Waiting Out Hurricane Sandy

As I was heading to the airport last week for my flight to DC to visit some law school friends, I heard abut the prospect of a historic storm as a hurricane was on track to converge with a nor'easter near the Mid-Atlantic.  I paid the news no mind.  How many times have we suffered through coverage of storms that end up being no more than a blip on the radar screen?  And so I passed on the opportunity to change my return flight and head back to Florida early in order to avoid getting stranded in DC.  Besides my skepticism about the storm, we had lots of fun things planned, and I didn't want to miss them.

Danita, Althea, Sally and me

There's something incredibly special about being with friends who've known you since you were young.  You've celebrated happy times together and commiserated through the inevitable times of struggle that come with being an adult.  (You might notice that I didn't call them "old" friends--that's a term that's a bit touchy these days as we've all crossed that 50-year threshold.)  Althea (my hostess) chose Pearl Dive Oyster Bar as the lunch venue, and we had a wonderful time catching up and enjoying some New Orleans-inspired cuisine.  I'm sure that I "outed" myself as being less than cool by taking pictures, but these get-togethers happen too infrequently to not memorialize them. 

Althea and her little boy Colin

On Saturday morning, Danita (my law school roommate) headed back to San Francisco, and Althea and I packed our bags and headed to Philly to visit the Barnes Foundation (which was incredibly amazing and will be the subject of another post).  From there it was a short drive on Sunday morning to Princeton to cheer for Althea's son Colin as he rowed for Columbia at the Princeton Chase, a three mile "head" race. 

Columbia Freshman Lightweight Boat

The Chase was my first regatta, and it was lots of fun.  There are two types of races--head, or long distance, races and sprints.  In head races, the boats have staggered starts--20 seconds apart in this case.  Massive exertion is required of the rowers but you don't get the excitement of pulling for your boat to cross the finish line first.  Colin rowed in Columbia's eight man freshman lightweight boat, and we positioned ourselves on a bridge where we got a great views of the boats with about one mile to go.  Colin's boat did very well--second in the lightweights (first was Princeton with the home river advantage) and sixth overall.  (The heavyweight and lightweight freshman boats competed at the same time, and there were 30+ boats in the race.)  The six hours of training that the team puts in every day paid off.  (Yes, that's right.  Six hours of training a day plus a college course load plus, in Colin's case, extra-curriculars like being on the Metropolitan Museum of Art's College Board.  It exhausts me just to think about his schedule!)   The weather held out for the freshman race but the event was called after that in order to get the students safely back to their respective colleges before the storm moved in. 

And so I found myself hunkered down with Althea, Pete, and Brian waiting out Hurricane Sandy.  We watched a lot of the Weather Channel and some bad TV (really--who watches those Housewife shows?), read, chatted, and played some competitive games of Boggle.  Althea being Althea treated us to home-cooked gourmet food along the way, including this gorgeous butternut squash tart with chili-infused honey and fried sage leaves.  (There were no left-overs.) 

The devastation left in the wake of Hurricane Sandy is incomprehensible.  My heart goes out to the millions of people affected by what in fact did turn out to be a storm of epic proportions.  I feel incredibly fortunate not only to have been relatively unaffected by the storm but to have ridden it out with some of my dearest friends.  Once again I am reminded that life is short and that I need to make the most of every day.   I'm going to give it the old college try. 

Manatee Mating Ritual

With our Groupon coupons tucked away in our bags, Dorrit and I headed down to Bonita Springs last week-end for a kayak eco-tour with Adventures Kayaking.  It was a perfect afternoon to be out on the water.  The tide was VERY low--as you can see by this picture of a heron barely up to its ankles in water--which gave us an opportunity to see lots of birds feeding.   Before we were more than 100 yards from shore, our guide Sterling was scooping critters up in his net for us to take a look at.  He was particularly excited about the pygmy sea horses and put them in a jar for our viewing pleasure. (They weren't kidding when they named them pygmy sea horses.  When full grown they measure no more than an inch, so you can imagine how tiny and adorable these babies were!)   We saw blue crabs and horseshoe crabs (a species that dates back 400 million years) and a lightning whelk that was home to a shy hermit crab.  We learned about soft coral (which is an animal) and hard coral (which is a symbiotic creature which is part animal, part algae).

I got my first look at a horse conch, which is proud to be the Florida state mollusk. (Dorrit and I wondered later how many states have an official mollusk, but I digress.)   You can see in this picture the "leg" of the mollusk.  It can extend up to five or six inches and exudes an acid when it is wrapped around a plant or animal that enables it to suck out its nutrients.   (I find myself wrinkling my nose as I write this because it is really kind of gross.)   The horse conch protects itself from predators by withdrawing into its shell and using its hard surface as a sort of door.

Much of the time we were kayaking in Estero Bay along a boat channel, which wasn't particularly pleasant.    Many of the boats barely slowed down as they went by, and on more than one occasion my kayak was swamped when I wasn't able to turn its nose into the waves in time.  Eventually, we made our way through a mangrove tunnel into Lovers' Key.  While going through the tunnel, I had to duck to avoid some low lying branches.   A couple in a tandem kayak in our group had the same trouble but decided to grab hold of a branch to guide their way through.  Before they knew it, their kayak had flipped.  Luckily, the water was neither cold nor deep, but it was still a bit embarrassing for them.  (It was a first for our guide, too, who had told us at the outset that the only way to tip over was if you tried to get into the kayak feet first.)

From there we paddled into a quiet cove and came upon a bunch of manatees "socializing."   Often when you see manatees, you just catch a glimpse of their noses when they come up for air.   They are generally on the move or scavenging for food.   (They eat about 20 percent of their weight in sea grass every day.  Since the average weight of a manatee is 1200 pounds, feeding themselves is a pretty time consuming endeavor.)    When they come to Lovers' Key, though, their objective is really just to relax and enjoy some companionship in a safe place where no combustion engines are allowed.  And we were privy to some manatees doing just that.  We learned that the frolicking conga line of manatees was a bunch of male manatees vying for the romantic attention of the female manatee.    The female was in the lead, and wherever she went three males would follow, wooing her with their swimming skills and their "singing."  (When they come up for air, manatees make quite loud noises that sound very similar to a sneeze.)    Sterling told us that a female manatee mates only once every three years or so, so she wants to choose her partner carefully.  This explains the weeks of foreplay that often go on before the romance is consummated (which apparently consists of the two manatees swimming belly to belly for about 30 yards.  I don't quite understand the logistics, but it's nothing that I want to think about too much.)   It was very cool to be up close and personal with these huge mammals, which swam close to each of our kayaks.  We all got great views of not only their noses coming up for air, but their bellies, backs, and tails.  

After we'd had our quality time with these "sea cows," we started paddling back to our starting point.  It was quite a hike back--at least 45 minutes of real kayaking--but well worth it after the show we'd been treated to. A baby dolphin accompanied us part of the way home, which made our smiles a little wider.   As we pulled our kayaks back onto shore, we were more than satisfied with our outing--and more than ready to put our feet up and have a cold drink!   Another fun day in Southwest Florida. 

Schroder by Amity Gaige

"Isn't that what childhood is?  An involuntary adventure?  A kidnapping?"  So asks Schroder, the title character in this sometimes sad, sometimes funny, always complicated story about a father who takes his daughter on an extended holiday that's not exactly within the framework of his custody rights.  The trip wasn't premeditated; it just kind of happened. This wasn't the first time that Schroder had an idea that snowballed out of control.  In fact, his whole adult life is a case in point.   You see, as a teen-age immigrant from Germany, Schroder created a new identity for himself, and it ended up sticking. 

The story is written as a letter from Schroder to his ex-wife as he sits in his jail cell awaiting his fate.  "What follows is a record of where Meadow and I have been since our disappearance. ....  There are castles of things I want to tell you."  And so he does, starting the story in 1984 with his scholarship application to a boys' camp in New Hampshire under the name of Eric Kennedy.  (When combined with a fictional birth place "near" Hyannis Port, the name gave him a certain cache.)  The application required a personal statement, and Schroder rose to the task.  "Mine was a tale that, by certain lights, was the truest thing I had ever written.  It involved the burdens of history, an early loss of the mother, a baseless sense of personal responsibility, and dauntless hope for the future.  Of course, by other lights--the lights that everyone else uses, including courts of law--my story was pure canard."  

Schroder takes us through his early years, his marriage, and the meetings with the mediator in which he agreed with his to-be-ex's characterizations of his parenting style as "erratic" and "unpredictable" in an effort to find his way back into his wife's good graces.  As he writes, his memories flow seamlessly from the present to the past in his attempt to provide some sort of explanation--not just for taking off with his daughter but for perpetrating the fraud that was his life.

His time with Meadow is a crazy adventure as they head from Lake George to Vermont with the ultimate goal of seeing Mount Washington together.  They swim in their clothes.  They buy silly outfits and eat cookies and rent a little cabin.  Despite the fact that Meadow is only six years old, they have wonderful, thoughtful conversations.  The truth is, it's a special time.   When talking with a mother who is out with her family, she comments on what a beautiful day it is.  "My problem is, when it's this pretty, I just want to keep it.  I just want to box it up and keep it and have it last forever."  Schroder responds, "You know where you keep a day like this?  You keep it in your heart.  That's the box you keep it in."

 After they've been on the road a few days, he sees a story on the news that characterizes him as a disgruntled father who's abducted his daughter.   Their already complicated situation keeps getting more difficult, and Schroder decides to tell daughter the truth about his past as they start making their way home.  He tells her about what it was like being a German boy in an Irish-American suburb of Boston.  He tells her about falling in love with her mother.  He tells her about his father, who never acclimated to the loss of his wife and his life in a foreign country.  Ultimately, of course, Schroder is captured and Meadow is taken from him.   And so we come to the end of his letter, with his ultimate explanation of why he made the choices that he made when he was just a child himself.  "I guess I needed a life that I could revise.  If I had just accepted the one life, my first life, I would have honored its limits.  I would have lived quietly, hardly even dreaming.  I would have tried to convince myself that a sad and quiet life is adequate.  Instead, I dreamt.  I decorated entire rooms of my past with the pleasures I salvaged elsewhere....I no longer had to be half alive.  A partial suicide like my father."

While Schroder isn't on my list of favorite reads, there was something about this book that I really liked.  Schroder and Meadow's relationship is quite sweet, and you can see why he'd go to great lengths not to lose that connection.  And who among us wouldn't like to revise at least some part of our history to make it more consistent with our vision of ourselves?   Interested readers can find Schroder in their local bookstores next February.    Score another good read from my stash of galleys from the Book Expo.  

Flower Power at Edison Pops

In my experience, most people are either Beatles fans or Stones fans.   I fall into the Stones camp, having spent many good times in high school rocking to the Some Girls album.  Having said that, I enjoy a good Beatles tune as much as the next person, so I was happy to hear that the Edison Pops Concert (an annual event that raises scholarship funds) was going to be a tribute to the Beatles.  It was only fitting since Edison State College is 50 years old and it's the 50th anniversary of the Beatles' debut on the Ed Sullivan Show.  (As you can see, Ed made a special appearance.) 

To add to the fun, participants were asked to decorate their tables for the event, and I was one of the judges tasked with selecting winners in the categories of Most Outrageous, Best Theme, and Judges' Choice.  Not having been to the event before, I had no idea what to expect.  The turn-out was great.  There were 48 tables of 10 (plus about 500 people sitting on the lawn).  While every table didn't participate, there were enough that did to make for some stiff competition.  My absolute favorite was the "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" table.  Let me tell you, these people went all out.  Not only did they decorate their tables to the nines and dress very mod but they played the song, had kaleidoscope glasses for passersby to don to get a psychedelic experience, waved laser lights during the concert, and offered the judges some Alice B. Toklas brownies.  (I didn't know who that was but got the drift of it, especially when one of the table members had a roach clip pinned to her hat!)  The brownies weren't necessary for the judges to agree that their table was definitely deserving of the prize for Most Outrageous.

"Yellow Submarine" was hands down the most popular inspiration for table designs (including our own, which wasn't eligible to win due my lofty status for the evening).   The Punta Gorda Chamber of Commerce did a fantastic job with the theme and the team members all wore matching yellow submarine t-shirts, which was a nice touch.  The tower on the top of the sub revolved, and there were pictures of the Beatles looking out the portholes.  I noticed after the sun set that the interior of the tower actually lit up!  (I later learned that the Chamber goes all out every year and often walks away with one of the prizes, as it did this year for Best Theme.)

There were several tables in the race for the Judges' Choice Award.   The attire of the staff of the Charlotte Sun definitely deserves an honorable mention.    One staffer commented as I was taking this picture was that their HR department obviously needs to do a better job of screening its employees!   (By this time I would have given anything to have been wearing something other than jeans and a t-shirt.  I could have easily been bribed to vote for a table with an offer of a headband!)   The award went, though, to a group that replicated a picture taken when the Beatles went to India in 1968 to attend a transcendental meditation session at the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's ashram.  Once again, I didn't initially understand the reference, but I loved the Yogi's get-up.    The other members of the group wore name tags identifying who they were supposed to be.  And the group helpfully had a picture from the original event to show the faithfulness of their imitation.   I was incredibly impressed with the creativity exhibited by all of the tables that went to the effort to decorate.  It really set the tone for a fun evening.

Enjoying the table decorations and costumes (and the picnic at our table!) was just a prelude to the main event--The Nowhere Band performing a selection of Beatles' songs. You probably won't be surprised to hear that you wouldn't mistake the Nowhere Band for the Beatles if you listened to them with your eyes closed.  Nor were the acoustics particularly good out in an open field.  Who cares?  It certainly didn't prevent the crowd from having a raucous time singing along to the music and vying for space on the dance floor.   It was a great choice for an outdoor concert on a perfect October evening. 

I headed out a little early as the Nowhere Band was playing "When I'm Sixty-Four."  For many people in the crowd, the question "Will you still need me/will you still feed me/when I'm 64?" is no longer a rhetorical one.   To my eye, the answer seemed to be a resounding, "yes"!   It was a great ending to another great evening in Punta Gorda. 

Fighting for an Education

The story of 14 year old Malala Yousafzi's fight for the right to an education and the Taliban's fear of her message has captivated me.  For a young girl to have such vision, passion, and bravery is amazing.  And for the Taliban to react with an assassination attempt to silence her is incomprehensible.  

The events have made me think once again about the power and importance of education in our society.  In my work at the Adult Learning Center, I see students every day who have come to their own realizations about the value of getting a high school degree, both from an economic perspective and for their own self-esteem.   These students--many of whom are in their 40s and older--are brave to come back to school.   Sure, there's no threat of gunmen coming into the classroom and shooting them for trying to achieve their goals, but it's not easy to acknowledge that the survival skills that you've developed just don't pass muster.  

My primary job at the Adult Learning Center is that of volunteer tutor coordinator.  I train our volunteers to work with adult learners, match them, and monitor their progress.  It is an amazing feeling to watch a student-tutor match thrive.  Our fall edition of Charlotte's Literacy Web is hot off the press, and I thought I'd share an article I wrote about one of our matches.  If you're interested in learning more about what we're doing, you can click here for the full newsletter.  http://charlottetechcenter.com/tutors-newsletter/  (You might notice that the writing sounds a lot like this blog--lol!)   Hope you enjoy it.  

Tony Costantini and Jane Pittinger:

 Student-Tutor Pair Extraordinaire

Sometimes a student-tutor match just seems meant to be.  Jane Pittinger is a long-time volunteer tutor with the Adult Learning Center and stopped in the learning lab one day last January to talk with Nanette Crist, our volunteer coordinator, about finding a new student to work with on his or her studies.  Tony was a relatively new student at the Center, and Nanette suggested that they sit together and go over Tony’s lessons.  The next thing we knew, they had decided to continue to work together; they have since logged in almost 100 hours in tutoring time! 

Tony was born in Italy and came to the United States back in the 1960s  at the age of five.  At that time, schools didn’t have programs for children whose native language wasn’t English, and Tony fell through the cracks.   Because Tony’s family spoke Italian at home, it took him several years to become fluent in English.  By that time, he was so far behind the other students that he had become very discouraged.  He felt school was “like a wall that he couldn’t get over, under or around.”  Tony dropped out of school after eighth grade to start working to help support his family.  He worked in delis and did yard work and learned real life skills.  As an adult he has primarily worked in warehouses, helping businesses maintain their inventories. 

At the end of last year, Tony was laid off from his job.  A friend told him about the Center and, with the encouragement of his niece, he came to check us out.  He says he feels like “a door opened up” for him, and Jane was there to meet him on the other side.  

Jane has been tutoring with the Center since 2009. Her work as a tutor began well before that, though.  Jane lived in Mexico for four years in the late 1980s where she helped business executives develop their English skills at the Centro de Idiomas del Sureste in Merida, Yucatan, Mexico.  (Interestingly, the Centro is owned and operated by Jane’s family.  Tutoring skills are apparently in her blood!)  Upon returning to the States, she tutored both ESOL and non-ESOL students at Frederick Community College in Maryland.  When Jane moved to Florida, she was looking for some volunteer work and called “211” for information.  They put her in contact with RSVP (Retired Senior Volunteer Program), which in turn put her in touch with the Center’s program at the Family Service Center.  Over time, Jane has tutored approximately ten of our students.

Tony and Jane get together twice a week and generally work for two hours.  Tony’s goal is to be able to represent himself to others the way he thinks of himself.  He wants to be able to confidently fill out job applications and speak with prospective employers.  Tony is enjoying his studies at the Center and working with Jane.  He says that the teachers are very supportive and find great resources for him to use.  Jane says that Tony is an eager learner who takes his studies seriously.  Like most adult students, he is filled with common sense, logic, and real life knowledge.  Tony is a walking advertisement for our program.  He encourages people he meets who are in similar situations to his own to come and learn, telling them that embarrassment shouldn’t hold them back.

Thanks to Tony and Jane for sharing their stories and partnership with us.  The progress that Tony has made through his hard work in the lab and his work with Jane and the dedication that Jane has shown to her students are inspirations to us all.  

Beaching It

It's been a long time since I took my clothes off in the back seat of a car.  (There are times I wish that my father didn't read this blog, but it's too good of an opening line to worry about parental embarrassment!)   And yet that's exactly what I (and Dorrit!) had to do last week when we needed an impromptu dressing room to change into our swimsuits to hit the beach.  Our intention had been to go kayaking but we arrived an hour late for the paddle, just in time to watch our group head into the distance.  (I swear they told me to be there at 9:45.)  Anyway, that left us near Fort Myers beach with a whole day ahead of us.

After setting up our umbrella (which is way easier to do when you have a cabana boy), we took a quick dip in the 80 degree water and headed down the beach for a walk and some shelling.  Even though the beach was fairly deserted, there were some real characters out there.   This couple caught our attention as they enjoyed the feel of the sun on way too much of their bodies.  (Dorrit's comment was that they must be French-Canadians.  I have no explanation.)  As we headed back towards our gear, we saw our umbrella take off towards the water.  Dorrit started jogging to retrieve it but I remembered my sister's admonition from the summer that my quick jog on the beach did not summon memories of Bo Derek in "10" and maintained my leisurely pace.  Luckily, a gentleman beachgoer rescued the umbrella before it hit the water.  I thought perhaps a cabana boy had miraculously appeared but it was actually just a helpful octogenarian.

We reset our umbrella and spent some time catching up, reading, and doing some more people watching.  This woman was pretty cute but I wasn't sure what the intention was behind the captain's hat.  I know there has to be a story there.  After carefully securing our umbrella, we headed out for a walk in the other direction and saw the cutest little sand crab scuttling around in the sand.  There were some great birds as well, including a lovely blue heron.   All in all, it was a wonderful way to spend the day, and we still have our kayaking adventure to look forward to.  Life is good in Southwest Florida.  

Yoga Month Wrap-Up

I have a ritual at the end of every vacation.  I like to do a little recap and think about favorite moments, different experiences, and even things I wouldn't do again.   My time at the Yoga Sanctuary during National Yoga Month was like a vacation in many ways.   Being on my mat transports me to another place.  Over the course of the month, I took 23 classes and spent over 1500 minutes on my mat, so that's a lot of time away from the rest of my life.  (Yes, I counted.  Just because I'm doing a lot of yoga doesn't mean I've left all of my Type A personality traits behind!)   So here's my recap:

Variety is the Spice of Life:  I was already familiar with the mixed level, level II and ashtanga classes at the studio.  One of the great things about yoga month is that I explored some types of classes that I hadn't done before.  I had heard people talk about yin last year but never made it to a class.  This type of yoga is intended as a counter to some of the more strenuous practices as you hold poses for longer periods of time in order to release some of those screaming muscles.  When I left the class I was in a stupor similar to  how I feel after a good massage.  Add that one to my calendar in the future!  I also took a sunrise class one morning.  One big surprise was that there are actually a lot of people out and about in Punta Gorda at 6:45 in the morning!  The other surprise was that the class wasn't the equivalent of a gentle stretch.  While we started with some nice sun breaths, by the end of the class we were working and our muscles were definitely awake.  A lovely way to start the day.

Most Powerful Experience:  September 21st was the United Nations' International Day of Peace.   Jen led a chant for peace that day that consisted of chanting "om" 108 times followed by nine minutes of silence.  (In case you're wondering, she kept track of the number of "oms" using mala beads, which are the Hindu equivalent of a rosary.)   There are lots of reasons why you chant 108 times, but the coolest one is that the diameter of the Sun is 108 times the diameter of the Earth, the distance from the Sun to the Earth is 108 times the Sun's diameter, and the average distance from the Moon to the Earth is 108 times the Moon's diameter.  The energy in the room was almost tangible at the end of the chanting and I felt myself gravitating towards the center of the rough circle we were sitting in.   I know I sound like I've been drinking the kool-aid but it was really an amazing experience.

Biggest Surprise:   Jen taught a mixed level class last week and told us to have bolsters at the ready.  I have always associated bolsters with chest opening postures (meaning that you're lying on the bolster for support).  VERY relaxing.  So you can imagine my surprise when we used the bolsters to position ourselves into supported split poses (which I don't think my body has done since I was a cheerleader in junior high).  Yes, I did feel that the next day (and this pose falls into the don't-need-to-do-that-one-again-for-awhile category)!

What I've Learned:  Although I love the physicality of ashtanga and the level II classes, I've come to a greater appreciation of the fact that there is a lot going on in even the simplest of yoga poses.  I've often thought of the analogy of  walking, chewing gum, patting your head, and rubbing your stomach all at the same time!  Take Mountain Pose (Tadasana) as an example.  If someone walked by the class and looked in, it would look a lot like people just standing upright with their arms by their sides. Au contraire! Your feet are together, your legs are firm, and your thighs are rolled inwards in order to create the base of the mountain.  Your spine is long and straight--no slouching in yoga class!   Your shoulder blades are drawn down and back (something I'm now able to feel).  Your arms are outstretched by your side.  Your gaze is towards the tip of your nose.  Oh, and don't forget to breathe!  It's no wonder that the outside world falls away when you're in your practice given everything you need to focus on.

My friend Bruce took a good long look at me the other day and said, "I'm trying to figure out if you've changed with all this yoga."  He is a funny guy and likes to throw comments out to get a reaction so I'm sure he wasn't serious.  And while I don't think I've changed as a result of all the yoga I've done over the past month, it's been great to have the time to get in touch with, well, a lot of things. Being at the studio so much has also deepened my sense of community there, making it an even more special place.   The trick, of course, will be not to slide back into my "I'll get to a yoga class when I can" attitude now that yoga month is over.   Which reminds me--it's time to get ready for class!