View to the west from just north of Santa Fe

While the multi-colored 45 minute sunset behind the wall of mountains was beautiful last night, what really took my breath away was seeing lentil soup at Whole Foods. A heart-healthy option and a place that serves something other than meat cooked in one way or another. Such relief, but disappointment at the familiar as well, knowing where everything would be, doing the self checkout. While there was no joy in taking a walk on the Route 40 Frontage Road in Amarillo past Volcano Korean Barbecue, Lin's Grand Buffet, Chuy's Mexican, Logan's Roadhouse, Saltgrass Steakhouse, Longhorn Steakhouse (I'm not making this up), Kabuki Romanza, Jimmy John's and Red Robin Gourmet Burgers and Brews, it was unfamiliar and like so much of what I've experienced, it shook me out of my world, providing me with appreciation for that. So Beemers in the parking lot, chiseled faces of people who work out too much, impatience - so much impatience, and there had been such politeness before, all made me feel like the party was winding down and it was almost time to go home to bed.

My friend's sister, who has a pretty little house in a quiet neighborhood south of Santa Fe downtown, as mentioned previously, is an Intimacy Coordinator. Turns out she didn't look into my eyes and call me a failure, but told me about her very interesting job which is advocating for actors when they are pressured by producers to, well, produce goods that aren't in their contract. A result of #metoo, she is hoping that people in her position will become part of SAG, but of course the producers are fighting this. She is also supposed to choreograph sex scenes so that there's no awkwardness, but the directors are unlikely to allow anyone else input. She's lovely and has given me the sweetest little room. It's been so nice to be here that I've decided to stay another night.

I went to the laundromat this morning, had been a while, but sadly, the technology is little changed though the prices have gone up. It was clean and shiny and required all kinds of ministrations with changing big bills into small bills and then small bills into a laundry card and a patient woman who worked there essentially holding my hand and talking loudly to me because I was just not getting it. It was a humbling exercise that I don't hope to repeat soon.

It's cold here, it was 20 when I was at the laundromat, and there's good downhill skiing right near by, the mountain has been dumped this winter, and within the last few days. Had I known, I MAY have rented as it was a bluebird day. But instead I went to visit Camel Rock and what was the Big Tesuque Campground, where we camped 30 something years ago. It has become Native American property and exists no longer as a campground. A casino grew nearby in the meantime.

7900 feet in altitude? Totally forgot about the old breathing thang. Yeesh.

Santa Fe is the most "crowded" of any downtown I've visited. It was even a quasi-challenge to find a parking space. The most special thing was going into San Miguel Chapel, which is apparently the oldest church in the US. Having recently re-read Death Comes to the Archbishop, I was able to imagine the French Archbishop and his sidekick doing their converting thing, and actually, there were some images that looked like European royalty, which seems absurd in a place like this. The outside bell had a lovely tinny sound that was so genuine and let you know it was small, and inside, there was a bell with many silver amulets on it.
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I’ll admit to timing visits to the opening of Yalla at 11:30, when the falafel is hot, the lines are short and Gene and Zohar are still laughing. That there’s a Star Trek theme, including a life sized mannequin that looks like Elvis in a Star Trek uniform, enhances, as does the graffiti’d back hallway and bathroom. But it’s the food that we come for, that and the examination of consistently odd footwear, which has included snow boots in summer, flip flops with socks, sneaker sandal combinations, an unmatching pair, earth shoes, white above the knee patent leather platform boots paired with a flannel shirt on a woodsy looking man. And you can’t discount the seats at the window, or the bench outside in summer, where we watch the logging trucks go by and guess what state each car is from based on the model and people inside (our record is good).

We might hazard a wander through Sam’s, an encyclopedic outdoor store that makes me want to take up winter hiking so I can rationalize buying an ice pick. But we’ll always go to the Coop, where everyone is out of central casting, to buy two 802 vanilla dipped in chocolate popsicles, pick up two napkins, two paper cups and two spoons for my mom and her roommate Sandy, who also suffers from memory loss.

When we arrive, neither of them recognize us, but they both know the popsicles and despite providing all the accouterments, they never need them, slurping down monster ice creams with a quiet focus and nary a spill. After, my mother will fold a napkin and put it between her lips, as though she has lipstick on. After a while, she will at least know that I’m someone in her life who loves her, and though she may not have a name or relationship, she prattles on about things I don’t understand, and will almost always say “Aren’t we lucky, the way things have turned out?” as I take in her Victorian china jug juxtaposed with the fake flowers and mylar balloon on the particle board dresser.

I had understood that her roommate was craving a beer and her family thought it alright if she had one. So the next time I came, I swapped out a popsicle for a Fosters tall boy (it was the only individual beer they had), pouring it for her into a coffee cup. She looked at us as though we were idiots and said “Where’s the salt?” Nat got her salt. In the same manner “Where are the chips?” We had none. After I had helped my mom with her popsicle wrapper, I looked over at Sandy and she had finished the cup of beer, poured and was drinking another, and had started getting out of bed, not fully dressed and pretty wobbly, talking like a drunk person. At the same time, my mom said “I feel sick, I think I’m going to throw up”. We dumped the beer, told the nurses there was a crisis in Room 305 and hightailed it out of there. Not my best work.

After talking crazy talk, smelling bad smells (masks aren’t only for COVID at the nursing home, and Nat has innovated Burt’s Bees smeared on the nostrils) and too much driving, hiking is the bomb, despite my usual weariness at the start, tight and approached with some small sense of duty. What is at first fairly flat and easily traversable, becomes rocky with slippery oak leaves or at certain times of year, a full stream. Eventually a rhythm sets in, the last few of the 5 zigs and 5 zags are the steepest but the easiest because movement ihas become smooth, quick, sweatier, heavy breathing, my mind gloriously empty. The view from the top is pretty but usually uncompelling. Mocha Joe’s for a cup of tea and it’s back on the road home, often with beautiful light.

A conversation about the people, or should I say individuals, of Brattleboro will have to wait for another time. 

I'll admit, I might not be the most laid back eater. Over the years, when I have scared myself by thinking about what it would be like to be in jail, certainly the brutality, the lack of decision-making and privacy, the lice, ugh, I don't even like to think of it now, but visually, it always comes back to a grey pile of quasi-meat goop slopped on a metal plate that gives me the shivers and I imagine deciding to end my life by just not eating. I know, dramatic and full of shit when my most difficult food decision today has been a deliberation between the Crunchy Hummus and Seasonal Peach with Goat Cheese salads at sweetgreens (I chose the latter. It was satisfying on a hot day). The point is that some foods have always given me the heebeejeebees, making me a challenging dining companion. And sadly, there seems to be no softening with age, my eating world is getting smaller.

When I was 4, I "had a bad egg", or so the fable goes (I suspect I was allergic) so haven't eaten anything significantly eggy since then, suffering through countless meals with whatever that thick egg and potato pie-ish thing. And the 80s, the era of quiche. At 7, I went off meat, with the exception of bangers, whose body part ingredients I didn't yet know, and crispy bacon, which doesn't seem any different than a good, salty potato chip, in fact at the BSO I was known as the bacon-eating vegetarian. People who found out I didn't eat red meat would say "aww, good for you", but honestly, it had nothing to do with conscience, I just never liked red meat. I had no qualms about putting a lobster into a pot of boiling water back then. 

One of my favorite stories about Nat when she was very little involves her being in the grocery cart at Whole Foods and, as I was ordering chicken at the counter, she remarked  "Isn't it funny that they call it chicken?" What does one say? I went with "yes". We ate a lot of Moroccan Chicken in the days of entertaining big groups, but at some point, I couldn't stomach chicken anymore. And while I'd cook turkey for 25 at Thanksgiving, eating it was out of the question.

So, fish. A month or so back, I got a beautiful piece of wild salmon, but for some reason after I cooked it and had a bite, it tasted awful. Never smelled bad, but that taste stayed in my mouth for a few weeks, blech. So, then shellfish. About a week ago, Nat told me that sardines were in season in Lisbon and I couldn't get those wonderful grilled fish I'd have at every meal, with boiled and buttered potatoes and parsley and maybe a half hearted stab at a green vegetable; a salad or quasi-cooked zucchini. Oh, those sardines were so good with a glass of vinho verde, lunch and dinner, every day. So when Wegman's didn't have soft shell crab today, I asked for the sardines.

While my friend the fishmonger was packing them, I confirmed that they were cleaned. He said they weren't but that it was easy. "You see this pinhole? You put your knife in there and then score along until you get to the head, opening up the body, then you put your finger in there and scoop everything out, it's very easy. You should have your children watch, and tell them that you'll do the same to them if they misbehave"

Bon appetite, I think.

Got to admit, living my best life here. The Beast's view while resting


We are staying in a converted barn with chickens (no, not inside) who so far have failed to wake us but keep trying, and two donkeys nearby who like to bray. The Bozeman prairie is flat, at 5,000 feet with mountain ranges on either side with our temporary home in fields of light green and a sandy yellow wheat, tucked in close to the foothills of the Gallatin range, which are covered with either grass and fir trees. The Beast is parked in a "lot" looking out across to the Bridier range, 10 -15 miles north, craggier and higher, some around 10,000 feet. It's cool at night and 80ish during the day, with clear air and sparkly sun, sunsets have grey and purple clouds that make the light something crazy I've never seen before. 


To remediate my lack of a hiking boot, I took a ride over to the local REI, which is more like a supermarket, with a mass of people coming and going. I actually saw a guy ride his bike out the front doors and no one batted an eye. There was a woman warmly greeting people, who told me that "One of our awesome boot people will help you out" Ray, who is a little older than me, was stocking shelves with a two day growth and the perma tan that seems prevalent from outdoor life, acknowledged me waiting, but continued to work on boot displays for perhaps five minutes. When he did come over, I asked him a few questions about the boots I had chosen, such as "What is the difference between these?" which stumped him. He did, however, offer that he was from Tenafly, NJ and had retired from a career as a construction engineer, and that there were people in Bozeman who had gone no further than Yellowstone, which baffled him. "I mean, how are they going to know how to take a bus?" "Are there buses in Bozeman?" "No, not really."


Nat, near the top of Drinking Horse Mountain
View looking towards Billings from the top of Drinking Horse Mountain


The one selfie I'm allowed per calendar year


There is a healthy respect for nature here, which we found out when we decided to stretch our legs by walking through fields and up a dirt road to the entrance of Levenrich Canyon, where we vaguely thought we'd take a wander, but were greeted with serious mountain bikers checking their times and more importantly, signs about only hiking with bear spray. On the way down, after seeing a 1 foot long garter snake, which caused both of us to have an internal dialog about whether to flee or just lay down and die, choosing the former we stomped down the hill, creating vibrations (snakes can't hear) to warn any other man-eating serpents that we were big and not to be messed with. The albino snakes we feared were in front of us turned out to be twisted white pieces of rope.


Max, a brown bear (see profile) saved in the Alaskan wilderness


To better understand bears, we went to a habitat where injured bears are housed, learning that black bears aren't always black and brown bears aren't always brown. The way to tell one from the other is to look at their shoulders. Brown bears have a bump and black don't, and the line from a forehead of a black bear to the tip of its nose is straight, while for a brown bear, it's curvy. And if you encounter one, "if it's brown, lie down, if it's black fight back". The subtext was that you're probably screwed either way. There was a man working there who had emigrated from Michigan, encouraging me to move Bozeman, oddly showing me a photograph of someone standing next to a snow bank that was taller than her. 


Yes, we got sucked into the Boot Barn, no Nat didn't find the right pair, and yes, I finally got that hat I've been dreaming of, and yes, a baby in Boston will one day wear baby cowboy boots.


I'm not sure I've ever seen so much well sculpted muscle in one place, there are some serious hard bodies on these outdoor people, most of them blonde, wearing plaid and genuinely friendly, except for the goth woman who served us dinner late one night, but she was probably tired and didn't really fit in. Beards, craft beer, trucks with caps, bikes hanging off cars and Chacos, so many Chacos. 

The bad news is that it was only day 2 and already I had lost a hiking boot and Nat her wallet. The good news is that we're both not unfamiliar with these sorts of crises and are well schooled at dealing with them.


As it was the same price to bring a carry on as to check a bag, we decided to share and check the monster bag Nat hauls back and forth across the Atlantic. I packed my stuff inside my prized Ikea bag that I am proud to say has a luggage check tag on it that I hope to never take off (it takes ingenuity and desperation to check an Ikea bag) and then put it inside Nat's, to take it out when we arrived. And while there are many good things about that Ikea bag, including its colors, size, ability to scrunch up into nothing, washability, one of them is not keeping things inside it all the time, so sadly, I must have lost a boot somewhere between our Trumpian hotel in Salt Lake and The Beast, parked in the hotel lot.


On our drive north, acknowledging we were already behind in fresh food intake, we were excited to find a Jamba Juice and after receiving our green drinks, skipped out, leaving Nat's wallet in Rexburg, Idaho, America's Family Community, only realizing it when we approached Big Sky, Montana, 2 hours in the wrong direction. 


While I am off to buy a new pair of boots today, I was overdue anyway, updates to follow on Nat's sitch.


It seemed imperative to stop at the Idaho Potato Museum, I, realizing that doing research on this museum was definitely work-related as an ED search may well come out of it. The baked potato was delicious, the tater tots, not so much.


Work related stop


As we got into various National Forests, the land changed quickly from gently rolling with mountains in the background to the actual mountains, filled with pine trees and white crosses that identify people who have died (an alarming amount). At what was called a caldera, but to us seemed like a meadow between mountains, we were lured in by the shockingly beautiful Flat Ranch Nature Preserve, where we took a walk in our Birkestocks (me out of necessity, Nat in solidarity, along a grassy track through the meadow. It was the kind of place I had pictured and hoped Montana would be like, the grasses were Wyethish in color, a yellow green, or perhaps green yellow, waving in the breeze and punctuated by purple, yellow and white wild flowers. When we got to the furthest point, I smelled that smell and felt the breeze of a big rain coming, hightailing it back in my case just in time, Nat choosing to stay with the cows she so loves and hoping lighting wouldn't strike. It didn't.


That I tried out my new wide-angle lens yesterday in a town and was frustrated by it, so didn't have it in these wide open spaces was of course a good lesson. Fortunately, there will be other opportunities.
Different kind of stile
View from Flat Ranch
Road to the hills
Taking it all in.


We arrived in Bozeman at dinner time and were a little shocked by the New Yorkness going on. We were tired and hungry and didn't feel like wandering into every restaurant, so made a random reservation at a sushi restaurant, something that did not seem right in Montana. In true form, we ended up walking away from the hubbub, through some sweet neighborhoods and a historical district, past fire trucks and close to Route 90, to the most random of new malls for what turned out to be not a bad dinner, but that might have been relative to the potato lunch we had had. 


For a few nights we are staying in a converted barn with views of the mountains and early morning wake ups from the chickens below. And the sound of wind, always wind.


View from my bedroom in the barn

Late night Salt Lake City arrival led us to a white Tundra four door that I am calling The Beast and Nat the White Falcon, and then to our hotel, a vision of the 1980s glam, that reminded Nat of an amped up version of my mom's prior independent living facility. But the beds were soft and and the bathroom a palace of its own with so many doors and separate rooms that I got lost in the middle of the night and walked into a wall.

TikTok led us to breakfast at Tulie, a half hour walk along a major thoroughfare with no traffic. We sat outside in the grass in this residential neighborhood enjoying the Salt Lake Sunday morning culture of those not choosing church. Tevas or some kind of river shoes are required. Delicious bread, home made chèvre and some orange cardamom cookies for car snacks, a black cat for company.

On the way back, we walked to the beautiful Temple Square near our hotel, only to find out that it was in fact, City Hall. Downtown reminds me of the Seaport with no open stores, sea or port. So, we mounted The Beast and did some driving around to find the actual Temple, which is closed, but saw men with white short sleeved dress shirts and ties and women with flowered print flowy dresses. A surprising amount of Pacific Islanders prompted Nat to dig into the google to discover that 7% of Pacific Islanders are Mormon. 

Heading north out to Salt Lake City, the land was almost immediately beautiful, but there were too many scars made by man. Eventually, there was just plain beauty, different kinds of peaks further to the east, mostly in the purplish blue range, and flat farmland closer by, in turns vibrant green, the tow-headed yellow of dried grass, small wild yellow sunflowers and sometimes a combination. There were cattle and fruit trees, and always behind, mountains on both sides.

Ogden sits in the flat but there are mountains protecting behind, demeaning the bigger buildings trying to be taken seriously. When seeing others in cowboy hats, we acknowledged the stress we felt of wanting to have one right away to better fit in, matched with the fear of jumping in too soon and making an uninformed decision that could lead to post-purchase dissonance. 

In a rainy Albertson's parking lot in Pocatello, we pulled in next to a woman returning from her shopping, about my age with the French braided hair and blue obviously handmade dress that could only be from the sect I had learned about watching the documentary Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey. I fear my mouth may have gaped a bit as I thought that sect was no longer. due to arrests and publicity. She and her passenger gave us nice smiles and waves and were off. 

Pocatello is such a good name, apparently not Italian, as lazily imagined without really thinking about it, but Native, after a chief who granted rights for a railroad to come through. 

We dined on 18 inch platters of various kinds of Mexican glop and saw a man with a gun in his belt. The urge to flee was there until I realized there was nowhere to run to that had no guns. For dessert, we were given a nacho chip each with whipped cream, a drizzle of chocolate sauce and honey, and sprinkle of cinnamon. Not half bad. 

Our long-held dream of going to see Barbie in Pocatello was dashed because, well, we forgot. But we did see a Barbie stove, which was kind of exciting.

A long time ago on courts not so far away, a Colombian man named Camilo and I got into a routine of doing an equal amount of hitting the ball and trash talking. While he moved to Sarasota, Florida, it remains easy to pick up where we left off, which we began when I met him at 10:30 on Friday night.

We hit the grass Saturday, Camilo having to get so low on the grass he was kneeling while hitting backhands, and me alarmingly anoxic after every point. We had lunch on the porch and watched the big kids play for a while, talking about what we could do better next time, as we usually do.

Because of Camilo's ability to be equally content anywhere, and our penchant for long, involved discussions, in some sense it doesn't really matter where we are. So when I had it in my mind I wanted to go to Worcester on Saturday after tennis, there was no convincing needed, we just got in the car and went.

A year or so back, Worcester Art Museum had been my client, and not having been to Worcester since a Grateful Dead concert in the 80s, it seemed a good idea to have a look around before I began the search. Worcester is a city at an interesting inflection point, with a mix of old and new buildings, neighborhoods, stores and residents. Some of the museum reminded me a tiny bit of the Gardner, without the good smell of the Palace that likely comes from the green courtyard. 

If you go out there, lunch at the Birch Tree Bread Company is killer, and a browse at neighboring and really nicely laid out Seed to Stem entertains. There's also a great used bookstore in the same building and good and not overcrowded antiques in the basement. But the other day, we had a different destination.

We went to Foley Stadium to catch Day 2 of the Worcester World Cup, a single elimination amateur soccer tournament with 16 teams, from Togo, Liberia, Kenya, Ghana, El Salvador, Somalia, Cameroon, Ecuador, Iraq, Honduras, Guatemala, Haiti, Albania, Jamaica, Nigeria and Brazil, all made up of local residents and in support of a junior program that teaches kids soccer and life skills.

We were met with delicious smelling food at the entrance on the left, pho on the right, and further along, a table with Ghanian handcrafts and fabrics. We paid our admission and tried unsuccessfully to find a place to sit in the shade. My neighbor was an 11 year old Honduran boy who clued me in on what was going on. Albania beat Jamaica handily, Nicaragua beat Brazil (lost $10 on that one), and Ecuador looked posed to send Cameroon packing. In the stands was a delightful assortment of people from the different parts of the world that represent over 20% of Worcester's population, all there to support their country's team. There was a spirit of camaraderie in the stands, within the teams, and also on the pitch.

All this is the work of a woman named Laura Suroviak, who founded Cultural Exchange Through Soccer 20 years ago at a Worcester school yard. She brought kids of different nationalities together, creating a dialog through a shared love of soccer. Since then, she has formalized programs that include year round soccer for 7-12 year olds that encouraging kids to stay in her "system" by moving them into team-building for teens, then leadership, a college scholarship program and hopefully, board seats. All with the intention of someday having governmental leadership in Worcester that more closely reflects the makeup of its tax payers, not to mention leaders who understand that soccer is as important as baseball, literally and symbolically. The World Cup we attended is the annual fundraiser and showcase, bringing together people who are involved with CETS at all levels. It was a privilege to be able to witness the spirit and joy this woman has created. 

The drive back to the city was mostly taken up with indulgent deliberations of where to go to dinner. We decided to shoot for the South End and hope that through some crazy turn of events on a perfect summer Saturday evening, we could score two seats at the bar of either SRV or Toro. When we pulled up, there was our sole table on the sidewalk at Toro, and even more miraculous, five cars away was our parking spot. A Winter Hill IPA and cold glass of white burgundy, bacalao, patatas bravas, charred broccoli, panne con tomate and conversations about the paramilitary's no mans land, ayahuasca and online poker made for an engaged ending to a perfect day.

I was really ill the next day, perhaps from the patatas bravas, but that's a whole other story that isn't very interesting, involving not much more than my couch, cancelled dinner plans, and gasp, me missing a meal. 

This coming Saturday, Nat and I head for Salt Lake City, a (hopefully white) pick up truck, the open road and the big sky, so stay tuned.

This is actually someone's desk, and while the view is killer, it's a challenging and stressful job that sometimes involves more people wanting courts than there are available.

We all have inherent truths that are part of us, and one of mine is that I'm happiest when being creative, allowing me to fully engage with life. Creativity was the muse Ernest Hemingway was chasing when he tried to imbibe just enough to loosen him up, instead drinking excessively which led to, well, death. I can sympathize with his challenge but don't believe chemicals are the best solution. 

When we were young, we might have been told by our parents or teachers that we were either creative or not creative, the implication being that it is something we're born with. It's my belief that we all have it in us. But why is it so hard to access? Speaking from my own experience, there are so many voices competing in one head. It's 9:09 am as I'm writing this and here is a partial litany of what has yelled at me (1) Get out of bed, you need to write before your day starts (2) Don't go barefoot as it will make your foot worse (3) clean that pan (4) You need more dishwashing liquid (5) Don't have so many cherries (6) Floss and brush better today (7) When are you going to the gym? (8) What are you going to bring Mom tomorrow? (9) Make that phone call (10) Get that interview scheduled (11) Ice your foot (12) Do laundry (13) Text everyone about next Thursday (14) What are next steps for outreach? And on and on and on and on. I knew a man who said that the only difference between the homeless guy at Copley who yells all the time is that he's doing it out loud while we have an internal monolog. I once did a project, writing down everything I thought I "should" do, from balancing my checking account to stretching to logging my work time, and laughed at the absurdity of one human accomplishing all of it. 

My point being that our worldly responsibilities are crippling, and can get in the way with the playful and curious sides of ourselves, which sadly become a luxury we can't afford. It was under these conditions I decided to embark upon my cross country drive. After a week of solitude and a hike in Amarillo, Texas, my mind quieted down enough to get a clear picture of things that weren't working and what I needed to do to fix them. I had been unhappy at work, with the stress of deadlines coming from too many directions. Something about nature's abundance in this beautiful canyon helped me to know that of greatest importance would be for me to focus on actions that would open up my world, rather than struggle to maintain what I currently had. 

As writing was one of those actions, and my prior work stress had precluded being creative, I fired a bunch of clients when I got home, clearing a path for something new. It felt sooooo good! But as it turned out, I was frozen and bored and my days felt empty. There was so much space that weeks seemed interminable, nothing was fun, the world was monotone. And writing was not happening. So when a new interesting client asked me to do a search, wavering from my commitment, I sheepishly agreed, relieved to have something that would provide structure to my days. And here's what I found: I loved doing the search and found it easier to write. "If a little is good, more is better" may be true for butter and hot sauce, but not for working or doing nothing. Balance is key.

When I was an HR person at the Symphony many moons ago, there was a guy on the house crew who everyone loved, in part for his smiling blue eyes, bright white hair and strong Boston accent, but also because he called it as he saw it. He once said to me "They're putting 10 lbs of %&* in a 5 lb. bag", a not unusual expression, but one that made me see the inefficacy of what was happening in that particular situation and one that is unfortunately prevalent for most of us on a personal and professional level. While people in my manager trainings always nod enthusiastically when I mention that studies show IQ decreases under stress, they are never quite able to translate this knowledge into action, continuing to be powerless to the work piled onto them, the assigned deadlines that are unreachable. And so it goes. 

My output last year had been incredibly high, some might have called it productive, but it was a joyless experience and unsustainable, mirroring so many of the work environments I've been part of. So many of us carry around an inherent, unspoken belief that we're not doing enough. I've realized by conducting only two searches at a time, that I can focus on every aspect, listening and interpreting better, thinking of creative solutions, and anticipating what lies ahead. It's my belief that while I'm doing less work, I'm more productive, sewing seeds that may take longer to mature, but that will regenerate for many years. It's my guess that I'll make more money this year than last, AND I get to write! 

Definitely disappointed as my friend whom I could usually beat when we played informally grabbed the win

We were supposed to play at the most wonderful Cambridge Tennis Club, where the clubhouse smells like an old-fashiony cabin, but unexpectedly, 2 inches of rain fell overnight and the court my friend had reserved was the one that takes longest to dry. So our other friend invited us to a private court nearby, owned by a kind family who don't play, but want it to be enjoyed. On the Boston border, this oasis made us imagine we were at a Hawaiian resort, with a killer pool surrounded by big moss covered rocks, beautiful gardens and a dry court with flowering trumpet vine along one side, bamboo and huge urns of red, pink and orange shade begonias on the other.

I played with a woman I know slightly, someone as nice as they come; thoughtful, warm, only ever positive with a beautiful and resident smile. When trying to convince me that she was indeed competitive, she mentioned that during a league match, when her opponents made a bad call, she immediately said "Are you sure?" If you're not a women's league tennis player, you might not understand that there can be a lot behind that question, and under most conditions, them's fighting words. When we played, the most aggressive she got was a couple of down the line passing shots, but even those seemed somehow apologetic. At lunch, her husband confirmed that she is indeed competitive, which still seemed hard to comprehend. I mentioned I wasn't, and one of the other women who knew me disagreed, which led to some re-examination and this post. 

Here is what Oxford Dictionary has to say about the word competitive: "having or displaying a strong desire to be more successful than others".

What comes to my mind with the word competitive is someone who will win at any cost, who would prefer to hit a rim shot that dribbles over the net, than a most perfect backhand an inch out. People whose eyes too often deceive them at the baseline, who use the USTA rules as ammunition, not scaffolding, who see the people on the other side of the net as the enemy. 

Since beginning tennis in my early teens, I never focused on winning, or "being more successful than others". It wasn't the tournament trophy I got, instead the one for sportsmanship, which at the time felt like the equivalent of a participation trophy. Now, I think of myself as playing for the joy of the game, exercise and sociability, as well as trying as hard as I can. I'm internally competitive, pushing myself to have a quiet mind, do better, reach further, master, keep trying. The best games are when I have that feeling of flow, having worked on something long enough that it just happens without my thinking about it. 

Playing a paddle tournament in Longmeadow a few years back, surrounded by tall oak trees, a snow-covered golf course and some crows, I had a funny vision of an alien or someone from a third world country seeing these four misguided women stuck in a cage on a very cold day, chasing a ball with glorified sticks, upset when the ball didn't go where intended. We have lost our minds, I thought. This reinforced the lack of importance I placed on winning.

But here's something that makes me question my focus on enjoyment. I play with someone who is not only a gifted athlete and fair, honest and a fun person to play with, but also focused on (and successful at) winning. Never a bad call or an inappropriate word, but she's down to business, moving forward towards a victory, staying cool and though rarely making mistakes, forgetting them. if she does. When I think about her, I realize there's something primal about winning as she does, something that has to do with never falling apart. It's the equivalent of not panicking when one's ship is going down, doing what needs to be done with a clear head, saving lives without jumping in to shark-infested waters, or pushing children out of the way in order to get in the first lifeboat. We all want and need to be that person, and some are better at it than others.

A few minutes ago while I was formulating this, I heard from a friend. She had applied for a job that was a stretch but she was ready for. The process had taken too many months, with poor communication, false starts and stops, optimism, disappointments, but for her, always a commitment as she studied up, asked good questions, challenged herself and the company she was interviewing with. In her text, she let me know that while it was really close between her and another, she didn't get the job, and is experiencing the raw disappointment of doing everything she could to get something she wanted really badly, then feeling that searing and painful let down. I look up to her bravery, she had done the equivalent of what I realized I was uncomfortable with in competition - putting it all on the line. 

So, I'm not sure what my friend meant when she said I was competitive, and I will surely ask her next time we're together, but it prompted me to understand that perhaps while I hope I’ll never waver into the land of iffy line calls, perhaps I'm not willing to try harder to win because I'm not sure I have the discipline, confidence or nerves of steel that some do. On the other hand, my mastering and enjoyment of racquet sports has brought so much joy. I suppose, as the dictionary states, it's all about being more successful, and that may be up to each individual.TBD.

Until I was 35, I moved every year or two, packing up those same old boxes and moving them myself. Among the things I carried around was an item similar to the photograph above, only pink, white and gold, a china toast holder that had been my grandmother's, given to my by my mother with some ceremony. Not a big toast person, and certainly not cold toast, as the English prefer it, I'd unpack that bloody thing, look at it, wrap it up in fresh newspaper, put it back in its box and put the box with other things of similar utility in a closet or basement. Then move it again.

When I finally got my own place, without thinking much about it, I threw it out. Didn't even try to give it away, put it on the curb in the trash. It was the beginning of a new relationship with things. 

About five years ago, my siblings and I had to move my mom into a nursing home, she was no longer able to participate in any of the decision-making. We only had a few days to clear her out and were unsentimental, calling in the trash hauler, giving things away, keeping a minimal amount. It was shocking how quickly all traces of a life could be erased.

Among them were things she had treasured, ok, not the shower caps she got from hotels that kept her leftovers fresh in the fridge, or the gently used paper napkins she'd hide from me so I wouldn't throw them away, but possessions that to her were part of a legacy she had either created or contributed to. One was a collection of cranberry glass that had been in our home growing up, displayed on an ancient, oak hanging shelf, adding color and contrast to the white wall and dark wood. But when we were moving her, we looked at each other and shrugged, none of us wanting this collection she'd treasured. As we didn't have the heart to get rid of it, into my brother's barn it all went. "Maybe one of the grandkids will want it", we half-heartedly rationalized.

It pushed me to think about how much our things do or don't define us and reminded me of the toast holder. All those objects we look at every day, things we hold and use and love, that are the scenery and props of our lives. If something is harder to get hold of, either because it's expensive or hard to find, do we love it more than an item found on the curb? How much memory is infused in things? And how unmoored would we feel if these objects disappeared and there was only us without any of our stuff? 

When I knew I'd be moving to a smaller, temporary place a few years ago, I was merciless about de-accessioning. But...... while I might not immediately need my perfect-size-for-me shovel with a handle that has dug many deep holes and has always been one of my favorite things, there was no question about whether I'd keep it or not. But there were many other things: dressers, hard copy photographs, mirrors, lamps, my father's diaries , pictures, love letters and brand new ski boots that never fit right.

So, I took a storage space nearby as a temporary measure and when the rent increased by 20%, was pushed to make a decision. I realized that there were objects that had replacement values that were below what I was paying to store them, and then other things that didn't have a mathematical formula. Out went the former, and as it turns out, a fair amount of the latter. I had been using the space as both a facility to put my things and a holding place that allowed me to exist between lives, and it was time to move on. 

There are friends who are still perturbed that I left the Tiffany place settings from my first marriage on the sidewalk in Allston. But doing so freed me of ties and any dreary sense that I should mitigate a soured relationship by receiving some kind of financial recompense. Instead, I imagine with glee an older, stiff hipped Russian lady wobbling from side to side, on her way to the shops, seeing the Tiffany blue peeking out of the box, checking it out, looking to the left and the right, and then picking everything up, stowing it carefully in her zebra motif shopping buggy and toddling off to the farmer's market in her beige orthopedic lace ups. Maybe that didn't happen, but maybe it did. Doesn't matter. 

Lest you think that all my mental and physical closets are cleaned out, let me introduce you to the "sports closet" As it was an old and pleasing piece that was an active participant in our lives growing up, I was happy to have it. Costing a significant amount to restore, it then had to be craned into the house because it was too wide to fit up winding stairs. It also has a tendency to overpower a room with its bulk and gravity. When it was time for me to move a few years ago, I decided it was a ball and chain I no longer wanted to carry, so researched who might want to buy this many hundreds of years old armoire in good condition. The answer was no one, sigh, antiques are out. My brother said he'd be happy to break it apart and use the wood, but I couldn't let it go, it seemed somehow wrong. So these poor guys had to hoist it down off a second floor porch and then carry it up five flights of stairs on a very hot day. I tipped them well. 

I'm in service to this behemoth, it owns me. 

Anyone?