Yoga?

May 20, 2013 By ElizabethWolf in Travel, Writing Tags: Connecticut, family, friends, humor, life 5 Comments

So…

I LOVE my husband.

I mean, I really, really love him. We live a wild, unpredictable life and we could never do it if I really didn’t just love him down to his guts.

That being said…

“Hi! We’re back!” I called out.

“Hey…did you find everything you need?” Michael asked.

Dear friends of ours let us stay at their home near one of the theatres where the show recently played. They were on their way to join us for the weekend and I wanted to prepare a nice dinner for them when they arrived.

“I did!” I beamed, “And the drive to the store is so charming…all the old homes and…is something wrong? Why are you just standing in the doorway like that?”

I know my husband. He had a clammy look about him, as if the effort it took to wrack his brain about how to tell me something caused him to break out into a fine sweat.

“I did something…bad.”

“What do you mean?” I marveled as I ascended the driveway toward the front door, “We were gone for 45 minutes, what could have possibly happened?”

“Well…I think it will be ok. I think I can fix it.”

“Fix it? Oh no, Michael! What happened?”

“Well…the story is kind of funny…” he offered, “see, I decided to do some yoga…”

“Yoga??? You decided to do yoga?”

This man, my husband, has not done yoga for about 8 years which pretty much qualifies him as having never done yoga.

“Well it was one of Margi’s (my favorite yoga teacher on the planet) downloads and she had us doing handstands at the wall…”

“Okaaaay…” I said suspiciously, “are you implicating Margi?”

“Well, I mean, no…of course not…it’s just…the handstands went so well I decided I could just do the forearm stands in the middle of the room…”

the middle of the room

“What???” I blurted out with a laugh of complete bewilderment and a shred of mild admiration for his momentary fearlessness, “I’ve practiced yoga for 15 years and I never do a forearm stand in the middle of the room!”

“Well I thought if I fell, I would just land on my feet again…I didn’t realize I’d flip over!”

a forearm stand…in the middle of the room. tumblr.com

“Oh NO!” I stood in the foyer now with both hands over my face to shield myself from the potential shattered vase or broken lamp I was about to see, “Of course you flip over!” I said loudly as if possessed by either Jerry Seinfeld or Larry David or both, “That’s what happens! If there’s no wall…you just…you flip over!”

I made swirling, circular loops to complement my words with my index fingers. I wanted to be sure my point really hit home as if that gesture alone could undo what had already been done. I began to round the corner into the living room as he continued, “Well, yeah…so, I flipped over, and toppled into the bench…”

this bench

“…and the corner of the bench slammed into the window.”

I froze wide eyed at the entry way to the living room while I stared at the following sight in our friends’ lovely new home.

I closed my eyes, I pursed my lips and I slowly exhaled all the air out of my lungs while Michael explained away in the background all the various ways he could remedy the situation. ”You know,” I interrupted, “if I could just not live in a Will Ferrell movie for one day, I would be so happy.”

Our next stop was Norfolk, VA.

Why I Heart NY

May 13, 2013 By ElizabethWolf in Inspiration, Travel Tags: children, culture, friends, humor, life, NYC, Sydney 5 Comments

Oh New York, it is so hard to leave you. After 15 years together, I’m still as giddy as a school girl when someone mentions your name. You’d think after all this time I would just be sick of you.

where else do your bad photos just look like you’re avoiding the paparazzi?

Well…to be honest…I was sick of you for a bit. When you are lucky enough to live in what you consider your favorite place on the planet, it does not change the fact that you live there.

but at least Dr. Norman makes the dentist visits fun

Life has certain inescapable daily responsibilities: work, appointments, errands, children, etc. So when you move in down the street from some gorgeous museum or fantastic restaurant and you think, ‘I will go there every week,’ it says something when you realize you have been to said museum/restaurant once, if at all, in the past several years.

I’m talking to you Pearl Oyster Bar…15 years and I still haven’t had the chance to visit you. pearloysterbar.com

When you realize all you really do at the end of a day is lie down on the floor exhausted while you eat the left over Chinese food you lazily ordered the night before, you begin to feel as though you might appreciate that beautiful museum and fantastic restaurant more if you could just come to visit New York City one day.

wouldn’t it be fun to go to New York and ride the subway?

Absence does make the heart grow fonder, New York, and now that you have been set in relief for the last 3 months I can take this opportunity to romanticize the idea of you again.

our friend T's fully stocked bar helped also...

our friend T’s fully stocked bar helped the romanticizing process begin…

But what I discovered during this week long visit to NYC was something very different than what I had expected to find. Yes, I miss Fairway (a dream of a grocery store, if they would just let me live in a storage closet there, I would leave my family to do so), I miss a good plop down in Sheep Meadow with the Sunday Times (although, I’ve missed that since G was born), and yes, I even miss the potentially frustrating hustley bustley way of life.

why can I not find a cab? why are there just no cabs?

why can I not find a cab? it’s my hairdo isn’t it?

But what I miss the most are our people, our fabulous friends who we have known for years, who we’ve watched grow and change, who have cheered for us when we’ve reached

who else but n’Uncle Peter is going to lend you the very same Yankees jacket he wore when he was 5?

huge milestones, and who have scooped us up when we’ve hit dicier times. Modern technology does provide the reassurance our nearest and dearest are always a click or two away, but it’s really no substitute for that spontaneous coffee or that walk around the block when you just need someone’s ear or they need yours. You know what I’m talking about.

So, when we went to New York City for just one week we planned all sorts of touristy adventures, but instead we ditched all those plans and broke bread every day with people we love. That is what makes it hard to leave you New York. I’m sure Sydney has its charms, but I know it does not have our people.

The next post contains all the photos of dinner with friends and will be password protected by order of the Queen to protect the innocent…or something like that. If you forgot the password you can use the form below to email me. There are some goodies in there.

It Takes A Village

May 12, 2013 By ElizabethWolf in Inspiration Tags: children, family, humor, life, parenting 2 Comments

If you are a Mother, if you have a Mother, if you know a Mother…to you I say THANK YOU.

Over these last 3 years of Motherhood not only have I started capitalizing the M in this loaded word, but I’ve realized every, single person I know contributes to this marvelous, overwhelming task of raising a human being.

Thank you for sharing your:

Wisdom
Stories
Photos
Techniques
Advice
and above all, Distractions

Cheers to you.

And now I will share A Mother’s Prayer for Her Daughter by Tina Fey because it makes me laugh and almost weep at the same time.

Enjoy.

First, Lord: No tattoos. May neither Chinese symbol for truth nor Winnie-the-Pooh holding the FSU logo stain her tender haunches.

May she be Beautiful but not Damaged, for it’s the Damage that draws the creepy soccer coach’s eye, not the the Beauty.

When the Crystal Meth is offered,

May she remember the parents who cut her grapes in half

And stick with Beer.

Guide her, protect her

When crossing the street, stepping onto boats, swimming in the ocean, swimming in pools, walking near pools, standing on the nearby subway platform, crossing 86th Street, stepping off of boats, using mall restrooms, getting on and off escalators, driving on country roads while arguing, leaning on large windows, walking in parking lots, riding Ferris wheels, roller-coasters, log flumes, or anything called “Hell Drop,” “Tower of Torture,” or “The Death Spiral Rock N’ Zero G Roll featuring Aerosmith,” and standing on any kind of balcony ever, anywhere, at any age.

Lead her away from Acting but not all the way to Finance.

Something where she can make her own hours but still feel intellectually fulfilled and get outside sometimes

And not have to wear high heels.

What would that be, Lord? Architecture? Midwifery? Golf course design? I’m asking You because if I knew, I’d be doing it, Youdammit.

May she play the Drums to the fiery rhythm of her Own Heart with the sinewy strength of her Own Arms, so she need Not Lie With Drummers.

Grant her a Rough Patch from twelve to seventeen.

Let her draw horses and be interested in Barbies for much too long,

For Childhood is short — a Tiger Flower blooming

Magenta for one day –

And Adulthood is long and Dry-Humping in Cars will wait.

O Lord, break the Internet forever,

That she may be spared the misspelled invective of her peers

And the online marketing campaign for Rape Hostel V: Girls Just Wanna Get Stabbed.

And when she one day turns on me and calls me a Bitch in front of Hollister,

Give me the strength, Lord, to yank her directly into a cab in front of her friends,

For I will not have that Shit. I will not have it.

And should she choose to be a Mother one day, be my eyes, Lord,

That I may see her, lying on a blanket on the floor at 4:50 a.m., all-at-once exhausted, bored, and in love with the little creature whose poop is leaking up its back.

“My mother did this for me once,” she will realize as she cleans feces off her baby’s neck.

“My mother did this for me.” And the delayed gratitude will wash over her as it does each generation and she will make a Mental note to call me. And she will forget.

But I’ll know, because I peeped it with Your God eyes.

Amen.

Saint Martin

May 6, 2013 By ElizabethWolf in Travel Tags: children, family, history, life, NYC, St. Martin 6 Comments

We came down to St. Martin for a vacation. We don’t go on “vacation” vacations. Michael and I are very similar in our tastes and we’d always much rather explore a place for its culture, food or history, rather than just plop down on a beach somewhere.

But our life currently feels like a constant vacation and from that we needed a vacation. There is something to be said for the all inclusive resort tucked away on a Caribbean Island. It’s not our style (for reasons I will spare you from), but in the end we all decompressed with no internet, phones, or errands…just a pool, a beach, an ocean, a book.

St. Martin is in the Caribbean, it’s half Dutch and half French and that was all I learned about it. There was also this spider. G checked on him twice a day to be sure he was alright.

The whole week Michael kept asking me if I was ok, he said I had a look on my face he wasn’t used to seeing and it concerned him. We finally decided it was just how I looked when I was relaxed.

Our next stop was New York City.

I Ran-A Cautionary Tale

April 15, 2013 By ElizabethWolf in Writing Tags: children, family, friends, humor, life, parenting 8 Comments

WARNING: While this post is tagged under family, it is not quite family friendly. It addresses themes of an irreverent political and social nature. It may, in fact, even represent bad parenting. In short, Tatiana would highly disapprove…

But if you have a late night sense of humor (GG), or an SNL sense of humor (not you, GG), read on.

If not…well, consider yourself warned.

thebreak.com

A lovely friend came to spend some time with us in Worcester, Mass a couple of weeks ago.

Somehow the topic of Adam Levine or Andy Samberg or Iran or Ahmadinejad came up, I can’t say for certain which one it was.

To the best of my recollection I said, ‘Oh ha ha ha, have you seen that video on SNL? It just cracks me up because that guy from Maroon 5 is so ridiculously serious.’

Then I played it for her while G sat on the floor and feverishly did a puzzle in the type of trance only a 3 year old can get himself into.

Now, before you read any further, click this link below to watch the full video or the rest of this post won’t make any sense. Then click back!

Iran So Far

So later that day on a trip to Trader Joe’s, G started to sing, ‘I ran, I ran….ecuse me, what next MaMa?’

‘Uhhhhhhh. I don’t know sweetie,’ I replied stunned, ‘I-ran so far away?’

‘I-ran. I ran so far away,’ he sang out, ‘what next?’

‘Uhhhhmmmm…You’re home and in my heart you’ll stay?’

Stop it…stop it, Elizabeth! Don’t teach him the words to this song.

tumblr.com

I can’t stop! I can’t help it, I’m so shocked he knows it at all, I just have no control over what I’m saying. Besides, it’s harmless. What are the chances he’ll ever sing it again after this car ride? He doesn’t even sing wheels on the bus anymore.

‘What next?’

‘Uhhhhh…I don’t know…how about…I look up to the sky, I look up to the sky, I look up to the sky, hiiiiiiiiiigh!’

Well, 2 weeks later, not only has he refined his technique in terms of pitch and rhythm, he performs this little chorus daily, constantly, ad nauseum, everywhere.

Baltimore Aquarium? Busts it out with dance moves in front of friends and strangers alike. Grocery store? Sings it out while he runs down the aisle. Maryland Science Museum? It was not spared.

And while it is esoteric enough, I rue the day when he busts this little number out in front of that one, circa 2008 SNL watcher who gives me a shocked and appalled look—until then—may you learn from my mistakes.

The Nurse Maid

April 12, 2013 By ElizabethWolf in Inspiration, Travel Tags: children, family, Florida, humor, life, parenting 18 Comments

My father and stepmother have a dog named Tatiana, otherwise known as TaTa or Totty, but ever since G was born she has been known as the Nurse Maid.

So proud.

One of the first times I brought G down to her house, he still had some sleep issues and would sometimes cry himself to sleep at nap time. I put him in a pac-n-play on the enclosed patio so he could nap in the cool breeze. I was tucked just inside, out of his sight, but he was not out of my earshot.

‘I’m watching.’

Tatiana was completely unimpressed with my behavior. She went out onto the patio and circled the pac-n-play, clearly in distress. She barked and howled to get my attention as if to say…

‘UM HELLLOOOOOO!!!! Your child is clearly suffering out here while you’re what? Watching Oprah??’

Then she’d come inside and bark in my face. ‘Your. child. is. crying.’

‘As if he could ride a bicycle with just these two for guidance.’

When G visited this time, nothing had changed. Totty slept outside the guest room door to protect him from would be predators…clearly she assumed I was not up for the task. The moment he woke up in the morning we would hear the click click click of her nails on the hard Spanish tile, coupled with her eager panting that said, ‘Move over lady—I’ve got this.’

‘Hello—this is a glass table here people.’

When I took G out to the playground, apparently without her permission, I returned to quite an earful. She gave me a little nip on the hand that said, “Next time you take him somewhere, just ask me first…or better yet, take me along.”

‘They’re letting him drink out of a coconut? Not on my watch.’

So it was no surprise to us when we were mulling over photos of G at his grandpa’s house that Totty was in practically EVERY shot, lingering in the background just to make sure no child labor laws were broken.

‘Who’s going to keep him from falling into the pool? This lady? I don’t think so.’

Gone With the Wind

April 10, 2013 By ElizabethWolf in Travel Tags: Charleston, children, education, family, history, life, parenting 6 Comments

There is something to be said for the sheltered upbringing offered by a quiet, American suburb during the late 1980s/early 1990s. It was a life of safety and comfort, where anything and everything seemed possible if you just put your mind to it. Bad things always happened to someone else, somewhere else and there was no internet or 24 hour news cycle to remind me otherwise. I just tossed my parent’s weekly TIME magazine along with life’s other questionable areas unexamined and unexplained into the junk drawer of my childhood.

newurbanarchitect.com

I want to raise my son the same way. Of course, the difficult aspect of this kind of upbringing is the shock you can experience when you begin to understand the more brutal reality of the world. It can unmoor your foundation, the very way you organized your understanding of things. Some might say this is simply the process of growing up. And that is true, to a certain degree. Lost idealism is a byproduct of aging of course.

This would be the moment when my almost 3 year old son would say, “Ecuse me MaMa. Why you talking about?”

“Well sweetie, when we were in Charleston I took you to visit the Magnolia Plantation and Gardens, and while its trees and flowers are very beautiful to look at, I can’t stop thinking about how to explain to you what happened at these old plantation houses that makes them important.”

“Oh.”

Azaleas and Live Oaks Magnolia Plantation South Carolina

flashcoo.com

There is a story in my family about my great (or great great?) grandparents on my mother’s side I just can’t seem to shake out of my head lately. At some point in his life, my great grandfather made an untold amount of money in the slave trade. I’m not sure if he was in a sort of Jean Valjean position where he NEEDED that money to survive, or if he just saw it as a way to make some extra money.

When my great grandmother found out what he did (because let’s face it ladies, we always do) she was beside herself. They (or their parents?) had come to this country to make a better life. How could he then make money off the backs of people who almost certainly did not come here for a better life, but were instead forced to come here for a life of servitude and subordination?

magnoliaplantation.com

Well, we all tell ourselves whatever we need to tell ourselves in order to sleep at night. It’s part of human nature. Every time I turn on my iPad I think for a second about how and where it was made, what the lives of people are like in places where forced labor is the only way of life. But I turn it on anyway, in fact, I just lied, I don’t think about it every time I turn on my iPad, that’s just how much I’ve convinced myself I do.

Maybe my great grandfather thought, ‘Well, if I don’t do it, someone else will. It might as well be me who makes that money and uses it for my family.’ And that is not an illogical argument, it is not an untruth. It is a skill we as humans have to ensure our survival. In order to survive in the wilderness, any type of wilderness, we might have to step on one of our own. We can if we have the innate ability to rationalize our behavior. It’s an uncomfortable reality of life, of nature. But I wonder, if this tool humans have, this innate ability, is supposed to be utilized for survival or once you have enough to survive is it supposed to be used to enable the individual and those closest to him the ability to thrive?

The entrance to the Magnolia Estate circa mid 1800s
magnoliaplantation.com

Some say yes, especially in this day and age, again…if you don’t, somebody else will. But my great grandmother didn’t seem think so. When she found out what her husband did she instead put her own security at risk. She made her husband make their home in Ohio part of the underground railroad. And he did. It was a crime punishable by a government who had not yet amended its Constitution. The barn of their house was one of many stops along the complex, word of mouth path to freedom for escaped slaves…it was also a path for dangerous bounty hunters and Federal Marshals.

G just inside the entrance to the Magnolia Estate 2013

I love this story. I want to teach my son to be brave like his great great (or great great great) grandmother, to move forward in life with unquestionable dignity and unwavering integrity. The paradox of parenting, however, is I also want him to survive…and thrive. I don’t want bounty hunters to ever come along his path. So while I grapple with this, I suppose I’ll find a place to start G’s junk drawer.

Our next stop was Florida.

The Wrong Direction

March 25, 2013 By ElizabethWolf in Travel Tags: books, Charleston, children, Cleveland, culture, family, food, humor, life, parenting 5 Comments

In addition to visiting the Home of Ralphy while we were in Cleveland, we also made it to the Great Lakes Science Center (and had a fabulous dinner with my Great Aunt, her son and his wife at The Greenhouse Tavern).

The Science Center holds many a joy for the young at heart, including a room full of rubber balls Michael was able to snap a few existential shots of:

There was also an Egyptian exhibit, replete with mysterious activities such as Archeological Digs…

Pyramid Building…

and faux Camel Back Riding…

And while I love the above photo almost more than life itself, you can imagine my surprise (horror/dismay) when my One Direction obsessed girlfriend sent me a photo of the One Direction bandmate doll someone just gave her 7 year old daughter.

Now who gave this kid a copy of Ines de la Fressange‘s Parisian Chic? Fess up!

Next we hit The Carolinas…

G’Day

March 22, 2013 By ElizabethWolf in Travel Tags: family, humor, Les Miserables, life, Lion King, Sydney 15 Comments

“Well,” I said to my cousin’s husband over Thanksgiving this past year, “this is what will probably happen…we’ll join Michael on the road with Les Mis until August 2013, then the show is supposed to head to Toronto for 6 months, then possibly back to Broadway 2014. So if it all goes according to plan, we’ll only be traveling for a year and change before we’re back in the city.”

I paused for a moment and looked at the floor, then we both doubled over with laughter.

“Wow! That just sounds too easy doesn’t it?”

“Yeah,” he laughed, “that sounds way too uncomplicated, Bets.”

I look back fondly on that moment while I bring you this news…

Michael was just hired by Disney to be the Resident Director of The Lion King starting in October of this year in Sydney…

Australia.

How could we say no?

And So it Goes…

March 15, 2013 By ElizabethWolf in Inspiration, Writing Tags: children, family, Florida, food, humor, life, Michigan 18 Comments

Today we had lunch on Sanibel Island in a divey little fish shack. Our lunch date pointed across the street and said, “Ooooo look, a Dairy Queen!”

“Dairy Queen?” I giggled, “I didn’t even know Dairy Queen existed anymore.” Then I let out sort of a weird, guttural, internal giggle.

“What?” our date asked me.

“Oh…no, nothing,” I said, “it’s just that…well, when I was a kid my Grandpa used to lean over to me just before we were about to have dinner and he would point over at my Grandma and whisper…’Watch this.’ Then he’d yell out, ‘Hey Harriet, I’m going to take the kids to Dairy Queen now.’ And she would get so mad and say, ‘Oh, come on John! We’re just about to have dinner.’ He’d look back at me with the most pleased, mischievous giggle. He did this to her at least once every summer for years and she fell for it EVERY time. I mean, every time.”

At 10pm tonight my Grandpa passed away, just a month after his wife. Hospice told my Mom over the last couple of days he had been hallucinating and talking to my Grandma. My Mom asked what he had said, but they told her out of respect, they didn’t eavesdrop. They didn’t have to, I think I have a pretty good idea of what he might have said.

La Maison du Loup

it's not French, but it's cute

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