Chris Bohjalian's Blog, page 19
March 17, 2014
Free stuff. . .
Or, at least, the CHANCE to win free stuff.
I discovered today that Goodreads and Doubleday right now are giving away free advance copies of CLOSE YOUR EYES, HOLD HANDS.
Want the chance to win one?
Click here:
https://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/en...
And, of course, you can learn all about the novel right here on Goodreads or on chrisbohjalian.com . The book arrives everywhere on July 8.
Thanks so much -- and happy reading. As always, my fingers are crossed that my work never disappoints you.
All the best,
Chris B.
www.chrisbohjalian.com
or
Goodreads
or
Facebook
or
Twitter
or
You get the point. . .
I discovered today that Goodreads and Doubleday right now are giving away free advance copies of CLOSE YOUR EYES, HOLD HANDS.
Want the chance to win one?
Click here:
https://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/en...
And, of course, you can learn all about the novel right here on Goodreads or on chrisbohjalian.com . The book arrives everywhere on July 8.
Thanks so much -- and happy reading. As always, my fingers are crossed that my work never disappoints you.
All the best,
Chris B.
www.chrisbohjalian.com
or
Goodreads
or
or
or
You get the point. . .
March 16, 2014
Sun shines on pioneering solar sugarhouse in Vermont
Lincoln, Vermont’s Tom Gadhue started sugaring on his own when he was 11 years old and living in Shelburne. “I got bit in the sixth grade, and this has been my love ever since,” he told me last week. He’s 54 now. “I had thirty buckets when I was a kid, and I was making the blackest syrup – but I loved it.”
As an adult, he had sugarhouses in Jeffersonville and then Huntington. He had 300 buckets in Jeffersonville, and he recalls his brother-in-law – who helped him with the sugaring – saying he was so tired from lugging the buckets through the snow to the sugarhouse that he could clip his toenails without bending over.
The very first sugaring season after Gadhue sold the operation in Huntington, he realized how much he missed it. “I remember telling my wife one evening that I really had to get back into it.”
His wife Rhonda’s response? “Fine, but I get a kitchen.” And that would be a kitchen in. . .the sugarhouse.
Tom was recalling the origins of his newest (and, he hopes, last) sugarhouse: The Solar Sweet Maple Farm high in the hills of South Lincoln, a beautiful, state-of-the art operation that is far more sugar mansion than sugar shack. Fifty-six solar panels sit atop the structure’s southern peak, generating the power 52 weeks a year that Gadhue uses almost in its entirety during the six or so weeks when he is sugaring. It is, he says, his “dream operation” – his wife’s, too, and not simply because it has that kitchen. It also has a bedroom, a fireplace and hearth, and a post and beam dining room where, last Saturday morning, he and Rhonda offered neighbors an $8 all-you-can-eat pancake breakfast. Roughly 170 people came, including Lincoln’s Christine Fraioli, a self-described “Vermont pancake connoisseur.” Her verdict? “The pancakes were absolutely fantastic. The ultimate was the sourdough with blueberry compote and maple syrup. It was worth every calorie.”1902788_10152245865492118_1804780191_n
Gadhue, who owns Mountain Valley Sprinkler Systems in Williston, bought 200 acres in South Lincoln and cleared the land for the operation in 2010. He built the sugarhouse in 2011, finishing just in time to tap and boil in 2012. Last year he produced 5,000 gallons; this year, he hopes to reach 8,000, or a half-gallon for each of 16,000 taps.
The frame of the sugarhouse was once a glass-blowing studio, and most of the siding is recycled barn board. The lighting is all energy-efficient LED.
Right now, the panels power everything except for the evaporator itself. But that means they are powering the vacuums that help draw the sap to the holding tanks; that means they are powering the reverse osmosis machine that takes roughly eighty percent of the water from the sap before it even reaches the evaporator; and that means they are powering the lights and the computers and, yes, that kitchen. And Gadhue is hoping to buy an electric evaporator next year, so that he can further reduce the sugarhouse’s carbon footprint.
And the vibe of the operation? Despite the high technology, it’s every bit as warm and old-school as the friendly madness that envelops a small sugarhouse with a single dangling overhead light bulb and an evaporator that looks like it belongs in a Grimm’s fairy tale. When I asked Rhonda why they were having the pancake breakfast last Saturday, she answered instantly, “Community. We thought it would be great fun to get people up here.”
Indeed. How we sugar continues to evolve, but there are a few constants. As my friend and writer and sugarmaker John Elder has said, the sugaring season may be short, but it’s always sweet. That goes for the syrup – and the fellowship.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on March 16, 2014. The paperback of Chris’s most recent novel, “The Light in the Ruins,” arrives on April 22.)
As an adult, he had sugarhouses in Jeffersonville and then Huntington. He had 300 buckets in Jeffersonville, and he recalls his brother-in-law – who helped him with the sugaring – saying he was so tired from lugging the buckets through the snow to the sugarhouse that he could clip his toenails without bending over.
The very first sugaring season after Gadhue sold the operation in Huntington, he realized how much he missed it. “I remember telling my wife one evening that I really had to get back into it.”
His wife Rhonda’s response? “Fine, but I get a kitchen.” And that would be a kitchen in. . .the sugarhouse.
Tom was recalling the origins of his newest (and, he hopes, last) sugarhouse: The Solar Sweet Maple Farm high in the hills of South Lincoln, a beautiful, state-of-the art operation that is far more sugar mansion than sugar shack. Fifty-six solar panels sit atop the structure’s southern peak, generating the power 52 weeks a year that Gadhue uses almost in its entirety during the six or so weeks when he is sugaring. It is, he says, his “dream operation” – his wife’s, too, and not simply because it has that kitchen. It also has a bedroom, a fireplace and hearth, and a post and beam dining room where, last Saturday morning, he and Rhonda offered neighbors an $8 all-you-can-eat pancake breakfast. Roughly 170 people came, including Lincoln’s Christine Fraioli, a self-described “Vermont pancake connoisseur.” Her verdict? “The pancakes were absolutely fantastic. The ultimate was the sourdough with blueberry compote and maple syrup. It was worth every calorie.”1902788_10152245865492118_1804780191_n
Gadhue, who owns Mountain Valley Sprinkler Systems in Williston, bought 200 acres in South Lincoln and cleared the land for the operation in 2010. He built the sugarhouse in 2011, finishing just in time to tap and boil in 2012. Last year he produced 5,000 gallons; this year, he hopes to reach 8,000, or a half-gallon for each of 16,000 taps.
The frame of the sugarhouse was once a glass-blowing studio, and most of the siding is recycled barn board. The lighting is all energy-efficient LED.
Right now, the panels power everything except for the evaporator itself. But that means they are powering the vacuums that help draw the sap to the holding tanks; that means they are powering the reverse osmosis machine that takes roughly eighty percent of the water from the sap before it even reaches the evaporator; and that means they are powering the lights and the computers and, yes, that kitchen. And Gadhue is hoping to buy an electric evaporator next year, so that he can further reduce the sugarhouse’s carbon footprint.
And the vibe of the operation? Despite the high technology, it’s every bit as warm and old-school as the friendly madness that envelops a small sugarhouse with a single dangling overhead light bulb and an evaporator that looks like it belongs in a Grimm’s fairy tale. When I asked Rhonda why they were having the pancake breakfast last Saturday, she answered instantly, “Community. We thought it would be great fun to get people up here.”
Indeed. How we sugar continues to evolve, but there are a few constants. As my friend and writer and sugarmaker John Elder has said, the sugaring season may be short, but it’s always sweet. That goes for the syrup – and the fellowship.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on March 16, 2014. The paperback of Chris’s most recent novel, “The Light in the Ruins,” arrives on April 22.)
March 9, 2014
The real March Madness? Mud season in Vermont.
The Olympics are behind us. Someday – even this endless winter – the ice will melt. And when it does? There goes my next big idea for primetime TV: “America’s Got Curling.” Or, better still, “Celebrity Curling.” Sure, curling lacks the speed and grace of “Ice Dancing with the Stars.” (Tonight starring Bruce Dern and Betty White.) But it’s less dangerous. And where else would we ever see Donald Trump or Paris Hilton push anything with a broom?
In any case, soon there will be mud. At least here in Vermont. We are now entering Vermont’s most mythic time of the year, mud season. The ground will thaw someday soon, and – Warning: Science Stuff Dead Ahead – it thaws from the surface down. That means all that melting snow has no place else to go except on to our dirt roads. Seriously, that’s what happens. Even when the thawing ground is nowhere near a dirt road, the water is going to go there. Water runs uphill in Vermont if it has the chance to turn an otherwise well-maintained, vehicle-friendly dirt road into a channel of car-swallowing slop.
And sometimes, people-swallowing slop. Not kidding. I had a wonderful neighbor named Wanda Goodyear who passed away at the age of 81 in 2005, and I will never forget when she told me about the time she was a little girl and got stuck in the mud on the River Road here in Lincoln. She was trying to cross the street one March afternoon and got stuck in sludge that was over her knees. She might have worried about getting run over, but obviously no automobile was going to be whipping down the road. Eventually one of her father’s friends rescued her, trudging his way into the channel and lifting her out. (Incidentally, I still have Wanda Goodyear as a neighbor: The wonderful eight-year-old daughter of Todd and Jen Goodyear – and the great-granddaughter of the Wanda Goodyear who was, one day in her life, literally stuck in the mud.)
Sometimes when the water does not turn a dirt road into an impassable swamp, it creates the creeping mud that settles inside our front halls and on our kitchen floors. Obviously many Vermont homes have something they call a “mud room.” In the coming weeks, those rooms will be different shades of brown as the mud settles and dries. I am convinced that the folks at Sherwin-Williams who name their colors begin by visiting a Vermont mud room in March. The paint company’s web site has no fewer than 28 shades of brown. It’s only a matter of time before they offer “Green Mountain Brown,” “Off the Mud Boots Brown,” and “Dry Powder Brown.” (Note this is merely the Mud Season Collection. There are plenty of other year-round Vermont browns, beginning with the seventeen different shades of manure.)
But when we think of mud season, we think first of the dirt road mud ruts: The ruts that yank cars out of alignment or stop them dead. One of my first mud seasons in Vermont, I didn’t know that a Dodge Colt was not going to fare well on the northernmost section of Quaker Street, the road that links Lincoln with South Starksboro. My car sunk so deep that I couldn’t open the door on either side. I had to climb out the window and sit on my hood until a neighbor came by in a truck. With a chain he yanked the Colt back onto a navigable patch and towed me the last few hundred yards to Vermont 17.
And now, once more, we await the imminent return of Vermont mud. Sure, it’s an inconvenience. It’s a mess. It means we can’t watch “America’s Got Curling.”
But it does mean that the sap is running, because mud and maple syrup are meteorological cousins. That’s good news.
And it also means this: Spring is just around the corner – even here in Vermont. So, bring on the mud, Mother Nature. Game on.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on March 9, 2014. Chris’s next novel, “Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands,” arrives on July 8.)
In any case, soon there will be mud. At least here in Vermont. We are now entering Vermont’s most mythic time of the year, mud season. The ground will thaw someday soon, and – Warning: Science Stuff Dead Ahead – it thaws from the surface down. That means all that melting snow has no place else to go except on to our dirt roads. Seriously, that’s what happens. Even when the thawing ground is nowhere near a dirt road, the water is going to go there. Water runs uphill in Vermont if it has the chance to turn an otherwise well-maintained, vehicle-friendly dirt road into a channel of car-swallowing slop.
And sometimes, people-swallowing slop. Not kidding. I had a wonderful neighbor named Wanda Goodyear who passed away at the age of 81 in 2005, and I will never forget when she told me about the time she was a little girl and got stuck in the mud on the River Road here in Lincoln. She was trying to cross the street one March afternoon and got stuck in sludge that was over her knees. She might have worried about getting run over, but obviously no automobile was going to be whipping down the road. Eventually one of her father’s friends rescued her, trudging his way into the channel and lifting her out. (Incidentally, I still have Wanda Goodyear as a neighbor: The wonderful eight-year-old daughter of Todd and Jen Goodyear – and the great-granddaughter of the Wanda Goodyear who was, one day in her life, literally stuck in the mud.)
Sometimes when the water does not turn a dirt road into an impassable swamp, it creates the creeping mud that settles inside our front halls and on our kitchen floors. Obviously many Vermont homes have something they call a “mud room.” In the coming weeks, those rooms will be different shades of brown as the mud settles and dries. I am convinced that the folks at Sherwin-Williams who name their colors begin by visiting a Vermont mud room in March. The paint company’s web site has no fewer than 28 shades of brown. It’s only a matter of time before they offer “Green Mountain Brown,” “Off the Mud Boots Brown,” and “Dry Powder Brown.” (Note this is merely the Mud Season Collection. There are plenty of other year-round Vermont browns, beginning with the seventeen different shades of manure.)
But when we think of mud season, we think first of the dirt road mud ruts: The ruts that yank cars out of alignment or stop them dead. One of my first mud seasons in Vermont, I didn’t know that a Dodge Colt was not going to fare well on the northernmost section of Quaker Street, the road that links Lincoln with South Starksboro. My car sunk so deep that I couldn’t open the door on either side. I had to climb out the window and sit on my hood until a neighbor came by in a truck. With a chain he yanked the Colt back onto a navigable patch and towed me the last few hundred yards to Vermont 17.
And now, once more, we await the imminent return of Vermont mud. Sure, it’s an inconvenience. It’s a mess. It means we can’t watch “America’s Got Curling.”
But it does mean that the sap is running, because mud and maple syrup are meteorological cousins. That’s good news.
And it also means this: Spring is just around the corner – even here in Vermont. So, bring on the mud, Mother Nature. Game on.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on March 9, 2014. Chris’s next novel, “Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands,” arrives on July 8.)
March 2, 2014
Town Meeting? It's always a story -- our story.
One of my favorite short stories is Rebecca Rule’s “Yankee Curse.” Here is how it begins:
“At School District Meeting, Miranda knits.
'May your neighbors steal from your wood pile, Mort Wallace.'
The points of her flexi-needle slide in and out of the heavy burgundy wool.
'May they incinerate their garbage in a barrel at your property line. And may the wind blow in your direction.'”
As Miranda knits, the vitriol inside her toward her neighbor grows ever more toxic – and funny. No one in the meeting has any idea of the rage Miranda is harboring, especially as Mort Wallace gets up to speak.
I think of that story often this time of the year. Tomorrow night the renowned village of Lincoln, Vermont – named not for our sixteenth President, but for a Revolutionary War general most of the world knows nothing about – will be holding its annual exercise in legislative self-determination: Town Meeting. I’m a fan. Lincoln, of course, is simply one of a great many Vermont towns that will be holding its Town Meeting this week. And while no two are alike, they all share a couple of things: The faith that as a village we are capable of deciding what to spend on graders and schools (which have less to do with each other than I’d thought at my first Town Meeting). And that we will not, in the end, stone the school board.
Over the years I have written about town moderators, selectmen and women, town clerks, and school board members. All are way better people than I am. I celebrate them all.
But some years it feels to me that no one is braver than the folks on the school board. There are thankless jobs in this world – think of those courageous women and men who perform colonoscopies day after day – but there is no work more likely to get you castigated than being a member of your local school board. In some towns, you can probably cook meth and be more popular.
Among the twists that makes Rule’s short story such a delight is that Miranda appreciates the hard work of the school board. Her well-concealed fury (“May your second wife find a sharp tongue in the bottle she loves and slice you with it.”) is directed at Mort for the way he tries to browbeat and bully and humiliate them.
Now, no one who lives in my town would ever try to browbeat or bully or humiliate anyone on the school or select boards. I mean that. We have disagreements and people question the numbers that the school and select boards present, but most years I am very proud of what a civilized bunch we are. Oh, once in a while I find myself thinking like Miranda. But usually I’m just waiting for the moderator to call someone out for saying something that is not “germane.” (I live in constant fear that I am going to say something that is not “germane.” Saying something that is not “germane” isn’t as embarrasing as being the Mayor of Toronto, but it isn’t pretty.)
Is that true in every Green Mountain Town Meeting? Is every community as calm and caring as Lincoln? Probably not.
But the fact is, Town Meeting works in a state like Vermont. Sure, there is the occasional Mort Wallace, but as Rule’s story makes clear, there are considerably more people who are willing to do the seriously thankless work that allows a town to function. You think it takes a village to raise a child? It also takes a village to figure out how much a dump truck should cost. Or how to balance a budget. Or how to allocate the limited resources we have at the school.
And so once again this year I raise my glass to everyone who serves on the school and select boards, and everyone who does their homework before Town Meeting – the folks who prepare the Warning and those of us who actually read it.
Sometimes, like Miranda, we might be thinking, “May a rat die between the studs of your bedroom wall.” But we will smile and keep that thought to ourselves. It’s how, year after year, we get things done.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on March 2, 2014. Chris’s new novel, “Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands,” arrives on July 8.)
“At School District Meeting, Miranda knits.
'May your neighbors steal from your wood pile, Mort Wallace.'
The points of her flexi-needle slide in and out of the heavy burgundy wool.
'May they incinerate their garbage in a barrel at your property line. And may the wind blow in your direction.'”
As Miranda knits, the vitriol inside her toward her neighbor grows ever more toxic – and funny. No one in the meeting has any idea of the rage Miranda is harboring, especially as Mort Wallace gets up to speak.
I think of that story often this time of the year. Tomorrow night the renowned village of Lincoln, Vermont – named not for our sixteenth President, but for a Revolutionary War general most of the world knows nothing about – will be holding its annual exercise in legislative self-determination: Town Meeting. I’m a fan. Lincoln, of course, is simply one of a great many Vermont towns that will be holding its Town Meeting this week. And while no two are alike, they all share a couple of things: The faith that as a village we are capable of deciding what to spend on graders and schools (which have less to do with each other than I’d thought at my first Town Meeting). And that we will not, in the end, stone the school board.
Over the years I have written about town moderators, selectmen and women, town clerks, and school board members. All are way better people than I am. I celebrate them all.
But some years it feels to me that no one is braver than the folks on the school board. There are thankless jobs in this world – think of those courageous women and men who perform colonoscopies day after day – but there is no work more likely to get you castigated than being a member of your local school board. In some towns, you can probably cook meth and be more popular.
Among the twists that makes Rule’s short story such a delight is that Miranda appreciates the hard work of the school board. Her well-concealed fury (“May your second wife find a sharp tongue in the bottle she loves and slice you with it.”) is directed at Mort for the way he tries to browbeat and bully and humiliate them.
Now, no one who lives in my town would ever try to browbeat or bully or humiliate anyone on the school or select boards. I mean that. We have disagreements and people question the numbers that the school and select boards present, but most years I am very proud of what a civilized bunch we are. Oh, once in a while I find myself thinking like Miranda. But usually I’m just waiting for the moderator to call someone out for saying something that is not “germane.” (I live in constant fear that I am going to say something that is not “germane.” Saying something that is not “germane” isn’t as embarrasing as being the Mayor of Toronto, but it isn’t pretty.)
Is that true in every Green Mountain Town Meeting? Is every community as calm and caring as Lincoln? Probably not.
But the fact is, Town Meeting works in a state like Vermont. Sure, there is the occasional Mort Wallace, but as Rule’s story makes clear, there are considerably more people who are willing to do the seriously thankless work that allows a town to function. You think it takes a village to raise a child? It also takes a village to figure out how much a dump truck should cost. Or how to balance a budget. Or how to allocate the limited resources we have at the school.
And so once again this year I raise my glass to everyone who serves on the school and select boards, and everyone who does their homework before Town Meeting – the folks who prepare the Warning and those of us who actually read it.
Sometimes, like Miranda, we might be thinking, “May a rat die between the studs of your bedroom wall.” But we will smile and keep that thought to ourselves. It’s how, year after year, we get things done.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on March 2, 2014. Chris’s new novel, “Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands,” arrives on July 8.)
February 23, 2014
Shell-shocked? Nope. Just shell-crazy.
I lived in Florida when I was a teenager, so I know a little about living with a seashell-obsessed crazy person: My mother. We moved to Florida from Connecticut, and there was nothing that my mother thought could not be improved with seashells. I am not making up what I am about to tell you: One year, she glued seashells on to a toilet seat she bought at a hardware store, spray-painted the whole thing silver, and hung it on our front door as a Christmas wreath. She used seashells to transform a perfectly comfortable pool chair into a medieval torture device. There was no piece of furniture that was safe from her when she had a glue stick for her glue gun. She stuck seashells to headboards, mirrors, and the dog dish.
I recalled my mother’s confidence that she was the Martha Stewart of seashells Tuesday afternoon when I was walking along the beach on Sanibel Island. Sanibel is one of those beautiful islands on Florida’s Gulf Coast where the cars stop for bicyclists at intersections or in crosswalks, the skies are cerulean, and the locals are outnumbered by the tourists by roughly seven million to one. That is, of course, an exaggeration: The skies aren’t always cerulean. And people love to go shelling on Sanibel Island.
I was on the island to give a speech about books, and because I was done by about 2:20 in the afternoon and wasn’t flying back to Vermont until the next morning, I decided to spend a little time on the beach. After all, it had been 15 degrees below zero on my porch in Lincoln on Monday, the day before when I had flown to Florida. A little beach time didn’t sound shabby at all.
And there I found a lot of folks “doing the stoop.” That is, according to one of my hosts from the Sanibel Public Library Foundation, what the locals call shelling. There were, in fact, way more people shelling than there were people sunbathing, but that may have been because it was low tide. Also, the average age of the people on the beach was Golden Girls.
I met one delightful married couple in their 70s who were there from Michigan, and they each had a yellow pail. They were finding shells to use as a craft with a Sunday school class. I said I should probably bring a few shells back for my wife and daughter, but mostly I was being polite. I had no idea what my wife or our daughter – who is 20 and lives in New York — would do with seashells. Neither does a whole lot with glue guns, and neither (as far as I know) has ever purchased a toilet seat. But then the husband offered me his pail, which was at least half full with shells.
“Oh, that’s really generous of you,” I said, “but I’m okay. I was just planning on bringing a few back.”
But then I remembered how excited my daughter had been when I brought her back a few handsome pebbles that had been polished by water and time from Lake Van: A lake in Historic Armenia. The area today is in Turkey, but once upon a time it was a part of the cradle of Armenian civilization. The pebbles sit today on her dresser.
And so, like almost everyone else on the beach, suddenly I was “doing the stoop.” I picked out perhaps a dozen shells, five or six each for my wife and daughter. They didn’t have the totemic significance of those small stones from Lake Van, but I thought they might be a reminder for them of a woman who was a mother-in-law to one and a grandmother to the other. They might be a mnemonic for all of the times we’d visited my father in Fort Lauderdale and watched seagulls peck at the sand along the shore.
Most days the shells will probably just be clutter on a shelf or a dresser. But maybe, once in a while, they’ll conjure a happy memory. And a gift that can do that isn’t crazy at all.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on February 23, 2014. The paperback of Chris’s most recent novel, “The Light in the Ruins,” arrives on April 22.)
I recalled my mother’s confidence that she was the Martha Stewart of seashells Tuesday afternoon when I was walking along the beach on Sanibel Island. Sanibel is one of those beautiful islands on Florida’s Gulf Coast where the cars stop for bicyclists at intersections or in crosswalks, the skies are cerulean, and the locals are outnumbered by the tourists by roughly seven million to one. That is, of course, an exaggeration: The skies aren’t always cerulean. And people love to go shelling on Sanibel Island.
I was on the island to give a speech about books, and because I was done by about 2:20 in the afternoon and wasn’t flying back to Vermont until the next morning, I decided to spend a little time on the beach. After all, it had been 15 degrees below zero on my porch in Lincoln on Monday, the day before when I had flown to Florida. A little beach time didn’t sound shabby at all.
And there I found a lot of folks “doing the stoop.” That is, according to one of my hosts from the Sanibel Public Library Foundation, what the locals call shelling. There were, in fact, way more people shelling than there were people sunbathing, but that may have been because it was low tide. Also, the average age of the people on the beach was Golden Girls.
I met one delightful married couple in their 70s who were there from Michigan, and they each had a yellow pail. They were finding shells to use as a craft with a Sunday school class. I said I should probably bring a few shells back for my wife and daughter, but mostly I was being polite. I had no idea what my wife or our daughter – who is 20 and lives in New York — would do with seashells. Neither does a whole lot with glue guns, and neither (as far as I know) has ever purchased a toilet seat. But then the husband offered me his pail, which was at least half full with shells.
“Oh, that’s really generous of you,” I said, “but I’m okay. I was just planning on bringing a few back.”
But then I remembered how excited my daughter had been when I brought her back a few handsome pebbles that had been polished by water and time from Lake Van: A lake in Historic Armenia. The area today is in Turkey, but once upon a time it was a part of the cradle of Armenian civilization. The pebbles sit today on her dresser.
And so, like almost everyone else on the beach, suddenly I was “doing the stoop.” I picked out perhaps a dozen shells, five or six each for my wife and daughter. They didn’t have the totemic significance of those small stones from Lake Van, but I thought they might be a reminder for them of a woman who was a mother-in-law to one and a grandmother to the other. They might be a mnemonic for all of the times we’d visited my father in Fort Lauderdale and watched seagulls peck at the sand along the shore.
Most days the shells will probably just be clutter on a shelf or a dresser. But maybe, once in a while, they’ll conjure a happy memory. And a gift that can do that isn’t crazy at all.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on February 23, 2014. The paperback of Chris’s most recent novel, “The Light in the Ruins,” arrives on April 22.)
February 16, 2014
Chauncey and Linus: The Tom and Jerry of mascots.
Champlain College’s mascot is a beaver. I’m not going to say a word.
Wait, I will say this: It’s a guy beaver. The school’s mascot is a guy beaver and he was (I am guessing) named after some dude on “Masterpiece Theater” or “Downton Abbey:” Chauncey. Not judging, but are we really surprised that when you search “sports” on the Champlain College web site you get a paragraph about dodge ball and Zumba?
Now, I think the Burlington, Vermont school is spectacular – and I’m not alone. “U.S. News & World Report” named it the number one “Up-and-Comer” in the North in its 2014 edition of “America’s Best Colleges.” Recently John Tierney of “The Atlantic” wrote, “While you’re busy designing your version of the ideal [college], I can take a nap or go fishing, because somebody has already built mine: Champlain College.” I’m not saying the school should replace Chauncey, but maybe he needs a mascot pal to help shoulder the load. Or everyone there should start playing cricket, which is what they play on “Downton Abbey” when they’re not hiding from Maggie Smith.
So, I am hereby nominating Linus Hubbell to join Chauncey. The name alone exudes two of the many things that Champlain does well: Graphic design (Linus) and computer science and innovation (Hubbell). I know, the space telescope is spelled differently. I never said the college stands for spelling. But Linus got his name because he loved his blanket when he was young – very much like the iconic Peanuts character.
Moreover, Linus Hubbell is a cat. This means he is already mascot material. Think jaguars and panthers and lions and tigers and. . .catamounts. He’s five years old, weighs 15 pounds, and is that classic black-and-white tuxedo kind of cat. Technically, he belongs to Nick Hubbell and Audrey McManus. Nick sells real estate. Audrey teaches first grade. They live in Burlington in the midst of the Champlain College campus, and figured out soon after they brought Linus home that he was not merely a “people cat,” he was a “student cat.” They would let him out and he would wind up in college classrooms, computer labs, film studios, and dorm rooms. “He does make friends with the ladies,” Audrey told me. “He often comes back smelling of perfume.”
Today he has his own Facebook page with nearly 800 friends. It’s not quite as many as Chauncey, but it’s not shabby. Also, it is four times the size of the beaver’s twitter feed. (So far, Linus has not joined Twitter. He should. Thanks to Grumpy Cat, felines rule Twitter.)
I highly recommend becoming Linus’s friend on Facebook and following the photos. You get a sense of the wonder and weirdness of the cat’s life. Audrey or Nick usually acquiesce to the cat’s demands to be let out early in the evening, and then see where he is from the photos that students – and occasionally faculty – post on Facebook. Even his tag says, “Linus Hubbell/Friend me on Facebook.” Linus returns most evenings around Nick and Audrey’s bedtime.
But not always. Sometimes he returns the next morning if a student has needed the comfort of Linus’s altruistic services as an overnight rent-a-pet. This sort of animal consolation is important because the school has a no-pets policy – except, apparently, for human beings dressed up in six-foot tall beaver costumes. Brandon Jones, a senior majoring in film, recalls how Linus kept him company through the night when he was editing a movie. Linus slept on his sweatshirt and provided moral support. “I’d have my headphones on and look back and find him there,” Brandon said. “It was very comforting.”
Likewise, Brendon Johnson, a sophomore majoring in communications, has found Linus a reassuring presence even during the day: “I would see him last semester when I would have my 8 a.m. marketing class. Sometimes I would see him between classes. He would always make my day.”
So, is there room on the campus for both Chauncey and Linus? I say yes. You just can’t have too many six-foot tall beavers and 15-pound cats in your life.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on February 16, 2014. Chris’s next novel, “Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands,” arrives on July 8.)
Wait, I will say this: It’s a guy beaver. The school’s mascot is a guy beaver and he was (I am guessing) named after some dude on “Masterpiece Theater” or “Downton Abbey:” Chauncey. Not judging, but are we really surprised that when you search “sports” on the Champlain College web site you get a paragraph about dodge ball and Zumba?
Now, I think the Burlington, Vermont school is spectacular – and I’m not alone. “U.S. News & World Report” named it the number one “Up-and-Comer” in the North in its 2014 edition of “America’s Best Colleges.” Recently John Tierney of “The Atlantic” wrote, “While you’re busy designing your version of the ideal [college], I can take a nap or go fishing, because somebody has already built mine: Champlain College.” I’m not saying the school should replace Chauncey, but maybe he needs a mascot pal to help shoulder the load. Or everyone there should start playing cricket, which is what they play on “Downton Abbey” when they’re not hiding from Maggie Smith.
So, I am hereby nominating Linus Hubbell to join Chauncey. The name alone exudes two of the many things that Champlain does well: Graphic design (Linus) and computer science and innovation (Hubbell). I know, the space telescope is spelled differently. I never said the college stands for spelling. But Linus got his name because he loved his blanket when he was young – very much like the iconic Peanuts character.
Moreover, Linus Hubbell is a cat. This means he is already mascot material. Think jaguars and panthers and lions and tigers and. . .catamounts. He’s five years old, weighs 15 pounds, and is that classic black-and-white tuxedo kind of cat. Technically, he belongs to Nick Hubbell and Audrey McManus. Nick sells real estate. Audrey teaches first grade. They live in Burlington in the midst of the Champlain College campus, and figured out soon after they brought Linus home that he was not merely a “people cat,” he was a “student cat.” They would let him out and he would wind up in college classrooms, computer labs, film studios, and dorm rooms. “He does make friends with the ladies,” Audrey told me. “He often comes back smelling of perfume.”
Today he has his own Facebook page with nearly 800 friends. It’s not quite as many as Chauncey, but it’s not shabby. Also, it is four times the size of the beaver’s twitter feed. (So far, Linus has not joined Twitter. He should. Thanks to Grumpy Cat, felines rule Twitter.)
I highly recommend becoming Linus’s friend on Facebook and following the photos. You get a sense of the wonder and weirdness of the cat’s life. Audrey or Nick usually acquiesce to the cat’s demands to be let out early in the evening, and then see where he is from the photos that students – and occasionally faculty – post on Facebook. Even his tag says, “Linus Hubbell/Friend me on Facebook.” Linus returns most evenings around Nick and Audrey’s bedtime.
But not always. Sometimes he returns the next morning if a student has needed the comfort of Linus’s altruistic services as an overnight rent-a-pet. This sort of animal consolation is important because the school has a no-pets policy – except, apparently, for human beings dressed up in six-foot tall beaver costumes. Brandon Jones, a senior majoring in film, recalls how Linus kept him company through the night when he was editing a movie. Linus slept on his sweatshirt and provided moral support. “I’d have my headphones on and look back and find him there,” Brandon said. “It was very comforting.”
Likewise, Brendon Johnson, a sophomore majoring in communications, has found Linus a reassuring presence even during the day: “I would see him last semester when I would have my 8 a.m. marketing class. Sometimes I would see him between classes. He would always make my day.”
So, is there room on the campus for both Chauncey and Linus? I say yes. You just can’t have too many six-foot tall beavers and 15-pound cats in your life.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on February 16, 2014. Chris’s next novel, “Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands,” arrives on July 8.)
February 9, 2014
Valentine’s Day is nearing: Nothing says love like a box of Cheez-Its
Once again, Valentine’s Day is nearing, that moment each year when we celebrate what it means to be in love. The traditional gifts? Cards and flowers and candy. Really uncomfortable lingerie. Some people, however, try to transcend tradition. I asked readers this year for some of the worst or strangest Valentine’s gifts they had ever received or heard about. Here are some of their responses.
• Selina Rooney: “My dad, a dairy farmer, once left a giant dried cow poop in the shape of a heart in the barn doorway for my mom. I don’t have any idea how he got the cow to poop a heart shape.”
• Nvair Kadian Beylerian: “Our first Valentine’s Day as a married couple, my husband gave me a waffle iron. ‘But honey, it’s heart-shaped!’ he said in defense.”
• Shelagh Connor Shapiro: “Long ago, a boyfriend gave me a heart pin made of faux pearls, and then told me he’d found it under the passenger seat of the used car he’d just bought.”
• Danielle Libertucci Tucker: “I was in college and had been dating my boyfriend for five years. He had graduated and I was in my first year of grad school. He was giving me hints about my Valentine’s present. He was going to take me to a store to pick it out, as he needed me to try it on. It was something I would wear and keep for a long time. I leapt to the conclusion that he was getting me an engagement ring, and so I was giddy with excitement. I asked my sister if she would be my maid of honor. I bought bridal magazines, circled dresses, and daydreamed. Then on Valentine’s weekend, my boyfriend took me to Dick’s Sporting Goods, where I picked out a pair of rollerblades.”
• Ann Grady Lang: “After gaining 10 pounds my first year of college, my boyfriend gave me a huge, heart-shaped box of chocolates. I was floored. ‘Dude,’ I said, ‘you’re always telling me I need to lose weight, and now you’re giving me pounds of chocolates?’ His response: ‘Nobody said you had to eat them.’”
• Amy Nash: “My sister enjoys cheese and crackers, so my brother-in-law gave her a box of Cheez-Its. He thought he was being efficient.”1891153_10152184358087118_377962235_n
• Hope Lindsay: “Worst Valentine’s present? I thought I had read the signals and that I was finally getting ‘the ring.’ Instead, my gift was a roll of crepe paper. ‘I thought it was funny,’ my boyfriend said.”
• Becky Holt: “My husband gave me a loofa sponge and bath gel in a brown paper bag, stapled at the top, when we were in college. (I still married him; we celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary in July.) He delivered his gift to the front desk in the dorm where I lived, so the attendant called me to come get my present — which was behind rows and rows of bouquets of red roses. I was wondering which flowers might be mine, when the attendant presented the crumbled brown bag. I was a wee bit surprised. It was actually the first of many memorable, off-beat Valentine’s Day gifts.”
• Amy Feld: “The week before Valentine’s Day, the guy I was seeing gave me a dozen half-dead roses that he got at the gas station. He said the guy told him they’d be more expensive the following week. He was the last guy I dated before realizing I’m lesbian.”
• Alison Redlich: “This was back when my husband and I were still courting. As we were walking home from a family function in Manhattan, my mother asked Lee — then my boyfriend – what he had bought me. He replied, ‘Wait a minute,’ went into a bodega, bought a card (not sure it was even a Valentine), borrowed the cashier’s pen, and wrote, ‘Love, Lee’ on the bottom. Then he handed it to me and said, ‘I don’t do Valentine’s Day. Too contrived.’ To his credit, he spontaneously brings me flowers year-round.”
• Kathy Jablonski: “I received a bug repellant bracelet … from my husband.”
Happy Valentine’s Day.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on February 9. The paperback of Chris’s most recent novel, “The Light in the Ruins,” arrives on April 22.)
• Selina Rooney: “My dad, a dairy farmer, once left a giant dried cow poop in the shape of a heart in the barn doorway for my mom. I don’t have any idea how he got the cow to poop a heart shape.”
• Nvair Kadian Beylerian: “Our first Valentine’s Day as a married couple, my husband gave me a waffle iron. ‘But honey, it’s heart-shaped!’ he said in defense.”
• Shelagh Connor Shapiro: “Long ago, a boyfriend gave me a heart pin made of faux pearls, and then told me he’d found it under the passenger seat of the used car he’d just bought.”
• Danielle Libertucci Tucker: “I was in college and had been dating my boyfriend for five years. He had graduated and I was in my first year of grad school. He was giving me hints about my Valentine’s present. He was going to take me to a store to pick it out, as he needed me to try it on. It was something I would wear and keep for a long time. I leapt to the conclusion that he was getting me an engagement ring, and so I was giddy with excitement. I asked my sister if she would be my maid of honor. I bought bridal magazines, circled dresses, and daydreamed. Then on Valentine’s weekend, my boyfriend took me to Dick’s Sporting Goods, where I picked out a pair of rollerblades.”
• Ann Grady Lang: “After gaining 10 pounds my first year of college, my boyfriend gave me a huge, heart-shaped box of chocolates. I was floored. ‘Dude,’ I said, ‘you’re always telling me I need to lose weight, and now you’re giving me pounds of chocolates?’ His response: ‘Nobody said you had to eat them.’”
• Amy Nash: “My sister enjoys cheese and crackers, so my brother-in-law gave her a box of Cheez-Its. He thought he was being efficient.”1891153_10152184358087118_377962235_n
• Hope Lindsay: “Worst Valentine’s present? I thought I had read the signals and that I was finally getting ‘the ring.’ Instead, my gift was a roll of crepe paper. ‘I thought it was funny,’ my boyfriend said.”
• Becky Holt: “My husband gave me a loofa sponge and bath gel in a brown paper bag, stapled at the top, when we were in college. (I still married him; we celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary in July.) He delivered his gift to the front desk in the dorm where I lived, so the attendant called me to come get my present — which was behind rows and rows of bouquets of red roses. I was wondering which flowers might be mine, when the attendant presented the crumbled brown bag. I was a wee bit surprised. It was actually the first of many memorable, off-beat Valentine’s Day gifts.”
• Amy Feld: “The week before Valentine’s Day, the guy I was seeing gave me a dozen half-dead roses that he got at the gas station. He said the guy told him they’d be more expensive the following week. He was the last guy I dated before realizing I’m lesbian.”
• Alison Redlich: “This was back when my husband and I were still courting. As we were walking home from a family function in Manhattan, my mother asked Lee — then my boyfriend – what he had bought me. He replied, ‘Wait a minute,’ went into a bodega, bought a card (not sure it was even a Valentine), borrowed the cashier’s pen, and wrote, ‘Love, Lee’ on the bottom. Then he handed it to me and said, ‘I don’t do Valentine’s Day. Too contrived.’ To his credit, he spontaneously brings me flowers year-round.”
• Kathy Jablonski: “I received a bug repellant bracelet … from my husband.”
Happy Valentine’s Day.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on February 9. The paperback of Chris’s most recent novel, “The Light in the Ruins,” arrives on April 22.)
February 2, 2014
Super Bowl Sunday: Time to kick off our anniversary
We are now but hours away from one of those epic, annual, Roman numeral-sized moments when as a nation we put our trials and tribulations aside, and savor a common interest. A shared passion. I am referring, of course, to the reality that later today almost every sentient human being in America is going to settle down with feeding troughs of guacamole and chips and bottles of beer, turn on our television sets. . .and then toast my lovely bride and me.
Yes, it was on February 2 that my wife and I meet. We were eighteen years old. We were in our first year of college. We did not meet at a Super Bowl party. We met at a college mixer, which is like a football game in that there’s a lot strategy, a little trash talk, and if you’re going to make a pass, you better be smart. Also, someone is bound to put his or her hands on someone else’s bottom.
My wife tolerates my interest in football, but when she was eighteen, her entire knowledge of the sport came from the movie, “The Longest Yard” – the original from 1974 with Burt Reynolds as a prisoner who leads his fellow cons in a football game against the guards. One Sunday not long after we were married – an era when we actually used television antennas for reception – she joined me on the couch when I was watching a game through screen fuzz so bad it was like the players were battling in a whiteout.
“What sport is this?” she asked.
“Football,” I answered.
“How can you tell?”
The truth is, I really couldn’t. But still I watched.
In any case, when I discovered that Super Bowl Sunday this year was going to fall on the anniversary of the day my wife and I met, I felt a moral obligation to try and transcend the Trans Fat Feast that I usually put together on the big day. There was no way I could turn my desire to sit before a television for hours watching men batter one another into a romantic evening, but I could do better than expect her to watch it with me with only a tub of ranch dip and a bag of Cheetos for sustenance.
So, I went on-line to try and find interesting Super Bowl party recipes. After about ten minutes I discovered that a whole lot of game day party suggestions involve at least one can of French’s crunchy fried onions. Those recipes that don’t revolve around crunchy fried onions are usually dips with many layers and enough sour cream to cause our hearts to rebel and beg for angioplasties.
Then I considered spending the afternoon in the kitchen preparing some of her very favorite foods: A chocolate-peanut butter pie. Armenian cheese boregs. The sort of healthy, hearty soup she savors in the winter.
But this plan struck me a bit like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. The Super Bowl stands for three things: Wildly expensive television commercials. Halftime extravaganzas that cause power failures. And the calories that will someday kill us all. A healthy soup on Super Bowl Sunday? Blasphemous. Only one baby step less weird than serving an unsweetened smoothie made from broccoli and carrots.
Besides, she would still have to enjoy this repast while sitting on the couch watching a game that she comprehends about as well as I understand the technology that magically makes emails appear on my cellphone.
So, did that mean that I have chosen to be a decent husband and do the right thing? To ignore the Super Bowl and celebrate our anniversary by taking my wife out to dinner tonight?
Nope. Tonight I will be camped out in front of the TV with enough junk food to make Honey Boo Boo Child swoon.
Instead, this year my wife and I celebrated our meeting anniversary a day earlier – yesterday. It was perfect.
Happy anniversary to my lovely bride, my muse, my inamorata. Thank you for so many wonderful years together. . .and, yes, for putting up with yet another three hours of football.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on February 2, 2014. Chris’s next novel, “Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands,” arrives on July 8.)
Yes, it was on February 2 that my wife and I meet. We were eighteen years old. We were in our first year of college. We did not meet at a Super Bowl party. We met at a college mixer, which is like a football game in that there’s a lot strategy, a little trash talk, and if you’re going to make a pass, you better be smart. Also, someone is bound to put his or her hands on someone else’s bottom.
My wife tolerates my interest in football, but when she was eighteen, her entire knowledge of the sport came from the movie, “The Longest Yard” – the original from 1974 with Burt Reynolds as a prisoner who leads his fellow cons in a football game against the guards. One Sunday not long after we were married – an era when we actually used television antennas for reception – she joined me on the couch when I was watching a game through screen fuzz so bad it was like the players were battling in a whiteout.
“What sport is this?” she asked.
“Football,” I answered.
“How can you tell?”
The truth is, I really couldn’t. But still I watched.
In any case, when I discovered that Super Bowl Sunday this year was going to fall on the anniversary of the day my wife and I met, I felt a moral obligation to try and transcend the Trans Fat Feast that I usually put together on the big day. There was no way I could turn my desire to sit before a television for hours watching men batter one another into a romantic evening, but I could do better than expect her to watch it with me with only a tub of ranch dip and a bag of Cheetos for sustenance.
So, I went on-line to try and find interesting Super Bowl party recipes. After about ten minutes I discovered that a whole lot of game day party suggestions involve at least one can of French’s crunchy fried onions. Those recipes that don’t revolve around crunchy fried onions are usually dips with many layers and enough sour cream to cause our hearts to rebel and beg for angioplasties.
Then I considered spending the afternoon in the kitchen preparing some of her very favorite foods: A chocolate-peanut butter pie. Armenian cheese boregs. The sort of healthy, hearty soup she savors in the winter.
But this plan struck me a bit like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. The Super Bowl stands for three things: Wildly expensive television commercials. Halftime extravaganzas that cause power failures. And the calories that will someday kill us all. A healthy soup on Super Bowl Sunday? Blasphemous. Only one baby step less weird than serving an unsweetened smoothie made from broccoli and carrots.
Besides, she would still have to enjoy this repast while sitting on the couch watching a game that she comprehends about as well as I understand the technology that magically makes emails appear on my cellphone.
So, did that mean that I have chosen to be a decent husband and do the right thing? To ignore the Super Bowl and celebrate our anniversary by taking my wife out to dinner tonight?
Nope. Tonight I will be camped out in front of the TV with enough junk food to make Honey Boo Boo Child swoon.
Instead, this year my wife and I celebrated our meeting anniversary a day earlier – yesterday. It was perfect.
Happy anniversary to my lovely bride, my muse, my inamorata. Thank you for so many wonderful years together. . .and, yes, for putting up with yet another three hours of football.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on February 2, 2014. Chris’s next novel, “Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands,” arrives on July 8.)
January 26, 2014
The Olympics are coming: Time to curl up with a good rock
The Sochi Olympics are but days away, which means that people who care passionately about curling are about to have their one moment in time. The same is true for cartographers, since before this month there were not a lot of people in the U.S. who could have found Sochi on a map. A month from now? We’ll all know that Stalin once had a dacha there. We’ll be calling it the Russian Riviera around the water cooler. We’ll be discussing that unbelievably tense curling game between Denmark and China.
Okay, maybe that’s hyperbole. The Rutland Rocks Curling Club might be talking about that game. So might the Green Mountain Curling Club. But the rest of us will be debating ice hockey, figure skating, and freestyle skiing. That’s not to diminish the incredible spectator appeal of watching people push rocks the size of car tires across the ice; curling just hasn’t quite caught on yet.
“Curling is pretty quirky,” agreed Nancy Murphy, retired banker, grandmother, and co-founder of the Rutland Rocks Curling Club. “We get very excited about the Olympics. It’s really fun to watch people who know what they’re doing.”
In any case, the Olympics are nearing. What makes them so commendable is the way they expand our horizons. I don’t buy into the feel-good notion that they break down international borders and make us less nationalistic; as a matter of fact, I think they make us more nationalistic. We all count the medals by country, we all pull for our hometown folks. We all know where we were when the U.S. Men’s curling team came out of nowhere to defeat the vaunted curling pros from the Soviet Union in Lake Placid.
Sorry, that was hockey. A different miracle on ice. But you see my point.
Nevertheless, we do learn about other countries and we do glimpse other cultures. My late mother-in-law loved the Olympics for precisely this reason. She could watch figure skating on television for hours, and not just the women’s figure skating that guys watch, hoping desperately for a wardrobe malfunction. She even watched the men. And the couples. But she also loved the travelogues between the events. She savored the back-stories about the athletes that showed small towns in Germany or villages in South Korea. She was riveted by the images of places on the other side of the globe from her perch in Manhattan. And, yes, she would learn a bit about sports that otherwise fly under the radar – sports like curling. Until she died in 2011, she wore a winter parka with her patches from the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid.
Of course, she may also have worn that parka for three decades because she was unbelievably frugal. This was a woman who used to have her daughter – my wife – hand-deliver her monthly electricity payment to Con Ed so she could save a stamp, even though it was a 20-block walk in often stifling summer heat. Still, she loved the Olympics.
I’m a little bit like her in that regard. The Olympics, I mean. I don’t ask my wife to hand-deliver our bills. I’ll watch the Opening Ceremony. I’ll nod at the dedication of the parents of the athletes. I’ll get a little dewy-eyed at the Proctor & Gamble commercials showing young athletes and their parents working together to someday make it to the slopes or the ice.
The truth is that as jaded as we are, as nationalistic as we are, as tired as we are of commercial exploitation of the games, we still feel a sense of wonder when we watch a figure skater perform a triple lutz. Or when we watch the remarkable work of a snowboarder on an Olympic halfpipe. Or even, just maybe, when we finally give curling a chance, learn the complex strategies involved, and watch from the edge of our couches as a 42-pound rock rolls across the ice.
I won’t be in Sochi next month. But I’ll be watching. And now I can find it on a map.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on January 26, 2014. Chris’s next novel, “Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands,” arrives on July 8.)
Okay, maybe that’s hyperbole. The Rutland Rocks Curling Club might be talking about that game. So might the Green Mountain Curling Club. But the rest of us will be debating ice hockey, figure skating, and freestyle skiing. That’s not to diminish the incredible spectator appeal of watching people push rocks the size of car tires across the ice; curling just hasn’t quite caught on yet.
“Curling is pretty quirky,” agreed Nancy Murphy, retired banker, grandmother, and co-founder of the Rutland Rocks Curling Club. “We get very excited about the Olympics. It’s really fun to watch people who know what they’re doing.”
In any case, the Olympics are nearing. What makes them so commendable is the way they expand our horizons. I don’t buy into the feel-good notion that they break down international borders and make us less nationalistic; as a matter of fact, I think they make us more nationalistic. We all count the medals by country, we all pull for our hometown folks. We all know where we were when the U.S. Men’s curling team came out of nowhere to defeat the vaunted curling pros from the Soviet Union in Lake Placid.
Sorry, that was hockey. A different miracle on ice. But you see my point.
Nevertheless, we do learn about other countries and we do glimpse other cultures. My late mother-in-law loved the Olympics for precisely this reason. She could watch figure skating on television for hours, and not just the women’s figure skating that guys watch, hoping desperately for a wardrobe malfunction. She even watched the men. And the couples. But she also loved the travelogues between the events. She savored the back-stories about the athletes that showed small towns in Germany or villages in South Korea. She was riveted by the images of places on the other side of the globe from her perch in Manhattan. And, yes, she would learn a bit about sports that otherwise fly under the radar – sports like curling. Until she died in 2011, she wore a winter parka with her patches from the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid.
Of course, she may also have worn that parka for three decades because she was unbelievably frugal. This was a woman who used to have her daughter – my wife – hand-deliver her monthly electricity payment to Con Ed so she could save a stamp, even though it was a 20-block walk in often stifling summer heat. Still, she loved the Olympics.
I’m a little bit like her in that regard. The Olympics, I mean. I don’t ask my wife to hand-deliver our bills. I’ll watch the Opening Ceremony. I’ll nod at the dedication of the parents of the athletes. I’ll get a little dewy-eyed at the Proctor & Gamble commercials showing young athletes and their parents working together to someday make it to the slopes or the ice.
The truth is that as jaded as we are, as nationalistic as we are, as tired as we are of commercial exploitation of the games, we still feel a sense of wonder when we watch a figure skater perform a triple lutz. Or when we watch the remarkable work of a snowboarder on an Olympic halfpipe. Or even, just maybe, when we finally give curling a chance, learn the complex strategies involved, and watch from the edge of our couches as a 42-pound rock rolls across the ice.
I won’t be in Sochi next month. But I’ll be watching. And now I can find it on a map.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on January 26, 2014. Chris’s next novel, “Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands,” arrives on July 8.)
January 18, 2014
You just looked around, and they were gone
This is the time of the year when we are most likely to hear “Abraham, Martin and John” on the radio. You know the song. It was a hit for Dion in 1968. It’s an homage to Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King, Jr., and John and Robert Kennedy. It’s wistful, elegiac, and perhaps a little saccharine. It has a harp.
We all, if we are a certain age, can ad-lib the lyrics pretty well, because the verses are nearly identical except for the names:
“Has anybody here seen my old friend Abraham?
Can you tell me where he’s gone?
He freed a lot of people, but it seems the good they die young.
You know, I just looked around and he’s gone.”
There are verses for each of the four assassinated men. Three white, one black. Two brothers. Two killed within a three-month span in the first half of 1968.
When I heard the song on Sirius radio the other day, the deejay shared two pieces of trivia about its history, one surprising and one tragic. The surprising? The song was written by Dick Holler, the same songwriter who gave us the novelty fluff classic, “Snoopy vs. the Red Baron.” The tragic? According to the deejay, the song was written after King was murdered in April, but before Bobby Kennedy would be murdered in June. The verse with Bobby was not part of the original composition (hence the title, “Abraham, Martin, and John”). It was, the deejay explained, added just before Dion went into the studio that summer. I have no idea if that’s true, but it’s a little wrenching to consider.
I am, of course, reminding you of the song because tomorrow is the day when we celebrate the life of Martin Luther King, Jr. The nation once more will pause to mourn, to remember, and to look back on the life and accomplishments of the clergyman and civil rights leader who quite literally helped change the face of America.
Whenever I am on a book tour in Memphis, I take time out to visit the National Civil Rights Museum. It’s built on the site of the Lorraine Motel where King was assassinated, and visitors can see the balcony where he was standing when he was killed. We can see Room 306, where he was staying. There is, obviously, a lot more. The museum offers a powerful history of the civil rights struggle in the United States.
If I ever needed a history lesson of why we needed King – and why we need him still – I got that reminder the first time I went to the museum. It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon, the sky cerulean, and I asked the concierge at the hotel where I was staying the best way to get to the museum. He put me in a cab and I was driven. . .less than a mile. Not kidding.
I walked back to the hotel after I toured the museum and asked the concierge, “Wow, do I look that old and infirm that you thought I needed a cab?”
He looked concerned. “Not at all,” he said. “But the neighborhood can be a little. . .sketchy.”
That’s when I got it. I understood the subtext. The concierge was white.
I told him I was appalled. He told me he had to look out for the safety of his guests.
When you hear Dion’s song today or tomorrow – and there really is a chance you will – try not to get lost in the repeated verses. Listen for what is, in my opinion, its best lyric, powerful because you only hear it once:
“Didn’t you love the things that they stood for?”
Indeed. That’s why we take a moment tomorrow to honor Dr. King: It’s not merely what he accomplished. It’s what, even decades after his death, he stands for.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on January 19, 2014. Chris's novel, "The Light in the Ruins," arrives in paperback on April 22.)
We all, if we are a certain age, can ad-lib the lyrics pretty well, because the verses are nearly identical except for the names:
“Has anybody here seen my old friend Abraham?
Can you tell me where he’s gone?
He freed a lot of people, but it seems the good they die young.
You know, I just looked around and he’s gone.”
There are verses for each of the four assassinated men. Three white, one black. Two brothers. Two killed within a three-month span in the first half of 1968.
When I heard the song on Sirius radio the other day, the deejay shared two pieces of trivia about its history, one surprising and one tragic. The surprising? The song was written by Dick Holler, the same songwriter who gave us the novelty fluff classic, “Snoopy vs. the Red Baron.” The tragic? According to the deejay, the song was written after King was murdered in April, but before Bobby Kennedy would be murdered in June. The verse with Bobby was not part of the original composition (hence the title, “Abraham, Martin, and John”). It was, the deejay explained, added just before Dion went into the studio that summer. I have no idea if that’s true, but it’s a little wrenching to consider.
I am, of course, reminding you of the song because tomorrow is the day when we celebrate the life of Martin Luther King, Jr. The nation once more will pause to mourn, to remember, and to look back on the life and accomplishments of the clergyman and civil rights leader who quite literally helped change the face of America.
Whenever I am on a book tour in Memphis, I take time out to visit the National Civil Rights Museum. It’s built on the site of the Lorraine Motel where King was assassinated, and visitors can see the balcony where he was standing when he was killed. We can see Room 306, where he was staying. There is, obviously, a lot more. The museum offers a powerful history of the civil rights struggle in the United States.
If I ever needed a history lesson of why we needed King – and why we need him still – I got that reminder the first time I went to the museum. It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon, the sky cerulean, and I asked the concierge at the hotel where I was staying the best way to get to the museum. He put me in a cab and I was driven. . .less than a mile. Not kidding.
I walked back to the hotel after I toured the museum and asked the concierge, “Wow, do I look that old and infirm that you thought I needed a cab?”
He looked concerned. “Not at all,” he said. “But the neighborhood can be a little. . .sketchy.”
That’s when I got it. I understood the subtext. The concierge was white.
I told him I was appalled. He told me he had to look out for the safety of his guests.
When you hear Dion’s song today or tomorrow – and there really is a chance you will – try not to get lost in the repeated verses. Listen for what is, in my opinion, its best lyric, powerful because you only hear it once:
“Didn’t you love the things that they stood for?”
Indeed. That’s why we take a moment tomorrow to honor Dr. King: It’s not merely what he accomplished. It’s what, even decades after his death, he stands for.
(This column appeared originally in the Burlington Free Press on January 19, 2014. Chris's novel, "The Light in the Ruins," arrives in paperback on April 22.)
