Atomic

Unbeknownst to me at the time, our family lived for thirty years in an atomic ranch. That is the 21st century name for mid-century modern houses. Now there is even a magazine of that name, Atomic Ranch, which is completely devoted to 50's and 60's design.

At first sight, I fell in love with our 1950's atomic ranch. With 1,100 square feet, it featured a low-pitched gravel roof, cathedral ceilings, huge floor to ceiling windows, redwood paneling and a carport. There was no attic, basement or garage. Is it any surprise I'm a minimalist? I had no storage for 30 years!

Our wonderful house also was sans stairs. This was a delightful feature until our young children started walking. Navigating stairs is a learned skill. We had to go to grandma's house for stair practice.

Appropriately, we furnished our mid-century house with mid-century furniture. Bertoia, Saarinen, Panton, Eames and Knoll are my design heroes, and I expect their chairs and tables will last us a lifetime.

The house, however, had a sad ending. When our kids were grown and married, we decided to pack up and move to the lake.

My husband and I made superhuman efforts to find buyers who would appreciate the architectural value of our home. But we couldn't even find a realtor who understood design. She tartly informed us our house was in "mint condition, but badly in need of modernizing".

After we moved, my son advised me never, never to drive past our old home as it had been "brutally remodeled".

I have taken his advice. Our dear mid-century modern home lives happily in my memory - exactly as it was.

Please click here if you wish to send me a comment

Atomic

Unbeknownst to me at the time, our family lived for thirty years in an atomic ranch. That is the 21st century name for mid-century modern houses. Now there is even a magazine of that name, Atomic Ranch, which is completely devoted to 50's and 60's design.

At first sight, I fell in love with our 1950's atomic ranch. With 1,100 square feet, it featured a low-pitched gravel roof, cathedral ceilings, huge floor to ceiling windows, redwood paneling and a carport. There was no attic, basement or garage. Is it any surprise I'm a minimalist? I had no storage for 30 years!

Our wonderful house also was sans stairs. This was a delightful feature until our young children started walking. Navigating stairs is a learned skill. We had to go to grandma's house for stair practice.

Appropriately, we furnished our mid-century house with mid-century furniture. Bertoia, Saarinen, Panton, Eames and Knoll are my design heroes, and I expect their chairs and tables will last us a lifetime.

The house, however, had a sad ending. When our kids were grown and married, we decided to pack up and move to the lake.

My husband and I made superhuman efforts to find buyers who would appreciate the architectural value of our home. But we couldn't even find a realtor who understood design. She tartly informed us our house was in "mint condition, but badly in need of modernizing".

After we moved, my son advised me never, never to drive past our old home as it had been "brutally remodeled".

I have taken his advice. Our dear mid-century modern home lives happily in my memory - exactly as it was.

Please click here if you wish to send me a comment

Raucous

This summer two crows have taken up residence in the small pine woods next to our house. Every morning in the predawn and dawn hours they proceed to organize the neighborhood for the day. Crows have 23 distinct calls, and strident variants of these calls shatter the morning silence.

Fortunately, corvids (ravens, crows, magpies and jays) are definitely my favorite birds. I can handle the morning cacophony.

Corvids are highly intelligent birds - no "bird brains" among them. A raven, for example, is half the size of a chicken but with a brain five times bigger.

Years ago, I observed a terrific con game pulled off by a pair of crows. Our neighbor's dog was fed chunks of liverwurst in his outdoor dog dish. One day crow number one flew right over the dog and then took off on a low flight path down the alley. Of course, the dog rocketed after it. That's when crow number two neatly scooped up the sausage chunk in his beak and retreated to the top of our gigantic willow tree. Crows share food, so crow number one soon joined in on the feast.

Ornithology books abound in observations of clever corvid behaviors. Ravens drop clams and walnuts on highways and let the cars crack the shells for them. Northern crows haul up the fishing line at ice holes when people aren't watching. A bird pulls some line up with its bill, steps firmly on the line and keeps pulling until the fish comes up. And, at one memorable Easter egg hunt in Alaska, the ravens made off with over 1,000 hidden colored eggs before the kids arrived.

Raven looms large in all Pacific Northwest Indian mythology. He is the creator, but also a powerful trickster. When the sun was stolen from the sky by an evil magician, raven is credited with returning it to its proper place. Perhaps that is why my neighborhood crows are so talkative in the morning. They are just welcoming back the sun they so generously returned to the heavens.

Please click here if you wish to send me a comment

Raucous

This summer two crows have taken up residence in the small pine woods next to our house. Every morning in the predawn and dawn hours they proceed to organize the neighborhood for the day. Crows have 23 distinct calls, and strident variants of these calls shatter the morning silence.

Fortunately, corvids (ravens, crows, magpies and jays) are definitely my favorite birds. I can handle the morning cacophony.

Corvids are highly intelligent birds - no "bird brains" among them. A raven, for example, is half the size of a chicken but with a brain five times bigger.

Years ago, I observed a terrific con game pulled off by a pair of crows. Our neighbor's dog was fed chunks of liverwurst in his outdoor dog dish. One day crow number one flew right over the dog and then took off on a low flight path down the alley. Of course, the dog rocketed after it. That's when crow number two neatly scooped up the sausage chunk in his beak and retreated to the top of our gigantic willow tree. Crows share food, so crow number one soon joined in on the feast.

Ornithology books abound in observations of clever corvid behaviors. Ravens drop clams and walnuts on highways and let the cars crack the shells for them. Northern crows haul up the fishing line at ice holes when people aren't watching. A bird pulls some line up with its bill, steps firmly on the line and keeps pulling until the fish comes up. And, at one memorable Easter egg hunt in Alaska, the ravens made off with over 1,000 hidden colored eggs before the kids arrived.

Raven looms large in all Pacific Northwest Indian mythology. He is the creator, but also a powerful trickster. When the sun was stolen from the sky by an evil magician, raven is credited with returning it to its proper place. Perhaps that is why my neighborhood crows are so talkative in the morning. They are just welcoming back the sun they so generously returned to the heavens.

Please click here if you wish to send me a comment

Wine

One of the greatest openings of any book I've ever read is from Glitz by Elmore Leonard.

"The night Vincent was shot he saw it coming. The guy approached out of the streetlight on the corner of Meridian and Sixteenth, South Beach, and reached Vincent as he was walking from his car to his apartment building. It was early, a few minutes past nine.

Vincent turned his head to look at the guy and there was a moment when he could have taken him and did consider it, hit the guy as hard as he could. But Vincent was carrying a sack of groceries. He wasn't going to drop a half gallon of Gallo Hearty Burgundy, a bottle of prune juice and a jar of Ragú spaghetti sauce on the sidewalk. Not even when the guy showed his gun..."

These lines pretty well sum up my feelings toward wine. Dinner isn't complete without a glass of wine, but Gallo red is just fine. I'm a wine lover not an oenophile.

If given a taste test, I would only reject wines like Boone's Farm and Mogen David. Wine should absolutely not be a stand-in for NyQuil cough syrup, nor should it taste like some solvent in my art room.

This concise discussion of wine leaves time for the topic of wine glasses. We drink our daily wine out of slightly upscale juice glasses. Why? Because one memorable night our 26 pound cat, Gato, jumped up on the dinner table knocking a stemmed glass full of red wine over on to the back of his brother below. Alarmed, cat 2 proceeded to run all over the house shaking red wine everywhere. I donated all my wine stems to Goodwill the next day.

Please click here if you wish to send me a comment

Wine

One of the greatest openings of any book I've ever read is from Glitz by Elmore Leonard.

"The night Vincent was shot he saw it coming. The guy approached out of the streetlight on the corner of Meridian and Sixteenth, South Beach, and reached Vincent as he was walking from his car to his apartment building. It was early, a few minutes past nine.

Vincent turned his head to look at the guy and there was a moment when he could have taken him and did consider it, hit the guy as hard as he could. But Vincent was carrying a sack of groceries. He wasn't going to drop a half gallon of Gallo Hearty Burgundy, a bottle of prune juice and a jar of Ragú spaghetti sauce on the sidewalk. Not even when the guy showed his gun..."

These lines pretty well sum up my feelings toward wine. Dinner isn't complete without a glass of wine, but Gallo red is just fine. I'm a wine lover not an oenophile.

If given a taste test, I would only reject wines like Boone's Farm and Mogen David. Wine should absolutely not be a stand-in for NyQuil cough syrup, nor should it taste like some solvent in my art room.

This concise discussion of wine leaves time for the topic of wine glasses. We drink our daily wine out of slightly upscale juice glasses. Why? Because one memorable night our 26 pound cat, Gato, jumped up on the dinner table knocking a stemmed glass full of red wine over on to the back of his brother below. Alarmed, cat 2 proceeded to run all over the house shaking red wine everywhere. I donated all my wine stems to Goodwill the next day.

Please click here if you wish to send me a comment

Slowathon

Is the opposite of a marathon a slowathon? If so, sign me up.

I don't understand triathlons, weight lifting, channel swimming, mountain scaling or the Tour de France. The only yellow jersey I will ever wear will be one of cowardice. I have no desire to beat my body to a pulp to achieve an adrenaline induced state of nirvana. I'm saving my adrenaline for dangerous situations that come uninvited.

When I first heard the term "sports medicine" I thought someone was joking. My second grade health book told me the purpose of sports was to build a "healthy body and mind". Now a billion dollar a year sports medicine industry exists to repair torn ligaments, ripped muscles and ravaged joints.

When asked why he climbed Mt. Everest, a famous mountain climber stated, "Because it is there."

My problem is I know the mountain will be there whether I climb it or not. Nor will I be more "there" if I climb it. What I might very possibly be, however, is injured, maimed or dead, no jolly outcomes from my vantage point.

This kind of thinking is not going to make me rich or famous, America's most prized cultural values. But I will have plenty of time for long strolls on the beach. That's my idea of a splendid slowathon.

Please click here if you wish to send me a comment

Slowathon

Is the opposite of a marathon a slowathon? If so, sign me up.

I don't understand triathlons, weight lifting, channel swimming, mountain scaling or the Tour de France. The only yellow jersey I will ever wear will be one of cowardice. I have no desire to beat my body to a pulp to achieve an adrenaline induced state of nirvana. I'm saving my adrenaline for dangerous situations that come uninvited.

When I first heard the term "sports medicine" I thought someone was joking. My second grade health book told me the purpose of sports was to build a "healthy body and mind". Now a billion dollar a year sports medicine industry exists to repair torn ligaments, ripped muscles and ravaged joints.

When asked why he climbed Mt. Everest, a famous mountain climber stated, "Because it is there."

My problem is I know the mountain will be there whether I climb it or not. Nor will I be more "there" if I climb it. What I might very possibly be, however, is injured, maimed or dead, no jolly outcomes from my vantage point.

This kind of thinking is not going to make me rich or famous, America's most prized cultural values. But I will have plenty of time for long strolls on the beach. That's my idea of a splendid slowathon.

Please click here if you wish to send me a comment

Wagons

I don't know if any of you have noticed, but a significant number of the sparkling new cars on the road now are reincarnations of station wagons. Of course, no one is calling these vehicles station wagons. That would be way too old-fashioned. They are called crossovers, which sounds vaguely transgender.

I, however, recognize a station wagon when I see one. In our family history of vehicle ownership, we owned one, our beloved, mud brown Ford Torino wagon.

Nobody pretended our Torino was glamorous. We bought it because we had two kids, one who always got carsick, and we all loved to travel. Bear in mind, this was in an era when seat belts hadn't been invented. Our road sick passenger could take a dramamine and stretch out on a mattress in the back. Her sibling could share the "way back" or have an entire back seat to himself. Our kids became great travelers (still are), and we enjoyed being with them.

We got our station wagon in the 1970s - just about the same time our American schools threw out all the geography books. Kids were apparently supposed to learn the globe by osmosis. My daughter told me many years later that she had a working knowledge of geography, unlike many of her peers, only because we "went places".

Many happy trips and our Wisconsin winters took their toll on our faithful brown wagon. Specifically, our back tailgate totally rusted out. We certainly didn't want our children to roll out somewhere in the Plains States.

My father-in-law, an auto body man who lived in Tucson, came to the rescue. One day the kids and I drove to the local truck terminal to pick up a big crate. Our almost new, rust-free Arizona tailgate had arrived... and it was bright red.

Please click here if you wish to send me a comment

Wagons

I don't know if any of you have noticed, but a significant number of the sparkling new cars on the road now are reincarnations of station wagons. Of course, no one is calling these vehicles station wagons. That would be way too old-fashioned. They are called crossovers, which sounds vaguely transgender.

I, however, recognize a station wagon when I see one. In our family history of vehicle ownership, we owned one, our beloved, mud brown Ford Torino wagon.

Nobody pretended our Torino was glamorous. We bought it because we had two kids, one who always got carsick, and we all loved to travel. Bear in mind, this was in an era when seat belts hadn't been invented. Our road sick passenger could take a dramamine and stretch out on a mattress in the back. Her sibling could share the "way back" or have an entire back seat to himself. Our kids became great travelers (still are), and we enjoyed being with them.

We got our station wagon in the 1970s - just about the same time our American schools threw out all the geography books. Kids were apparently supposed to learn the globe by osmosis. My daughter told me many years later that she had a working knowledge of geography, unlike many of her peers, only because we "went places".

Many happy trips and our Wisconsin winters took their toll on our faithful brown wagon. Specifically, our back tailgate totally rusted out. We certainly didn't want our children to roll out somewhere in the Plains States.

My father-in-law, an auto body man who lived in Tucson, came to the rescue. One day the kids and I drove to the local truck terminal to pick up a big crate. Our almost new, rust-free Arizona tailgate had arrived... and it was bright red.

Please click here if you wish to send me a comment