The Joy of Harvesting

From childhood summers in Roosevelt picking vegetables to my recent years of gathering the delights from our Cold Spring garden, harvesting is a simple joy. There is nothing quite like the feeling of bare hands working in soil, the pleasure of pulling out a carrot or radish root or the treat of snapping off a cherry tomato from a winding vine. Best of all is popping the sweet tomato still warmed from the sun directly into your mouth. As a young girl I loved to join my grandmother (Coco) and great grandmother (Hani Mama) in their garden behind their house on Farm Lane. I remember well how much I loved collecting string beans and pulling up carrots. Although I was presumably helping them in the garden, mostly I was just along for the ride while they worked and I got my hands dirty and ate a fresh vegetable here and there.

At my great aunt Ellie’s house on Valley Road, the harvesting was of fruits. We picked fresh gooseberries, raspberries, and cherries and baked yummy pies and made wonderful jams. I treasure those memories in Roosevelt and had forgotten how much I enjoyed vegetable gardening until a few years ago when Andy built us two beautiful large raised vegetable planters. I have been tending to my flower garden for twenty years at our house so I certainly have known the joy of gardening. But I had forgotten the great pleasure of picking your own homegrown vegetables and savoring their fresh flavor within minutes of harvesting.

All of our vegetables have been wonderful, but basil wins this year’s prize for most abundant. I have made eight very large batches of pesto since August. Each batch I altered the ingredients and they have all been divine. My recipes are simple: basil, evoo and vary the cheese and nut. Parmigiano-Reggiano and walnut, almond with no cheese for my vegan friends, pecorino and almond, pecan and parm and I even made a mixed basil-parsley batch. Sometimes I add garlic and other times I add lemon. And of course you can’t go wrong with the traditional pine nut and parm. I have given away a few batches and I have also given away tons of the fresh basil for others to make pesto. The rest of the pesto is in my freezer waiting to be enjoyed over pasta on a cold winter night! We are in pesto nirvana.

Fall harvesting is often the most abundant time for a garden in the northeast. It takes time for many plants to reach their peak so it is natural that September is a great time to enjoy the vegetable crops. This year, however, has been a strange year for our garden. Warm weather came late in the spring so our garden got off to a slow start. Then August was a particularly dry month and September particularly warm. The upside of the unusual weather is that we still have vegetables in our garden at this late date in October. Yes, it is not unusual to have colder weather veges like second plantings of hardy root crops like radishes, beets and turnips—we have all of those at the moment. But here it is in October and in addition to the root vegetables we have zucchini, celery, parsley, eggplant, peppers, tomatoes and even cucumbers. Amazingly we even had three basil plants that I finally pulled out a few days ago to make our last two batches of pesto. Truly unusual for October. Lucky us as we enjoy the fruits—vegetables that is—of our labor and create delicious farm-to-table meals from our fall harvest.

XOXO Rachel

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Longing For Childhood Friends

I woke up this morning very lonely. Although when I had that feeling I was snuggled closely to Andy and my kitty, Anubis, was settled on top of me purring away. But nonetheless, I felt lonely. Images of my childhood friends from Roosevelt, NJ haunted my dreams last night and I awoke longing to see them and have long conversations with them. Long and deep conversations with them. Sure, we had conversations when we were kids. I remember some of the talks got to a deeper level though many were everyday conversations. It didn’t matter because simply my friend’s company and my ability to be with them and talk about anything was so important to me. But now, I envision heart-felt connected conversations with them as adults as if I inhibited my childhood existence with my adult mind. I long to talk to Peri and Elan and Dawn and Kirsten and Nathalie. I long to stroll down the streets of my hometown to one of my friend’s houses. To be able to walk into their home at any time unannounced.   To be able to hang out whenever and wherever. Because that is what you do when you are a kid in a small town. That is what you do with good friends who aren’t so busy with life and work and everything that is so planned these days.

Deep connections with friends are different as adults. If you are in a couple relationship and are lucky—like me—you have deep meaningful connection and conversations with your spouse. I am grateful that I have that. And yet I want and need more. I want the connection to girlfriends with whom I can connect without having to schedule days in advance to meet, or schedule weeks in a advance to get coffee together, or schedule even for just a phone call! Spontaneity is difficult. The complexity of everyday commitments gets in the way of relationships. Perhaps this is the reality of adulthood. Perhaps this is the reality of these times in general so therefore also true for kids. We are so busy. Our access to community is so structured.

I live in a small town again like when I was a child. However, I am on a dirt road not directly in the village so walking over to someone’s house is not so easily accomplished. And even if I was in town, could I just stop by someone’s place? I lived in New York City for many years and in a way I felt very connected though again, no one stopped by just to chat. I find that as I read books that take place in small towns—of course they are deeply romanticized stories of big families with gatherings of many generations and lots of friends—I feel deep longing. That is the essential word here. Longing. It is a simple word and yet it conveys an intense emotional feeling of needing to be seen and needed and wanted and connected to others. A yearning, and aching, a desire that I feel deep in my core of being. I itch to wander over to one of my childhood friend’s house and plop down on their couch and talk. I miss you.

XOXO Rachel

My Head Is In The Clouds

Ah, the summer. It is a time to relax and unwind and do nothing. I have been doing a lot of nothing this summer and loving every minute of it! Of course, my nothing is still fairly active with regular exercise and yoga and our DIY house painting room-by-room project. But I have slowed with work and I have indulged by reading many romance novels and murder mysteries and taking trips to the Jersey Shore (see Magical Moment Mondays Jersey Shore) and a trip to Saratoga Springs (see also At The Races).  And I find that my head is in the clouds, both literally and figuratively. By literally I mean that I am perfectly content to watch the clouds roll by and do some cloud hopping (see Cloud Hopping) if the conditions are right. Lately the sky has been very clear but today I am enjoying the drift of fluffy white clouds just asking to be leapt into. When I engaged in cloud hopping, I feel a lightness and thrilling sense of freedom as I jump from cloud to cloud. And that moves me to then have my head in the clouds figuratively.

When I go up into the clouds figuratively, I am very removed from the world and my body. It is as if I can peer down upon me and my own life with a new perspective—almost as if I were a different person. It is very calming because that view is always magnificent and optimistic and persuasive. From the cloud view I am able to look over the past of my life, the present of my life and the future of my life without fear and without judgment and with love and kindness. It is serenity. It gives me clarity.  What a great place to live!

Sometimes I figure out a problem up there. Other times I get new ideas and run back inside to write them down. Almost always I want to write after I am up in the clouds because I have so much pouring out of my head that I must release. And writing is a wonderful method to release and cultivate my thoughts. Even as I type away at the keyboard, I feel removed from my physical self when I am downloading post cloud time. The words tumble from my head and I feel soothed and completely at home. As I sit here attempting to make sense of it, I would say that for me nature and writing are curiously intertwined. I don’t always need to be in the clouds or in nature to write, but nature moves me. Being outside pushes me into the clouds, which then pushes me into thoughts and then pushes me to write. I say push because it is as if an energy field is surrounding me that compels me to write. Yes, inactivity leads to boundless activity! The inactivity of having my head in the clouds is actually one of the most powerful ways for me to get into action—the action of writing. I say let’s all get our heads into the clouds and see what we create!

XOXO Rachel

Streaming Memories—Flea Markets

A few weeks ago I was thinking about what I wanted to write for my monthly blog. Nothing was front and center for me at the time so I decided to try to dredge up as many memories of my childhood in as quick a time as possible. I wrote my stream of memories as they emerged from the recesses of my mind. And so here is a slightly edited version of that project that produced thoughts about flea markets plus seemingly random yet related memories.

I only recently put together that my love for flea markets started at a young age. Englishtown Flea Market has a particularly strong and positive spot in my heart. I remember not really liking the old stuff at the flea market—some would call it junk—but I loved others aspects, like the food and new items. And I didn’t like flea markets for a number of years after childhood but I love them now. The main thing I remember about Englishtown was the excitement of visiting the Danskin man. Nathalie and Peri and I loved to get leotards and tights in so many varieties there. My favorite was the gymnastic style that had a V-neck and a zipper down the front.

This was the era of Olga Korbut at the Olympics so we were in love with gymnastics. I have vivid memories of running around and doing fake gymnastics—and then some real gymnastics after we got lessons—on the lawn between Peri’s grandparents and her house. Fake gymnastics was were we would take a running start and call out round-off, back-somy, back-layout, or some sort of floor routine while we spun around but didn’t actually tumble. Peri and I went to the YWCA in Princeton when they first offered real gymnastics classes. It was all so new then. I remember vividly how Peri and I watched this beautiful girl with long flowy hair do a backward walkover. Her name was Yvette. In about a year or so she and her family actually moved to Roosevelt. She and her whole family was just so cool to Peri and me and everyone. I think we all had crushes on someone in that family.

As the gymnastics craze grew, a school called Alts then opened in Princeton at the University and we took gymnastic classes there. I stuck with Alts up through high school when they moved to their new location on Bear Brook Road in Princeton Junction (just down the road from Erehwon as it turned out—see The Moment My Taste Buds Came Alive for more about Erehwon). I gave gymnastics up perhaps in my junior or senior year when I really had too many after-school activities.

I loved all my high school activities. There was Field Hockey, Winter Track, Spring Track, Musicals, Choir, Schola Cantorum—the a cappella choir, and my most favorite and nerdy activity—Math League! Math League was such an interesting and satisfying activity even if I didn’t always get the math problem correct. They were really difficult word problems for the most part and even if I made a dent in them I felt good. We did OK as a school though nothing quite like the prep schools in and around Princeton.

All of these memories stem from my memory of Englishtown as a kid. Besides the Danskin man, my other important memory was getting a baby goat—a kid—there. I don’t really remember buying Geto, but I remember how my great aunt Ellie held him like a baby in her arms as Mom drove us home, Erik and me in the back. What an amazing item to get at a flea market.

Geto was a wonderful pet. Our cat, Minu would sometimes stand on Geto’s back and we loved to play with Geto while he tried to butt us with his small horns. Geto liked to eat any and everything he could find. In general goats are known for being an automatic lawn mower. Unfortunately he also ate half of our dogwood though I loved how he left the tree so that it draped gracefully over our steps to no-where—concrete steps in the middle of our lawn. Sometimes we would get a call from a neighbor down the street to come and get our goat who had wandered down the road.  I loved him—what a flea market find!

These days we go to Stormville Flea Market which is open one weekend a month from Labor Day to Memorial Day and a couple of special days in October and November. I can’t say that we have found anything as unusual as a goat there, but just like Englishtown, there is food, old items and new items, organized into separate areas so that you know what you are getting. And leotards are nowhere to be found at Stormville—I have no idea where you can get such specialty items even though little girls are most certainly doing gymnastics now that it has become more mainstream.

Most times when we visit any flea market, we don’t buy much but we have such a good time looking at the various, and sometimes quirky, items for sale. Each time we visit we identify the item of the day—something that seems to be sold at more than a handful of stalls. And I am not saying there was just two or three of them—it is more like five or more times that we see the same item in a particular day. Like last time we found old wooden tool boxes many times. And we saw architectural items over and over. Or there was the time we saw the same 60s penguin ice bucket at probably six different spots! Or the time we saw garden gnomes aplenty—that is a common sighting in summer. Another time it was typewriters. It’s a fun activity that emerged naturally for us after years of scouring flea markets! And I owe this all to Englishtown. Thank you Englishtown for starting a life-long love of visits to flea markets.

XOXO Rachel

I Forget What Serves Me Best

IMPORTANT NOTE: I actually forgot to post this blog when I wrote it on October 21, 2013—how funny!

One forgets. I am constantly reminded of that in life. Often it isn’t such a bad thing. Like those times when I have been in physical pain, for instance—I tend to forget what that felt like. Or I forget about arguments I had or some awful experiences I had while I was working in corporate America. I am not upset that I forget these things. Apparently my mind is smart and has done a beneficial thing by tending to forget these negative things. So I can say in these cases I am forgetting for my own good.

Unfortunately, I also forget the good stuff, the stuff that serves me so well—and I bet you do to. It is a natural tendency—it is so easy to forget. I forget that reading poems helps to get my own writing juices flowing. I forget that when things seem hard, I should stop and let something make it feel easy again. Really what I forget is that I need to fill myself up with fuel before I can run (and I’m not talking about going for a jog). And by fuel, I mean anything that gives me energy and excitement and re-lights my passion about my work or whatever I am pushing and wanting to do.

One of the most unfortunate things I forget is to have fun. So I devised a method to stop during my workday to refuel and have some fun. I cut out hearts, peace signs and flowers out of good old-fashioned colorful construction paper (that was fun in and of itself). Then using a colored felt-tip pen I wrote a different fun activity on each piece (like read a poem, walk our labyrinth, write in my journal, play with my cat—I keep adding items when I think of them). I now have a grab bag of fun activities in a beautiful pottery bowl that I made. Now all I have to do is remember to pick one out of the bowl each day. But that’s the problem—I forget! I forget that doing something that makes me happier and saner is as easy as picking out a random fun activity from the bowl (which is really just picked from my head). It’s very simple if I would just not forget!

I have lots of techniques to help me remember and they work pretty well—for a while anyway. For instance, I have reminders pop up on my computer to take my vitamins, keep track of work hours, and pick a grab bag fun activity. And yet I still often forget those tasks anyway. If I have set up the reminder to pop up at the same time of the day for too many day, weeks or months in a row, I click “dismiss” on the task without really thinking about it. Instead of automatically doing the task, I automatically ignore it! Yes, we humans are so excellent at doing things automatically and unconsciously. That’s a good thing if it’s exercising most mornings (which I am happy to report I have been doing now for years without much thought). But it’s not such a good thing when it’s automatically dismissing something good like putting something out of your mind that will benefit you and make you happy.

So why do we forget? There are a ton of theories but all I can say is that forgetting isn’t such a bad thing. It’s part of life.  So why not do things in life that make me the best me I can be? The answer for me is simply that I forget what serves me best…until I remember and I am off and running again with positive energy.

XOXO Rachel

At The Races

At the races conjures up two very different things for me—being caught up in the rat race of work and watching horses racing at the track. The first is being stuck in it all and the latter is being away from it all. The balance between the two is even apparent in my memories of going to the horse-track. The first time I was “at the races” was when I was a young girl and my mom was working as an attorney at Legal Aid Society in Trenton, New Jersey. Periodically I went to work with her instead of school. I don’t remember the exact circumstances on that day that led to me joining her rather than going to school but I can say that my mom was very trusting that I knew which days I really had to be at school and which days were not such a big deal.

I had a great relationship with my mom—I still do—and she understood that when I occasionally woke up and said that I really did not want to go to school that day that I truly needed the day off. I was an “A student” and I was very conscious in my decision to take—what I would now call—a mental health day now and again when I needed a break, careful to not miss an exam or something else important that day. And so my mom and I played hokey a day here or there. She didn’t entirely play hokey because my day of hokey always included some work time for her. In the earlier days it was at Legal Aid but then later when she was on her own, we would go to her private practice office to work for a few hours then head over to the newly opened Quaker Bridge Mall—one of the first malls and certainly the only mall around us in those days. So I had a day off from the rat race of school and she had a partial day off from the rat race of work. As I look back I realize that I continued to quite successfully understand when I needed a mental health day off from work. Throughout my years working in corporate America I managed to take an occasional day off for no reason and I believe I was more successful—less prone to burnout—because I did so.

The day that we went to the races was a particularly unusual day off from school for me. At my mom’s office she was one of the few women attorneys. The guys loved to go to the Garden State Park Racetrack in nearby Cherry Hill, NJ now and then as a lunch break (I think that is where we went, as the racetrack is no longer there). I was fortunate to be at the office on one of their hokey days. We slipped out of the office for a few hours and drove to the park. I remember picking horses based on their names. We found a perfect choice named after a flute or classical piece or flutist—was it Die Fledermaus or Magic Flute or Jean-Pierre Rampal… Well, I don’t remember the horse’s name exactly but I do remember that the choice paid off! What a thrill to watch the horses come around the bend towards the finish line while my mom and I cheered our horse on. We won a few bucks!

Although I have been “at the races” metaphorically in the workforce for many years after that day with my mom, I only recently was literally was “at the races” again—a first time as an adult. Now that Andy and I are working on our own, we have tremendous flexibility when it comes to taking time off from work. A couple of years ago for our 25th wedding anniversary we decided to take a mid-week getaway to nearby Saratoga Springs during the racing season. Saratoga is a lovely town with interesting little shops and gourmet restaurants lining main street and lovely inns. After breakfast, we wandered around the town a bit before going to the races.

Although there were some similarities to my early childhood experience, much of this horse racing track trip felt very different. We parked near where all the horses and their caretakers lived during the season. It was fascinating to get a glimpse behind the scenes of the racing horse life. It felt foreign to me and yet very comforting in a way. It was a hot day and people milled about with their horses; jockeys and horse trainers hung out and chatted with their colleagues; others sat outside around the barracks listening to music. The occasional fancy car appeared with what I assumed were the wealthy horse owners.

We made our way to the gate where we picked up our tickets that we had ordered in advance then people watched while standing in line until the gate opened. The mix of people was wonderful. There were big families, fancy dressed women in hats, men in suits, young groups of friends, older wealthy couples and of course unfortunate looking people who I presumed were gambling away whatever they had. We found our section in the grandstand and then were escorted to our seat by a gentleman who whisked our seat clean before we sat down. Such a lovely tradition.

Then the preparation for the races began! We scrutinized the racing bet sheet to see if we could make heads or tails of the horses. The only thing we could make heads or tails of was which was actually the head or tail of the horse. So instead of any fancy system we went for horses that were mentioned as promising or had a nice name—that worked when I was a girl. Even making our few-dollar bets was an experience. We went up to the window and fortunately had a teller who was patient as we tried to state our bet the way you are supposed to: Track Name, Race, Amount, Bet Type, Horse Number (not the horse’s name). So it would be something like Saratoga, race one, two dollars to win on the five (though we didn’t state Saratoga because it was obvious we were there). Unlike as a girl, we did not win a penny—but just like as a girl, watching the horses fly around the track to the home stretch was indeed trilling!

I am glad that I have been “at the races” in both senses of the expression throughout my life. Now that I am able to be “at the races” in the getting away from it all sense more often than in the being part of the rat race way, I am indeed grateful.

XOXO Rachel

A Nature Child Of The 60s In Small-Town USA

Although it is easy to wax poetically and over-romanticize one’s childhood while looking back decades, my childhood days really were glorious. I lived in a tiny town of about 1000 people located in one square mile of New Jersey, very much in farmland. Roosevelt is located in central Jersey where relatively large areas of undeveloped land remain and there are still farms left. Sure, there are tract housing developments near my hometown now that did not exist when I was a kid, but it is still a wooded borough surrounded by plenty of nature.

I got to thinking about my experience with nature as a child because of a book that I just read for my book club, Last Child In The Woods: Saving Our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder by Richard Louv. I have been in one book club or another for more than 20 years. This time I have rejoined a club that meets at the library in my new small-town—new in the sense that I have only been living here full time for about 5 years and part-time for only 20 years. A club member, Annie, who works in ecological education, suggested the book. She also happens, coincidentally, to be married to the son of Becky who I grew up with in my hometown of Roosevelt. Although it is possible that knowing Annie’s connection to my town primed me to recollect these nature experiences, the book on its own was remarkable in how much it elicited my memories of being a child of nature in the 60s.

One of the themes of the book is that children raised before the early 70s had a different relationship with nature than most children do now or during the intervening years. As I read the book I realized how lucky I was to roam the small streets and woods of my town and commune with nature. My whole perspective on life, in retrospect, was influenced by nature when I was a girl. To me, being in nature is paradise—heaven on earth. I assumed everyone felt that way and I am sure many do. But I actually did live in Paradise. Well, it was once.

Roosevelt was originally Jersey Homesteads and before that is was an area named Paradise. I have the map to prove it!  In winter I often sled down Paradise Hill, a steep paved road that was the only remaining nod to Roosevelt being Paradise. In the adjacent woods, if you dared, there was a path through the woods called “Steeple Chase” where you had to dodge trees as you speed down the slope. I think the first time I tasted Jack Daniel’s—just a sip—was on a cold evening as a teenager sledding on Paradise Hill. My mom grew up in the same town and during the early 50s, she sled there too (though I have no idea if she sipped whiskey).

So many of poignant childhood memories are outdoors somewhere in town. Near our school there were many great opportunities for outdoor exploration. In “the enclosure”, a tree and grassy square lined by hedges, friends and I played many different games including hide-and-seek. Even though that area was relatively manicured compared to the woods, I loved running around and under and sometimes climbing through the big trees or just lazing on the grass in the enclosure blowing blades of grass to create sounds.

I was devoted to the paths in town (I walked many paths outside of town too—see Walking Around A Lake). There was the formal path between the school and Tamara Drive where I even found wild asparagus growing. I can almost taste the raw thin sweet stalks to this day. I often walked along the path beside the creek that ran through town. The creek meandered and crossed roads at several locations including Tamara Drive, Rochdale Ave and an unpaved road that we simply called “the path”. I loved stopping on any of those overpasses to play with the creek. I’d place a leaf on the upstream side of the road so that I could watch it float under the road and pop out the other side. What quiet joy!

I wandered all the paths in town alone or with a friend or my brother any number of times just to explore. Or to use as a shortcut. That was a common word I used to describe the routes on paths I found between places in town. I took a shortcut through people’s backyards, front yards, or the woods—all ways imaginable including just about going through someone’s house—to get between my home and somewhere I wanted to go. I took shortcuts to school. I took shortcuts to my best friend Peri’s house that was across the street from my grandmother Coco’s house so therefore a shortcut to her place as well. And I took shortcuts to my great Aunt Ellie’s house. Most of the shortcuts were through the woods on hardly what you’d call a path in some places. They were more just routes through bramble and prickly bushes, some with blueberries or raspberries, or slimy rock lined routes with colorful moss.

Moss stands out prominently in my love of nature. Very close to my house, above the Pine Valley Swim Club, was a path into the woods where I made a secret hiding spot in a moss-covered embankment. I kept a metal box that held—I don’t know what—tucked under rocks and moss. I loved to go there and sit and think and smell the earth around me. I’ve apparently known forever that flora sights and scents are essential to my livelihood. Not that I didn’t like bugs. I really liked bugs a lot! Whether playing with lighting bugs by putting them into jars as lanterns, or pulling off the lighting part just when they flashed on and squishing them on my finger to imitate a diamond (gross), or collecting bugs as specimens for a science classification project, I definitely was one with bugs.

So now when I think of Coco’s and my great grandmother Hani mama’s vegetable garden and the sweetest peas imaginable from the brightest green pods possible or I remember the wonderful feeling of my hands pulling carrots from the earth or I envision dancing around Ellie’s cherry trees and gooseberry bushes and the baked goodies that we created with them, I recognize how much my childhood was chock ‘o block with good times in nature. And I recognize that those good times in nature have influenced what I consider good times now. I’ve been a flower gardener from the time we bought our home 20 years ago to today. Now that Andy built us a vegetable garden, we are also vegetable gardeners. I often dream of that wild asparagus in Roosevelt, so much so that I am considering planting some in our garden even though it needs lots of space and years to establish. And not surprising, one of the first things I did when bought our property was create paths (and a labyrinth—see Revealing the labyrinth on our land). I need only step outside to be surrounded by our 3 acres of woods to regain the calm and quiet joy that I have known since childhood.

Several years ago I rambled on about how nature soothes my soul to my life coach. From the clouds above (see Cloud Hopping) to the earth below and all the flora and fauna in between, I spoke of my sense of awe and love for nature. He paused and thought about what I said and then characterized me as deeply spiritual. I had a momentary confusion having been raised non-religious. Me spiritual? I never learned anything about religion so what does spiritual mean? I was unable to fully reconcile my feelings of transcendence when I commune with nature with what I think of as religion. But now I recognize that through nature I was first exposed to the sense that there is something more than me as an individual. In nature, as a child and now as an adult, I feel connected to all forms of life and I have a need to use my hands to connect with my evolution on earth. This isn’t a theological perspective but rather a personal spirituality perspective. Now I understand that to me nature is a perfect place to get replenished because it embodies love, beauty and peace. I will always be a nature child of the 60s.

XOXO Rachel

Cross-Country Skiing Our Way Through Snowy Winters

As I look out upon the snow covering that we are experiencing in the northeast this winter, I am reminded that when life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Or in this case, when weather brings snow, go skiing. I didn’t really understand this variant on the dictum until Andy and I lived in Ohio during our first cold-weather winter together in 1989. We were living in Oberlin where the world is very flat and fields and roads go on for miles. During the warm weather months we found that the terrain was well suited for taking long bicycle rides. During spring and summer we became very devoted to weekend bike outings. Once the snow arrived, we had to rethink our outside game plan. Enter skiing—cross-country skiing to be precise.

Andy had some experience cross-country skiing but I had never been on skis of any kind before. But given our athleticism at the time, we didn’t bother with lessons and found a local golf club that rented skis during winter. I’ll never forget when the guy at the ski-rental booth said something like, “you must be cyclers.” Apparently all those months of biking long-distances had made our thighs quite clearly built up and toned. And so began our life of cross-country skiing through snowy winters.

We didn’t stay in Ohio very long, so we only went skiing there a few times. Nonetheless those early years set us up nicely for many years of outdoor fun—now based out of New York. One of my favorite memories of cross-country skiing was not long after we moved to New York. We took a weekend trip to Ludlow Vermont, a town most known for its proximity to Okemo Mountain for downhill skiing. We had no experience with downhill and didn’t even consider it an option (later we did learn to downhill ski and enjoy it). Instead, we went to Ludlow because it was near the well-know cross-country ski area Viking Nordic Center in Londonderry, VT.

The weekend was planned as much for the eating as the skiing because we had read about a bed and breakfast known for gourmet meals. The Black River Inn is no longer open but at the time they not only provided yummy breakfasts, they also served formal gourmet dinners. The food was indeed divine and plentiful which was just what we needed because food is burned very quickly when you cross-country ski. The way I think of cross-country skiing is essentially “running on snow.” Except that usually when you go for a run it is only a half hour to an hour run. Whereas typically we would head out and ski for two to three hours at a time. I’ll never forget how exhausted we were on that trip when we got back to the B & B after a day of skiing. We’d barely make it to the shower but we were determined to get dressed and make it to dinner. The food almost evaporated in our stomachs as we chowed down. We had no problem putting everything away including the heavy and deadly but delish caramel cheesecake for dessert. Those were the days.

These days we still cross-country ski but we don’t stay out as long and we don’t eat as much afterwards. We are fortunate to live just a few miles from Fahnestock Winter Park  where they have miles of groomed trails and ski rentals. We had our own skis for years but they recently died so we have been renting when we go. So given that it’s snowing again, I think it is time to embrace the weather and go skiing!

XOXO Rachel

The Magic of Mom and Dad Celebrating 60 Years Together!

This year is already turning out to be a positive and joyful year. Last week my parents celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary. It is hard to imagine that so many years have passed, but not hard to imagine that my parents are together and in love after all these years. Here is their story. At least here is their story as they told it to me many, many years ago. I could ask them now to repeat it to me, but what’s the fun of that? I prefer the version that I have cultivated over the years in my head. I am sure that I have at least some of it right.

My dad went to MIT as part of the GI bill, having served as a naval communication officer in WWII. His amateur ham operating experience in his hometown of St. Louis, Missouri came in handy in the Navy. After getting his electrical engineering degree at MIT, he went to New York City and worked on any number of interesting projects like cathode tubes and other technical stuff.  My dad had been painting (and writing?—I don’t really know when he started writing) since the war and he decided to pursue his art by getting an esthetics degree at NYU. One of his roommates in the city went home on weekends to visit his family in Roosevelt, New Jersey. My dad, then 24 years old, joined his roommate to get out of the city every now and again. And that is where my dad first saw my mom. She was a 13-year-old dark haired petite beauty playing table tennis (ping pong just doesn’t sound right for the 50s) when my dad couldn’t take his eyes off of her. Fortunately not much more happened at that point because she was so young.

My mom finished high school very young (those days skipping grades was not uncommon) and she went to Bard College at age 16. She got her bachelors degree in dance and then went to New York City to dance professionally. She joined the Henry Street Playhouse and studied and performed modern dance under Alwin Nikolais and Murray Louis.

My parents continued to see each other and actually lived together for a short time before they were married—if I remember correctly. Then on January 13, 1955, just a month before my mom was of legal age to marry (that would be 21 in those days), they were wedded. With the approval of her legal guardian—her mom—my mom and dad got married at the courthouse in New York City. My parents lived in a couple of places including Greenwich Village and the infamous “cold water flat” in the Lower East Side—way before it was so fashionable to live there. Then they moved to Roosevelt, New Jersey, were it all began, to start our family.

Roosevelt was a wonderful place to grow up in the 60s and 70s. Because it was my mom’s hometown, I had the luxury of having my grandmother and great grandmother living just a street away. And I also had a kind of second grandmother, my great aunt Ellie, who lived just around the corner. I loved to drop by their houses and get fed yummy food. Roosevelt became the spot for all of our extended family to visit for holidays and other events. I have fond memories of my many cousins and aunts and uncles and great aunts and uncles and more partying in Aunt Ellie and Uncle Jack’s back yard under the cherry trees. That is the definition of community to me. I really haven’t had anything close to that since I was a kid.

My mom and dad raised us in such a wonderful way and our house was filled with love, books, art, music and the political activism of the 60s. We even went on peace marches in DC. And together, my mom and dad were also puppeteers.  My mom became interested in women’s rights and decided to go back to school to get a bachelors degree in history before she went on to get her law degree, both at Rutgers. She was one of the only woman law students there and she got to study with Ruth Bader Ginsburg, also probably the only female professor.

My dad worked at RCA for a number of years as an engineer and inventor (he holds several patents) and then at Bell Labs as a technical writer. Once my mom began practicing as an attorney, my dad became a househusband—again they were trendy before their time. Although these days we would have said he was a stay-at-home-dad. Throughout, he was always working as an artist and writer and always considered the intersection between science and art.  I loved woodworking with him in his basement workshop (see The Wonder Of Woodworking).

My mom worked at The Legal Aid Society and then went out with a partner before she left and worked on her own legal practice. She was an early female entrepreneur, a feminist and worked on the counsel for the Black Panthers. Her work and perspective had a huge impact on me. I read Ms. Magazine from its inception and I have never wavered in calling myself a feminist and seeking equality in the workplace. Looking back I can see that that both my mom and my dad have had a tremendous influence on my whole life journey from education and political views to need for right-brain and left-brain work. I love structure and spontaneity, I am equally comfortable with business and science and arts and writing. I thank them both for that. And I thank them both for showing how to love and stay married for 60 years.

XOXO Rachel

Holiday Traditions Old and New: Baking Christmas Cookies with Mom

Our family lore goes something like this. I was just four years old when Mom and I began the holiday tradition of baking Christmas cookies. Apparently while baking cookies that first time with my mom, I saved her life. Well not exactly her life, but her hand. We were using the electric mixer when my mom got a spoon stuck in the beaters that pulled her hand into the mixer. Being the brilliant little girl I was—according to lore—I pulled the power cord out of the outlet in a flash.

My memory of the event is dim at this point but it must be true according to our family story. That first cookie baking experience—scary event with the mixer notwithstanding—set the stage for a lifelong love of baking in general and more specifically baking Christmas cookies with my mom. Each year while I lived at home, we baked Christmas cookies together. Starting in the 70s, we selected recipes from the December issue of various magazines such as Women’s Day, Family Circle and Ladies Home Journal. One of my favorite memories was going to the grocery store to pick up the December issues that always had special inserts of holiday cookie recipes. Many of the magazines still do today.

Since that fateful day, I have baked Christmas cookies with my mom every year while I lived at home. When I left home for college and beyond, the days of baking Christmas cookies together with my mom stopped. Not living near my mom, I continued the tradition of baking Christmas cookies on my own or with Andy. Each year we did at least get to eat the cookies together when my mom and dad visited at Christmastime.

Sometime over the years of baking the holiday cookies on my own, my mom sent me a Xerox copy of our favorite magazine cookie recipe pamphlet—Women’s Day Kitchen #203 December 1973—so that I could bake our favorites. Then sometime later, she sent me all the original pamphlets that I lovingly keep in my cookie recipe file. The usual suspect recipes include hazelnut studded fingerprint cookies, mocha pecan balls, crescents of some sort and Greek Christmas cookies. Of course I always bake chocolate chip cookies and often oatmeal scotchies and more. But alas, I had to bake the cookies without my mom.

This year was different. For the first time since I left home, my mom and I baked Christmas cookies together at her place—which happens to now be just 10 minutes away from my home. We arranged to spend a day together baking our old standards. I gathered all my recipes and bought a bunch of the ingredients. My mom bought a bunch of other ingredients and so began the day-of-baking-cookie-frenzy. It was a delight! When I arrived first thing in the morning, my mom was already in a pretty vintage apron and she had several aprons for me to choose from. The dining room table was chock-a-block with bowls and cookie sheets and cooling racks and ingredients. In the kitchen that is open to the dining room, the mixer (no, not that mixer—it is long gone) and measuring cups stood nearby ready to use.

We have always worked well together in the kitchen and this year was no exception. Mom acted as prep chef, nicely chopping nuts and measuring ingredients, while I operated the mixer. Being new to the apartment and the kitchen, my mom wasn’t sure whether her oven was true to temperature, but it turns out that it was perfect. We mixed and rolled and baked and talked to our hearts delight. After 7 hours, we had plenty of yummy cookies to be enjoyed together and also to be shared with others.

Before I left, I gave Mom back the Xerox copy of the Women’s Day Kitchen #203 booklet that she made for me so many years ago. I kept the original. So the tradition of baking Christmas cookies with my mom restarts. I am so lucky to have my beautiful and loving cookie-baking partner nearby!

XOXO Rachel