Off to See The Wizard

This weekend we traveled some roads oft-taken (Interstate 89 and highways 100 & 108), and also discovered some new old haunts. Vermont promised to be in “peak color” following several weeks of abruptly crisp fall air and months of summer rain. As we do every Saturday from May to October, we began the weekend at the Burlington Farmer’s Market. As always, I had 2 broccoli samosas for lunch, and Matea had a veggie samosa and a Folk Foods “Bennie” bagel sandwich. We walked over to Mirabelle’s afterward to share a snack while we waited for the Flynn box office to open. We bought tickets to our perennial favorites in live theater, Winter Tales and A Christmas Carol. We’ll get tickets to The Nutcracker and an off-Broadway production of Annie when they go on sale later this month.

By the time we left the box office, a light rain and nasty cloud cover were again threatening our plans for viewing Vermont’s own seasonal spectacular, Foliage on the Mount. But after another hour or better, the clouds began to move out to the east. From the top floor of our house, I could see blue skies over the Adirondacks. So we hopped in the car and made our first new discovery of the weekend: Lake Iroquois. Unbeknownst to us, this beautiful lake is a mere 6 miles from our home. The sun shone fully for the first time in the day, and we took a group photo with the lovely red and yellow hues surrounding the lake. We saw a blue heron basking in the sun at water’s edge and a golden retriever joyfully bathing itself in a large mud puddle.

We then proceeded down I-89 to Stowe, where, we discovered, all the peepers in the state were undoubtedly also converging. After moving through Waterbury at a snail’s pace, we by-passed Stowe and a long line of crawling traffic and headed on our own to Lake Mansfield. The lake itself was, honestly, unimpressive, but the drive along the Little River, with surprise cascades and roadside waterfalls, was a great hit. There at the base of Mount Mansfield, we were also surrounded by lovely late yellows and oranges. Afterwards we rejoined the mob of visitors on Rt. 108. We noted license tags from all over the U.S. and felt a spot of pride as Vermonters, as if every towering maple were our own.

As we continued over the notch and through Jeffersonville and Underhill, the colors were dazzling as promised, though many of the early reds had faded in the higher elevations. As we drew closer to home, though, the colors became much brighter and more vibrant. In Essex Junction, every fifth tree seemed set afire. I would venture to say that the spits and flashes of color on our most familiar streets, close to home, were more appreciated than the grand vistas of color, range after range, we had seen elsewhere. (Matea had described a predominantly yellow and green mountainside in Underhill as resembling “bad broccoli.”) At some point, maybe, the dazzle of large-scale color began to suffer diminishing returns. But Lake Iroquois, where we spent only a brief moment, had been superb. The individual maples along West Street in Essex Junction were unparalleled.

We had spent the day focusing on the summit only to discover that, right now, the grass is sublimely green right here in the valley.

Wicked Bunch of Crazies

Today I attended the protest in front of Allen House/UVM Hillel put on by the Phelps family of Topeka, Kansas’s Westboro Baptist Church. I have seen the WBC in the news often, picketing the funerals of fallen soldiers, Jewish community centers and synagogues, and anything having to do with gay rights. This morning I got to face Shirley Phelps-Roper, the church protestors’ new ring leader, first-hand. Since I was attending on official UVM business, our encounter began and ended at the release of my camera’s shutter. There are scores of blogs, newspaper articles, videos, etc. that decry this organization’s hate-spewing messages, so I will not expostulate on it here. I believe the pictures will speak for themselves. (Click on any photo to view full size.)


The WBC brought a grand total of five protesters (all members of the Phelps family), ranging from Shirley (50) to Luke (7), her 11th child. As far as I can tell, they (and GOD) hate gays, women, Jews, Obama, Israel, America...and burgers.




Shirley Phelps-Roper. She said some of the most vile things to those who approached her. Their objective is to provoke the love? protesters, and it is incredible the vitriol that she could spew on command. Good thing the opposing sides were separated by the widest section of South Prospect Street. Shirley led the group in a rousing, rewritten version of John Denver's "Country Roads," replacing "country road, take me home" with "filthy Jew (where's the cash?!), God hates you..." They also chanted other perennial favorite slogans such as "God Hates Fags!" and "America is Doomed!"


The saddest sight of the day, since most of the peace-loving student crowd was wholly unaffected by these wing-nuts, was poor little Luke Phelps, age 7, who stood throughout the rally taking still pictures and video.


This man dressed as Jesus, who was apparently present 10 years ago when the group was in town protesting, stood close to the WBC and verbally challenged them throughout the event. He said the group was much smaller in numbers than they were a decade ago; he hopes, in 10 more years, no one will be left but the child.


On the other side of South Prospect, the mood was decidedly lighter and the crowd was much larger. The group, mostly composed of students, held signs, blew bubbles, and cheered as cars drove by and honked with enthusiasm.


And they chanted. "We say no to hate and fear; Westboro's not welcome here!" "Bigots, bigots, go away! You can't spread your hate today!"


"Gay, straight, black, white--marriage is a civil right!"


Many signs were specific that Vermont does not stand for hate. There's a reason we're here.


"Stop the hate! Stop the hate!" "United against hate! United against hate!" Even from the south side of the street, where the WBC was standing, the chants of the Burlington community members easily drowned out those of the 5 "crazies."


After all was said and done, this group, who has been blasted by religious and secular organizations alike, did little to put a damper on the rightful celebrations of same-sex couples who, as of today, have been granted the freedom to marry for the first time in our state. This couple, and others, were unabashed in their affection before the WBC protesters. Raucous cheers were heard from the student side as a couple crossed South Prospect hand-in-hand.


I will take this opportunity to write an op-ed for the Diversity Task Force newsletter, Diversity Times. As suggested in my quickly-made sign, it's clear that "tolerance" and "acceptance" are not enough to combat the venomous hatred that this group so brazenly displays, or the insidious squeamishness that lies dormant in those who are less vocal. Marginalized groups, our friends, families, and supporters, must be just as brazen with our love as they are their hate.

Happy Marriage Equality Day!

You Grow It, I’ll Habit

I have a confession to make, blog world. Matea and I have been making “deals” on the side in order to feed our addictions and hedonistic cravings. That’s right, we needed a fix. So a couple of weeks ago we met up with an elderly Hungarian woman named Gita, whom a friend told us about, at her home in South Burlington. A number of other strange characters were coming in and out of the house as we approached the door. She greeted us warmly and welcomed us in to view the goods she had precisely portioned out on a scale in her garage earlier that morning. She had brought it in from somewhere in New Jersey the night before.

“Are you Matea?” she said in a thick Hungarian accent. Matea smiled nervously and said yes. I stood near the door as another “customer” walked out, calling behind him, “Danke schön!” My excitement was growing; I hadn’t been able to partake since my college days, nearly six years ago now. After a few pleasantries, money exchanged hands and I was on my way out with the high-quality stuff we had scored.

As soon as we got home, we hid most of it away in a black box. The next morning I prepared a small portion for consumption, removing the stems, etc. I was both giddy and nervous, hoping that the experience would be as good as I had remembered. I could smell the familiar earthy sweetness as I brought it to my mouth. I closed my eyes and took a hit, and it was utter perfection, exactly as I dreamed it would be. It was sweet, satisfying...and a little fuzzy. It was a peach.

Indeed, New Jersey was the last place I imagined getting a peach as good as the ones grown in South Carolina, and I had especially never thought I would meet up with some Hungarian stranger to buy them in 25-pound batches. But it proved to be more than worth it. They were of the perfect consistency, with perfect shape and color. For the last couple of weeks, we’ve been taking four at a time out of the fridge (black box) and letting them ripen to perfection in the kitchen window sill. By now, we are towards the end of the batch and will have to wait another year before Gita and her daughter make the trek down to Jersey and again fill their SUV with crates of the delicate fruit. Until now, it’s been impossible to find an edible peach in Vermont. They’re all tasteless, mushy, or hard. I’m so glad we now have a dealer we can trust.

In that same vein (ok, enough drug references), I’ve also been in contact this week with Hank at Lewis Creek Farm in Starksboro. They’re going to deliver us seven flats of delectably sweet red and yellow cherry tomatoes at the Burlington Farmer’s Market on Saturday. That’s eighty-four pints of tomatoes, and we still need to search for a few more flats of Sun Golds (yellow) to even out the mix. If all goes well, we’ll have over 100 pints of tomatoes this weekend to be cooked down slowly into a confit that Matea makes. It is a deceptively simple mixture of halved cherry tomatoes, fresh garlic and basil, olive oil, a pinch of chili flakes, and a splash of balsamic vinegar, baked for about two hours on low heat until much of the moisture is gone. Served over pasta, it is arguably one of the best things I’ve ever eaten. We make big batches in the summer to last us through the rest of the year.

Hopefully there will also be time to find more sweet corn before winter. The best I’ve had so far this year came from Adam’s Farm Market, at the junction of Mountain View and Old Stage roads in Williston. It was super plump and sweet, and multi-colored the way I like it. Adams also has cut your own flowers available (beautiful Zinnias) and other delicious fruits and veggies grown right there in their garden. I ate nearly a quart of their fresh strawberries the other night, and they were also the best I’ve had this year.

If the forecasters are wrong this weekend like they were last, you will find us in downtown Burlington this Saturday afternoon getting our fix along with the rest of the fresh-food junkies in City Hall Park. The farmer’s market is by far our favorite activity in the summertime. It’s an opportunity for some interesting people watching, a chance to see your neighbors and community members...and their dogs. I love seeing the fresh veggies and growers who show up with dirt under their nails, having just picked my dinner from the field that morning. It is a rare opportunity for a direct connection, and it gives us a real appreciation for what we’re bringing to the table. Last week, in addition to other crops from other vendors, we bought sweet onions (delicious on the grill), carrots, broccoli, leeks, squash, and zucchini from Full Moon Farm, which is owned by Chittenden County Representative David Zuckerman (the Progressive who, incidentally, introduced the marriage equality bill that will take effect this coming Monday, September 1) and his wife Rachel Nevitt. How “Vermont” is that! And an especially rare case of mutual support and symbiosis among community members.

And for my friends who think the prices are just a tad high, here’s an interesting tidbit from another blog on economics:

A recent Oregonian article on the high prices at Farmers Markets raises an interesting question: just what are you paying for? The Oregonian article focuses on the high prices charged at the market and how this compares to CSAs and supermarkets. There is a long discussion of what the prices actually reflect, yet, interestingly, the discussion fails to mention (or at least explicitly couch it in terms of) the basic economic concept of supply and demand.

The demand for farmer's markets comes from people who want to consume the food that can be purchased there, but it also comes from the desire to attend an enjoyable open air market, to interact with the people responsible for growing the food, to be able to select the best possible quality and to support local agriculture.

On the supply side, the cost of providing produce to a farmer's market can be higher because of a lack of effectively taking advantage of scale efficiencies, cost of time and transport to attend the market and the extra cost of selecting the highest quality from among your crops.

Put these two together and there is little mystery why farmer's market prices are higher in equilibrium than in a supermarket, and nothing sinister either: What we pay for as consumers is a lot more than just a commodity.

Hope to see you all at a local market (or in Jersey!)...Bon appétit!

That to Which I Perspire

The temperatures have been rising into the 90s this week in Vermont. Here in the Northeast, where no one seems to appreciate central air conditioning, the heat tends to creep into the house like a fog that doesn’t lift for days on end. I have never been one for summertime, with the breath-sucking humidity, the shocking brightness and the unbearable scorch of the sun. I dread the scourge of biting insects and colorful outdoor event invitations that accompanies the first May heat wave. “Come languish in my backyard for the better part of the afternoon!” “Join us for a dip in our wonderful new (urine-filled cess)pool, with singed meat and boisterous conversation to follow!”

I am the Scrooge of summer.

As a child, I would play outside all day long, despite suffering from “heat migraines” on particularly sweltering days. Occasionally I would come inside, dirt on my bare feet and calves like a henna tattoo, for glasses of ice water to cool off, but most days my mother had to call and call for me to come in at dusk. My grandmother’s house had no air conditioning, and I spent countless hours with my face pressed against the metal grill of the electric fan, or twirling a wet washcloth in the air and then pressing it to my eyes and forehead. There, the preferred activity of my cousins and me was to “play in the hose pipe.” We started off filling a baby pool with water, which was sufficient enough for a half an hour of splashing around, until the Southern sun would begin to poach us like so many dressed hens. A fresh stream of cool water was soon necessary, so we would turn the hose back on and lay back and let the warm water overflow the sides all around us until the pool felt fresh again. Then, after another half hour, when we grew tired of simmering in a cartoon-covered pool now filled with dirt and grass clippings like a broth of cooking herbs, we turned the hose on full-time. We covered the nozzle with our thumbs and power-sprayed each other in the face. We would arc the water into the sky to make rainbows, put the hose down our bathing suits, lean over and let water flow into our mouths and fall out again, spray down the windows and all the cars, the dog…until the entire backyard was flooded with wasted water and mud. Then, in the tamed heat of the late afternoon, we would bike and scooter and dig in the dirt until our bathing suits were dry.

As an adult, I find no such novel remedy when the temperature rises. Now, like then, I am cursed in the heat with a very, very red face. Extremely red, like my cheeks might break out into blisters at any moment. I cannot escape this, and no cool cloth or iced drink will remedy it. At the slightest bit of physical exertion in summer weather, I begin to feel my heartbeat in my face, like mercury surging through a thermometer, my head the red, bulbous tip about to burst for lack of an outlet. I become physically drained, sometimes nauseated, and have the constant sensation of someone breathing on me, hot, hot breath all around me. My one objective these days is to lessen the time I spend between my air conditioned car and my air conditioned bedroom. In the afternoon, after walking the dogs in the direct sun, I want only to retreat upstairs, toss my damp clothing into a pile, and sprawl out underneath the ceiling fan. Luckily, in Vermont, snow flurries are always right around the bend!

But Scrooge is meant, at the end of the story, to find some level of appreciation for that which he has come to detest in his jaded old age. And since I am the Scrooge of summer, it was only a matter of time before I had my own Tiny Tim moment. Last night, because we felt like cockroaches being bombed out of our own mega-hot home, we decided to dine out on the back deck, which is shaded by the shadow of the house in the evening time. The temps were still in the mid-80s as I stood over a hot grill to prepare two very delicious small pizzas (tomato/garlic/basil/asiago and pesto/sundried tomato). My feet were swimming in my Crocs. My face was a glistening crimson, of course. Sweat was permeating every inch of my clothing and cascading down over my temples like a Mad TV skit. But at some point, the eastern sky turned a brilliant golden color. I looked out over my yard—weeds are taking over everywhere—and felt the most gentle breeze. I questioned whether it was a breeze at all, certainly not something to move the hair matted to my forehead, but it was definitely not “hot, hot breath.” As beads of sweat rolled downwards from my fiery face, I was filled with a sense of myself and my body. I felt a tickle on the nape of my neck and in the small of my back. Perhaps in a heat-driven delusion, the ghosts of my past, present and future rushed over me. I appreciated where I had been and where I am headed. Two days before, this yard had been graced with its own plastic pool, and my friends’ toddlers laughed with delight as they dipped toes and faces into the water. I envisioned my own children someday muddying the yard and spraying down our unsuspecting pugs.

Matea and the dogs appeared at the sunroom window, and a feeling of satisfaction and contentment for the present moment came over me like a gulf stream of fresh water from the hose. We slid the cooler, still filled with ice from the weekend barbecue, between two opposing camping chairs and ate the grilled pizzas and watermelon as the sun set. I didn’t smack one mosquito, and never once sighed with exhaustion. I knew, when the winter comes, I will long for the intimacy of sweat evaporating into the summer night.

VH-1 Behind the Music: Learning to Sing Joni

May for us was a month of focusing on one thing and forgetting everything else. Since we closed on the house April 30th and began renovating May 1st, everything from birthdays to anniversaries to dear friendships has gone virtually uncelebrated or unattended. We were literally more involved with choosing a toilet lever than we were in acknowledging our 14-year anniversary on May 30th. And, obviously, I have seriously neglected my poor blog, having spent too much time in work boots and not enough going barefoot. So, in a month when I slipped one year closer to “old age,” and my relationship progressed further into its teenage years, why not a retrospective on a time when “we” were teens and “WE” was in its infancy. Even if this “happy anniversary” to Matea is off schedule, at least it’s under budget!

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At some point in the late 80s/early 90s, my Dad decided to convert our family to a country music household. I resisted as much as I could at the time, holding firm to my beloved Debbie Gibson, Wilson Phillips, Whitesnake, et al; but after a couple of months of car trips featuring The Judds, Reba, and Travis Tritt, the twangy, story-telling tunes somehow managed to endear themselves to me. So by the time Matea and her family had made their way south from West Virginia, the year before we met, I was pretty much as honkey-tonk as they come. She says one of her earliest memories of me (other than my being generally obnoxious) was my singing Garth Brooks’s “Calling Baton Rouge” in the hallway of our junior high school. My earliest memory is having French class with her. My French name was Gabriella, and I think hers was Elise...Estelle...Monique? I can’t remember. But anyway, we were assigned to do a skit together on the topic of getting ready for bed. So we showed up that day decked out in pajamas and got up in front of the class to recite phrases like “je me brosse les dents, je prends une douche, je dorm,” etc. This initial collaboration somehow parlayed itself into a second later in the year. We were dismissed early from same French class to an end-of-year auction for participants in a program called Accelerated Reader. We had accumulated “dollars” over the school year by reading books and taking tests on the computer. Although I don’t remember our being the closest of companions at this point, we ended up pooling our resources in order to augment our bidding power. Who knew that would be our first foray into acquiring communal property? At the end of the day, I think we left with a Zip-Loc bag full of candy and a Santa Clause toilet seat cover which I gave to my grandmother. I was 13 then.

Nearly a year later, we had become slightly better acquainted. The passing of my grandfather in late November of 1994, however, had a profound effect on my life. It shocked me to realize that even family was not permanent. Matea was the first person I told about it at school, in English class. I wrote my first poems that December, and the period of angst and grunge had officially begun. Matea’s compassion during a tough time had galvanized our friendship, though, and I started walking to her house after school. My mom would pick me up around 5 each day, so for a good hour or two, we had time to eat frozen pizzas from the microwave, watch trash tv, annoy her sisters, etc. But mostly we listened to music. She had one Trisha Yearwood cd and one Garth Brooks greatest hits, but otherwise her collection was like a whole new world of unfamiliar musical territory. I had never been exposed to Little Feat, Steely Dan, Amy Grant (ha ha), Cat Stevens, John Prine, and especially not her favorite, Joni Mitchell. By this time, as necessitated by my new grungy modus operandi, I had begun listening to top 40 and alternative radio. Most of the classic rock was a familiar enough approximation to or amalgamation of the hair bands/pop country/alternative rock of my past and present. But Joni Mitchell, with her high-pitched singer-songwriter style, was enough to pierce my eardrums and send me running from the room. But as a much more mature 15-year-old, I learned to bear it somehow and began to break myself in on the folksy soprano, starting with “Big Yellow Taxi.” I sat in the floor of Matea’s bedroom listening to the track over and over until I got the words down. Sing-alongs were important. We routinely sat in front of the boom box for hours, belting out everything from Bonnie Rait to The Offspring. Over the next year or two, both Joni and Matea, had found a place in my soul. I had nailed the high-octave “Pleeeeease” at the end of “Big Yellow Taxi” and mastered most of the songs on both Ladies of the Canyon and Blue.

Fast forward: before we knew it, we were graduating from high school a year early and heading off to Clemson, then graduating and moving to Vermont, and now settling into our first house. Even after 15 years, it seems like we’re just getting started. We were lucky to have had so many years of practice, collaborating, pooling resources, helping each other through hardships. I have learned to have true compassion, conviction, and trust. But most importantly, no matter what we’ve gone through together since she first played “Big Yellow Taxi” for me, I’ve always remembered to savor the high notes.

“Oh, you’re in my blood like holy wine. You taste so bitter, and so sweet. Oh, I could drink a case of you, darling, and I would still be on my feet. Oh I would still be on my feet.”

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY!

A Note From the Eternal Applicant

In case you haven’t heard yet, we are closing on the Pleasant Acres house on April 30th! (If you have any empty boxes, send ‘em my way!) During this process, I’ve realized how much of my life has involved striving for acceptance. Even my rebellious teenage antics worked to grant me general acceptance among many high school peer groups, although I’d say I never achieved a “full membership” in any of them. I studied for 11 years in order to be accepted to college (and no one’s even heard of Clemson up here!!). Matea and I left the South in search of acceptance and inclusion, put our best selves forward in interviews in order to impress potential employers. And here we find ourselves again, relieved at having won the approval of our lender, keeping our fingers crossed also that the inspector approves of our home’s imperfections tonight. There’s a lot of impressing to manage! I honestly don’t know how people of faith can do it, to have that omnipresent judgment and ire “hanging over them,” as it were. Not that I wouldn’t “pass” in that regard, too, I suppose, but good grief.

Well, hope you weren’t expecting too much from this blog entry. Wasn’t in the mood to impress. If disappointed, unsubscribe now. ;)

Pleasant Acres

So we’ve begun the stomach-churning process of looking for a house. You have no idea how many spreadsheets we’ve made and pored over in the past two weeks. It looks like, if everything works out, we may end up making an offer on the first and only home we’ve actually taken a look at (pictured above). We’re going today to see some undoubtedly-inferior dwellings, just to be certain our liking of this house was really love at first sight and not just a one-night stand. The minute I envisioned myself getting tea from the fridge at midnight in my underwear, I knew it would be hard for another place to win me over. I know, the name makes it sound like we’d be moving into a retirement community, but from what we can tell, there are actually a good number of young families there. So, wish us luck that on our second date (we’re seeing the house again tonight) we don’t start noticing a bunch of wrinkles and belches.