Full Circle

Mom during her 'wooden spoon' years

I've just returned from several weeks vacation with my family, a portion of which was spent with my mother. It was interesting spending time with her, she and I are much alike, and find each other easy company. When I was younger and living in her home, she was somewhat fastidious and always a bit of task-master, the 'bad cop' to my father's 'good cop'. I always attributed my quasi-OCD behavior to being her son. The revelation I had this summer was that as she's aged she has become an entirely different person. No surprise, really, it's been thirty years since I lived under her roof. My image is an out of date snapshot of her in her forties. Now that I'm 50 and she's nearing her eighth decade, I've begun to notice that in some ways she, herself, needs a bit of guidance, gentle reminders now and then. The truth is, I see our roles somehow reversing themselves; the child as parent and vice versa. Partly, this was due to her spending ten days as a guest in our home (what is it they say about fish and house guests...). As I mentioned, like the younger her, I'm on the obsessive-compulsive side-a monster of her own creation, if you will. I was either reminding her to clean up after herself in the kitchen, or quietly in disbelief that she was as messy as my two teenage sons. When I was their age, she ran a tight ship, large wooden kitchen spoon in hand to aid in direction and enforcement. (Some other childhood friends shared membership in the 'wooden spoon club') I'm beginning to understand the label 'sandwich generation', we've got kids that aren't entirely out of the house, and parents that are beginning to warrant almost as much concern. Of course she won't be around forever, so what's a few dirty dishes and crumbs on the counter?

The Boarding House Reach

Fresh cut flowers from this summer's intern, Rachael Bentley

Each summer, for the past four, at least, my wife has had interns from her company come and stay with our family. Usually these are the children of old friends or family, who through the nepotism common in such situations, have finagled a paid summer gig at her company. Being parents to two boys, my wife and I have welcomed the opportunity to have these interns,  exclusively girls, it's been an opportunity to have nieces, cousins, and the loveliest of our good friends' progeny for an extended six week visit. Perhaps it's been even better than having daughters of our own, at the very least it's given our male-centric family a welcome change of dynamic. 

We have a big , old house, which seems to have been built for more than a family of four, and it positively hums for the duration of these internships. Dinners seem 'Walton-esque', and left-overs are scarce, or packed for lunch at the office the next day. I've always been a little envious of larger families,  these stints in the summer are a bit like having the big family, only without the tuition bills... Of course there's the cut-flowers and the baking, which are such a welcome and pleasant surprise, and our sons' friends seem to linger even longer when these girls are around. 

I'm already beginning to wonder who's going to come next summer.

The Long Goodbye

 My wife and I were fortunate to spend a lovely week with some dear friends at their family retreat outside Livingston, Montana. It had been many years, since a college aged NOLS course, that I'd spent any time in this part of the world. I had forgotten how breathtakingly beautiful it is, how alive one feels when hiking through the mountains, or floating down a river, still a bit swollen from snowmelt, fly rod in hand. The climate in the Absaroka's this time of year was refreshing, overnight lows in the 30's and daytime highs in the 80's. The lupines and poppies were just beginning to bloom, it was just about perfect. 

 The only thing to mar this idyllic vacation was the fact that our friend and his sibling were in the process of selling this remarkable slice of heaven. As I've remarked upon before, joint ownership of this sort of family vacation home proves very challenging. So our week was bittersweet by association, colored by second thoughts and recriminations. Emotions run high when dealing with real estate and even higher with family.

 Despite this narrative playing out in the background, the four of us had a fabulous week, and I'm a little disappointed to be back in the humidity and 'closeness' of the East.

Grain elevator, Livingston, MT

The West Boulder Creek

Fishing the Stillwater

A  view that will not soon be forgotten.

The Beginning Of The End

Well, after one high school graduation ceremony, and one college orientation, summer is in full swing. My boys are already complaining that their internships are starting on Monday, after only one week of 'true' vacation, if there is a silver lining (in addition to the fact of their actually having paid internships), it's that their lovely cousin has arrived to stay with us for six weeks, as she is interning as well. Somehow, summer has become something slightly less idyllic, less relaxed, no longer seemingly endless. Jam-packed and abbreviated by early college move-in dates, month-plus long internships, the only solace, truly, is a change of venue from the usual school-work year. There is almost more joy in the planning than the execution, as one old friend is famous for saying each Memorial Day..."summer's almost over".

Where I long to be.

The Reawakening

Apologies for the pregnant pause between posts. I've just returned from a long Memorial Day weekend to open our family's summer house. For generations my family has been making the long trek to Michigan's Upper Peninsula to take in the cool air, sylvan north woods and sheltered waters of the Les Cheneaux Islands. My great grandparents began visiting family friends in the 1920's and bought a cottage in the early 30's. For them, it was an escape from the muggy Ohio River valley of Cincinnati. 

For anyone who's shared the tradition of a family summer house, they know that these places are more 'home' than any place they might spend the other nine plus months of the year. Each of these places holds a rich tapestry of memories shared in common among siblings, cousins and generations. Every bedroom might be named, 'the indian room', 'uncle Louie's room', and so on and if not for the oral histories passed down through generations, uncle Louie's identity might be lost to the mists of time. 

So for me, Memorial Day is a time not just to reflect on the sacrifices of those who spilled their blood to ensure our national freedoms, but also to meditate on the rich tradition which I've been privileged to enjoy. As the cottage reawakens from it's winter long dormancy, so do all the memories of parents and family, some long gone.
Each generation inevitably faces a watershed moment when siblings and or cousins part ways, joint ownership can and often does prove nettlesome. When my father passed away nearly 20 years ago, my mother, not an avid boater, decided to acquire a mainland residence so as not to be island-bound at the old family cottage. Just a couple of years ago, my wife and I secured a full interest in my mother's place and were able to renovate. The house, not freighted with the same degree of aforementioned memories and history, allowed us a free hand to take things in a fresh direction. I think the reawakening was a wonderful one, hopefully it too will last for generations.

Move Over, Andy Goldsworthy

I've always been fascinated by the work of artists like Andy Goldsworthy, Jim Denevan and also Christo, though his pieces are less naturalistic and more monumental. I came across the this spread on the work of French artist Sylvain Meyer which I find quite inspiring.

via Colossal and ruines humaine

Rainin' Spain

I'm seeing a lot of Spanish design these days that very much appeals to me, and there seems to be a growing number of good Spanish design blogs as well. One that I follow on a regular basis is Desde My Ventana, which always seems to have rich content. I found this interesting Spanish farmhouse on Interiors.

via Interiors