One Year and Counting

One Year and Counting

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Suzanne left for Africa a year ago today. She packed a large bag and a small bag and slipped out by rail to Philadelpia. (“That was a very emotional goodbye for a trip from Washington to Philadelphia,” another passenger said as they were boarding the train.)

From Philly she went to New York, Belgium and Benin. For the last ten months she’s made her home in a small village on the edge of the Sahel. She teaches school, and this summer is working in a girls’ camp and at a health clinic. She is completely immersed in village life. She loves the people and they love her. She’s the happiest person I know. 

The months that led up to her departure crept by in slow motion, like time does on a roller coaster inching up that first hill. Now we’re on the downward slope. It hardly seems possible that Year One has passed. It now seems entirely possible to make it through Year Two.

Still, I seem to miss her more and more. Thanksgiving, Christmas, birthdays and, ten days ago, a graduation — all without her. The phone keeps us together, a family of the air, and that will have to do.  But now that she’s almost halfway done, I’m allowing myself to dream of a time when we’ll all be together again. Even being on the same continent will do.

Perigee Moon

Perigee Moon

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I saw the moon rising as I rushed to the store on a last-minute errand. It was almost 9 and still light. I pulled the car to a stop at the corner and snapped this photo, which makes the moon look small and faraway instead of large and in-your-face, which is how it appeared outside the view finder.

This morning I learned from the weather guys that this is a perigee moon (closest to earth in its orbit), and the full perigee (also known as a super moon) appears 14 percent larger and 30 percent brighter than the apogee (farthest away in its orbit) moon.

I’m not a big statistics person but from the look of last night’s show, I’d say that’s about right.  And it was 40 percent more beautiful — at least.

But just to be sure I’ll be gazing skyward tonight and tomorrow, when the full perigee will once again bridge the gap between heaven and earth.

Longest Day

Longest Day

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Linger on paths, on beaches and on slopes. Soak in all sunlight, turn not a ray away. It’s the day we have longed for since Christmas. The longest day.

I plan to spend mine on the deck. The work will be done, but al fresco.

Plus, in the current living room configuration, the couch overlooks the backyard. From my morning perch I see sun-dappled oaks, potted begonias and, in the distance, the trampoline and hammock. These are the counterweights, what pulls me through the hours.

There are a lot of hours this longest day. But I can tell they will pass quickly, like water in a rushing stream. All leading to those final golden ones, the ones we have reclaimed from the night.

Rhapsody

Rhapsody

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Choose a word, a favorite word.

It was the first assignment of a writing class in college, and it didn’t take long to come up with “rhapsody” — a highly emotional utterance, a highly emotional literary work, and a musical composition of irregular form. Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. Not everyone’s favorite word but a fair representation of the romantic English major I was at the time.

The professor’s favorite word was “deliquesce” — to become soft or liquid with age or maturity — a verb I’ve come to appreciate more of late. He not only liked it for its sound and spelling, he said, but also because it contained the word “deli.”

Another student, the pet, picked “level.” A palindrome of perfect symmetry, a word that walks its talk, the two “l”s bolstering the structure, the “e”s in between and the “v” equally open to each side.

Next to “level,” “rhapsody” looked silly and sophomoric. But when I heard it on the radio this morning (Brahms Rhapsody in E Flat Minor), I have to admit that it still has a hold on me. And if I had to pick a favorite word again, I don’t think I could find a better one.

Half a Meadow

Half a Meadow

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To reach Franklin Farm I clamber over a fence and into a greensward bisected by a paved path. Most summers the flanking land is left to its own devices. Queen Anne’s Lace, oatgrass, milk weed and timothy spring out of the clay-packed soil, and by midsummer these grasses sway waist-high in the breeze. I look forward to the meadow as I would an old friend.

But this year the mower is much in evidence. Though patches of land are still wild and free, most of it is tidy stubble. At first I thought it was just the first strafing of the season or that it was growing more slowly than before. But now, well into June, the truth is evident. What we have in Franklin Farm is half a meadow — and that’s generous.

Is the neighborhood safer without swaths of tall grass through its heart. Maybe, though I doubt it. It is quieter without the buzz of insects and chirp of the red-winged blackbird. It is less arresting to the eye. And it is, sadly, less a place.

Still, half a meadow is better than none at all.

Last Day of School

Last Day of School

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Graduation is behind us, so why do I care?

Because it’s a ritual, I guess. Because this is the last day the big yellow bus will come to our corner for two and a half months.

Because Fairfax County Public Schools close for the summer today and when they reopen in September it will be the first time since 1994 that one of my children isn’t enrolled.

This is a good thing, of course, what is supposed to be. But today, just a brief backward look, not of longing or of regret, but of fullness, significance. A nod to time passing. A nod to change.

In the Soup

In the Soup

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A cool morning has given way to a hot, sticky afternoon. But until a few minutes ago I didn’t notice. I’ve been doing what I do, sitting with a laptop, sending emails, editing an article, drafting a letter.

When I felt warm enough to check the temperature a few minutes ago, I read that we’re “in the soup” —that would be the high-humidity soup.

But I took that a different way. I thought about frogs that don’t notice they’re being boiled alive because the water is comfortable in the beginning.

Maybe those frogs are an urban legend. But I feel like one of them today. I didn’t know I was in the soup until I’d been in it for hours.

A Dad, Dancing

A Dad, Dancing

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I’ve learned through the years that dancing is one of the most embarrassing things you can do in front of your adolescent children.

But like so many delightful reversals of age, that all changes. At this point in my life, to see a parent dancing is encouraging and endearing.

Though my father would rather be jitterbugging to Glenn Miller, he recently took his cane out for a spin and bounced along to the Beatles.

So here’s to fathers everywhere, especially fathers dancing.

Graduation Day

Graduation Day

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All you really need is a camera and some tissues. At this point the graduate will take care of everything else. Processing in, taking a seat and, when her name is called, shaking hands and receiving her high school diploma. But to get to this point has been a group effort. It always is.

When I graduated from high school I didn’t understand what the fuss was about. Celia is probably feeling the same way. Milestones don’t mean as much when the years they mark are so few that they  get along fine without them.

But parents of graduates know better. They know that rituals take us from one place to another. They know there are few moments when you can say that one thing has clearly ended and another has clearly begun.

High school graduation is such a moment.

So, hats off to the graduates … and (if I may say so) to their parents, too!

Jackets Off!

Jackets Off!

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A sure sign of summer in D.C., more even than long lines at the Capitol Visitors’ Center or Code Orange air alerts, is the suit jacket carried over a shoulder.

I noticed at least half a dozen examples of this on yesterday’s walk around the Mall, but didn’t snap any photos.

So for this one you’ll have to imagine it 20 degrees warmer, air steamy rather than brisk. Feel the heat radiating up from the pavement, see the leaves not moving on the trees.

It’s summer in the city. Jackets off!