a great party in Montauk the other night and met some very nifty people, one of whom, an elderly Japanese guy, used to be a film maker, apparently very famous. There was too much noise for me to understand him well  but will find out from a friend what films he made. She asked him what his favorite films were and he said the old J. Ford westerns, Bleaugh — lol! Oh well, he was very nice. The food was endless and delicious — lots of fruit, veggies, shrimp, cheeses, sushi, dips, bagel crisps, etc — ate self into a coma. 

    Then we got invited to one of Gurney’s Inn’s sumptuous summertime lobster feasts on a terrace overlooking the ocean, another Montauk evening — seems Montauk’s where the gourmet-action is these days. For those who don’t know, Gurney’s is a very fancy world-class spa-resort, very la-di-da, and, I think, “connected”. A lot of “mob” people have been pointed out to me there, though if they were movie extras I’d never know the difference. My best friend works there and this last year F. has been doing all their building and rebuilding, so we’ve gotten to know a lot of the people who work there. Since everyone is so wild about F. (the haloed saint of the building world <g>) they invited us to one of the buffet dinners Gurney’s puts on during the summer. Not all that crazy about lobster, but since they had a gazillion other delicious dishes managed to eat self into yet another coma — mostly shrimp and Mako, exquisitely grilled. The people we sat with were so totally charming — some from Poland, others from Guatemala, and one couple from Brussells — can’t wait to have them all over here for dinner. Will have to think of something F. and I can make for them that won’t take us a week to prepare — my super-cook days are over. Have totally gone off cooking — in fact, if I could, I would get take-out for every meal. Thank the gods for the outdoor grill.

    Oh yeah, and we went to Montauk again on Tuesday, to The Harvest, for my birthday dinner, but enough already with the food. Am still eating the leftovers.

   On a cozier note, the  famous bamboo sheets came — they’re absolutely GORGEOUS!!!!! Didn’t think I’d like the marine blue but I find I love it,  deep, rich, not too cobalty- shrill, and the fabric is so amazingly soft — like nothing I’ve ever felt before. Time will tell if they stay that way, but so far, delightful.

the puppy (Henley is her name, but am told NOT after the shirt), yipped most of the morning while her Mommy was at work. I decided not to go over and babysit, to let her get used to being alone for a three or four hours at a stretch but now regret it. She’s only 8 weeks and two days old. Feel awful

😦

It’s been a busy coupla weeks, what with Labor Day coming and then going, along with guests and dogs (two Scotties as adorable as pups even though both around 8, a hyperactive Golden Doodle !!!!, and a standard poodle, very black, very serene) and dinners with friends.
And speaking of dinners, we had a lovely one with two other couples at a restaurant called The Inlet in Montauk — some absolutely fabulous mussels in a coconut milk sauce with cilantro and chilies, so scrumptious we tried to make one at home but came up a bit short. One of those dishes that needs a lot of work, and probably a lot of butter, which I try to get F. NOT to use. My mistake. We sat outside on an upper deck for that dinner, watched the sunset, which was blood red and cerulean blue and all shades of lavender and orange, one of the finest shows I’ve ever seen the sky put on. And speaking of putting on, good thing I had two sweatshirts and a shawl in the car as nobody else had thought to bring anything, so everyone was toasty.
The Big News around here is that F’s niece, who lives across the field from us in the barn apartment, brought home an 8 week old Chesapeake Bay Retriever puppy yesterday, which makes me ecstatic. There’s hardly anything in the world I love more than a puppy, and this one is so perfect — all I have to do is be the Grandma and spoil the bejeezuz out of her. She’s already housebreaking herself, learning to bark when she wants to go out, all in one day and one night!!! SO smart! And I’m not the LEAST bit prejudiced.

Spent part of the day in our hammock, out by the pool — it was pure heaven: cool breezes, bamboo windchimes, warm sun, two dogs in lap, hard to even imagine winter. Maybe time to rethink the idea of moving to Hawaii.
Then my studio assistant L. came over so we got two Raku firings done (not the most glam I’ve ever seen, but serviceable) and will do two more on Wed. Will have a truck-full of pots to bring to my gallery, so it’s off to the North Fork with me on Thursday. Hope to be able to get to the beach sometime this week — must be gorgeous.
Hope everyone’s summer is winding down nicely.