The Burrow

Why did you decide to become a pitcher?  I asked the birthday girl, a State Champion All Star softball player, a day or two before her Big Day.   Well, it looked like fun.   (insert big smiles on both sides) And, it's complicated.   And I like complicated.  So that's why. The kid's mind is so interesting.   She's got the story of her birth down pat, from her Mama and Gramma planting flowers the day before; to the early back pains; to her first action out of the womb - grabbing her mother's thumb.   We three shared telling the story, they correcting my so-obvious-to-them errors, all of us smiling and laughing.  She ended with this: And then I was born.  And now I'm playing softball.  The passage of time made clear to all of us.   It was a moment.  We paused to appreciate that..... then they arrived at the 7-11 for their Slurpees. They spent 8 hours at the beach on the actual anniversary of her birth...

I did nothing but go from air conditioned space to air conditioned space, and I was exhausted.   I stopped at the car wash, got out to use the vacuum, and managed to finish the driver's floor mat before I succumbed to the heat.   I spent 15 minutes at the nursery , pricing plants and soil for the  Grandma's Garden grant .  I took one turn around the outdoor space; I felt as desiccated as the seedlings I passed.  The plants agreed with me - it was just too hot to be out in the sun. Now, we're used to heat.  We're used to prolonged periods of heat. We are used to triple digit temperatures.  We're just not used to all of that without a drop of rain.  It's almost August and we've had one decent storm.   Last night the ticker below the soccer game (I'll get there eventually, I promise) warned us about the  Severe TStorm moving at 15mph right in our direction.  We heard the clouds before they began darkening our world....

Oppenheimer  is the best movie I've seen in decades.   It's everything a movie can and should be.  Each part of the process - cast, script, cinematography, sound - is wonderful.  There are no flaws.  Though some complained that 3 hours is too long, neither TBG nor Not-Kathy nor Dr K nor I felt the need to get up and stretch our legs. It is riveting.  It's surprising.  It's startling and deep and nuanced. And don't worry, you won't spend half the film agonizing over Oppenheimer's downfall.  The time-shifting story solves that problem.  It also allows you to dig into the why 's . And those why 's will stick with you after you've left the theater. NB: See it in IMAX or 70mm with surround sound.  It was shot in IMAX.  It's a big film, a movie that couldn't be a play.  You deserve to see it at its best. ***** The NYTimes ran a story about the Folly Tree Arboretum , a "natural museum" curated by an arborist architect ,  Tuc...

The morning temperature was in the 90's.  It felt cool.   I drove to Pilates on empty roads.  School starts next week (?!?!); my guess is that families are sneaking in one last vacation trip. The parking lot was empty, too.  All the prime spaces - close to the door and under the trees - were available. Pilates practice was perfectly tailored to my needs.  By hip joints were swimming in synovial fluid by the end.  Motion is lotion, one of my physical therapist's bon mots, is as true as it is lovely to say.  I sashayed down the stairs with a friend, pausing to mail a postcard to Giblet, and got into my delightfully shaded car. Little Cuter says that Giblet squeals every time he gets mail.  I spent the drive home imagining his joy.   The cleaning ladies were busily at work as I said Hello I'm taking a nap and headed straight to the bed.  A brief phone call and a quick Amazon order later, I was asleep.  Not nap asleep.  C...

I'm still going to write about Oppenheimer and the soccer.  But Sister's morning text sent me reeling. so much for having some place to run to when the anti-semites come for us again. (sic) It's possible to be Jewish (or Jew-ish) and in favor of Israel's continuing existence while being revolted by the current political situation.  Gaza and the West Bank and the settlements are morally indefensible.  Greater Israel is literally indefensible.   Israel does not have a written Constitution.  It has a ruling coalition formed from the gazillion parties on every millimeter of the spectrum which make up the Knesset.  To call them far-right is barely extreme enough.  They are led by an indicted autocrat with a big mouth and a bigger ego.  And now their Supreme Court has been disemboweled. The people have taken to the streets.   The pilots are refusing to show up for Reserve Duty. The notion that there is a haven from anti-Semitism, a place that ...

There is so much to write about - Oppenheimer and USA Women's Soccer and grandkids' accomplishments (from holding a rattle to riding without training wheels).  But I have to finish what I started back in June .  After 4 attempts to get the replacement Comcast box delivered to my home, I went to the store itself, brought it home, and couldn't do a thing with it.  The tech was to come on Sunday morning, between 8-10.  He was here the whole time. He rang the doorbell at 8:01, a tall, laconic, middle aged gentleman with an inscrutable demeanor.  Neither TBG nor I could get 2 words out of him.  He looked at the tv.  He looked at the boxes.  He asked for a step stool to reach the control panel high up in the corner of a closet.  He wandered around the outside of the property; I saw him following the fiber optic line around to the open space behind our house.  He was gone for a long time. He spent a great deal of time on his phone, comparing re...

I once had a grant for Grandma's Garden from the Department of Agriculture, through COoperative Extension here in Tucson.  I'm now filling out an application for another grant, just as wonderful as the first one. I can look on Amazon and copy and paste exactly what I want into the form.  Everything I buy has to be in service of nutrition.  Luckily,  I've trained the scholar gardeners well.  They now routinely ask if I'll cut them some salad.  It will be a pleasure to buy starts of all kinds of lettuce, of Romanesco broccoli, of scallions, and of stevia, which the kids like most of all. What makes me happiest about all of this, after I get over thinking about the fun we're going to have in the garden with our new tools and soil and plants, is that I'm getting tangible returns from my tax dollars.  I share the roads and the common defense with every other American, but these supplies are just for us.   I'd be spending my own dollars, or donor d...

TBG and I decided to put the whole Comcast/Xfinity cable box upgrade on hold for a while.  Our tv was still our tv, all our shows were viewable, and what we'd saved was still saved.  He was satisfied, and as the primary viewer in the household, that was enough for me.   I'd like to finish watching Ozark , but Netflix is on my laptop so I wouldn't really care if the tv sets suddenly vanished into thin air.  Not so my husband, who saw a message reminding him to replace the boxes or else.  He couldn't remember what it said exactly, but that it was enough to make him sigh and say it was time to move on.  I drove past the big building with the big COMCAST sign on the big road through town today and took action into my own hands.  I drove around the parking lot several times.  I followed all the signs that said COMCAST.  Everything led to Employees Only signs.  Sometimes those were accompanied by NO TRESPASSING signs.  I could not fi...

The entire month of June was dry.  That's not how it's supposed to be. Half of July passed, and still there was no precipitation.  Things were beginning to look dire.  My two year old desert willow was becoming unmoored from its home.  Animals had taken up residence beneath its root ball, as evidenced by the multitude of holes dug around the tree line.  Without sufficient rainfall, the tender new roots were shriveling up.  The upper branches were still green, but the leaves were brown.  If I could reach them I'd pluck them off; I do not like dead foliage trying to draw nutrients they don't need. The leaves are the little engines that could.  They are the factory that changes sunlight and CO2 into oxygen and sugars to fuel the planet and the plant.  Without them, there's not much that the branches and the trunk can do.  My newbie was struggling, mightily. But yesterday afternoon, the 40% chance of rain was moving closer and closer to actu...

It all started with the table. It was our first dining room table, bought in Chicago in the 1970's.  It has leaves that pull out from each end, making it perfect for small gatherings and seders, too.  It retained its original glory until Big Cuter began eating at the table.  I'd prop his sassy seat at one end and shovel food into his mouth with reckless abandon. Once he began to feed himself, table manners were the last things on my mind.  He was happy spreading his oatmeal or spaghetti around on the table before finding his mouth.  Place mats were just one more thing to wash; they were easy to do without. Then, one day, I looked at the table.  Half of it was shiny and bright.  The other half was distressed.  We'd finished the finish. With the legs taken off, the table sat in storage for years and years.  TBG periodically asking me why we were keeping it did nothing to make me want to give it away.  Far from it.  It made...

Five years ago this weekend, I was hanging out with Flapilly while her Mommy and Daddy were at the hospital, pushing out her baby brother.  We slept in the king size guest bed, which didn't prevent her from flinging her foot into my face.  She doesn't remember it, but knows it as a foundational story, along with brownies with whipped cream and sprinkles for breakfast. Little Cuter texted from the softball tournament weekend that the rain outs and the 10pm games were all part of the core memories her family was making.  Giblet's startled Holy Shit that was fast  as the 100 mile an hour fast ball hurtled into the padding between them at the Louisville Slugger museum is part and parcel of that memory, as much as his big sister's exploits on the field. Arguing while playing mini-golf, Camp Mom, cheese-and-cheerios sandwiches - that's what come to mind without much thought at all.  There are phrases we say, people we laugh about, memories we share. It's been too hot ...

Dr K and Not- Kathy came with TBG and me to the Center for Creative Photography's Linda McCartney Retrospective  this afternoon. Thanks to their brilliant parking directions, we ended up right by the steps down to the undulating ramp  beneath Speedway (which is as busy a street as its name implies) which deposited us at the entry to the U of A's repository of all things photographic.  The exhibition space began with the donation by Ansel Adams of his own collection of his works, a sneaky deal with the legislature securing the $300,000 needed to create the building, and all of a sudden Tucson was the place to be if you were looking for a venue to venerate your work. This summer's exhibit is curated by her family, and the hagiographic accompanying notes are proof of that.  The notes further annoyed by identifying and contextualizing Simon and Garfunkel, Jimi Hendrix, Judy Collins, Eric Clapton and Cream. Icons of my youth are now history.  I'm not sure how I feel ...

You were a pudgy little baby who's turned into a kid with no hips to hold up the elastic wait pajama pants that are your favorite things to wear. You ask more questions in less time than any human on the planet, which both exhausts and delights your parents.  You often want to call Gramma and Grampa to share a piece of news.  When the news is shared you smile and say That's All  and walk away.  The information was imparted, what else was there to do. You didn't like the feeling of wet bathing suits; there are many adorable-but-not-shareable pictures of you after the birthday party guests had left, naked as a jay bird, and happy as a clam. Having a July birthday means you get to play on the slip-n-slide and the blow up waterfall castle and the big-kiddie pool and the swing and the motorized Jeep and Mustang.... all the things your Mom and Dad have provided, since Pandemica, for fun. It's a nice life, kiddo, surrounded by stuffies and soft blankets galore.  You've...

Where are the grownups over there? The presumptive Republican nominee for President of the United States has a very full calendar this summer.  If he thought he was busy  when Dr Fauci wanted to talk to him about the Pandemic, he's going to be really surprised when he finds all those court date taking up his time. It is stunning to me that millions of people are willing to put him back in office.   Reality Winner  spent years in prison for revealing one report, a report detailing Russian interference in our election.  The lying liar took battle plans. He took a lot more, too.  He took the country to the brink of disaster.  And he's the front runner for the Republican nomination. Is there no one but Chris Christie who is willing to offer an alternative to a twice impeached, twice indicted, lying liar?  I cannot imagine what the debate is going to be like.   There must be a principled argument against Bidenomics.  There must be s...

A commercial for Stouffers' lasagna brought me right back to raising and educating my kids.   There were very few occasions where heating up one or two or three of those 9x11 aluminum foil pans was inappropriate.  With a Farmer's Market salad and loaves of garlic bread on the counter, lacrosse players and soccer players and PTA moms and classrooms and teachers all were feted and none went away unhappy. ***** We have a new favorite burger place .  I cruise the menu, but TBG is faithful to the Classic Burger.  It is adorned with American cheese.   I do not understand American cheese.  It impresses me as being a conglomeration of chemicals pressed flat and wrapped in more chemicals sealed together with more chemicals.   It doesn't feel like food to me.   ***** My ultimate American food moment came in the kitchen of our Chicago house.   The Cuters were 5 and 3, sitting at the table, waiting for lunch, before he went to a...

  ‘Woke’ is defined as a gift to persons of different complicated matters that when transcribed into the local pedigree of those of a system that is not full of a computation of elements affecting the underlying commitment to bringing about that which is paramount within the psyche to conflagrate those into an aberration of ones self-realization to covet that which when realized is pointed out to be that which can be remitted in a near feeling of being ones’ own self which when projected will allow others to find their true wokeness. David ben Avram Marana Disclaimer: As submitted to the Arizona Daily Star. ***** That is a letter to the editor printed in the Arizona Daily Star this morning.  I have no idea what it means.   I've read it half a dozen times, including just now as I copied it into this post.  I read it aloud to TBG until he begged me to STOP because I don't understand a single word you are saying. I sat next to him, watching the LPGA,  con...

Queen T brought it up.  I can honestly say that the thought had never crossed my mind; if it did, it didn't make any impression at all.  That it might have been discussed and I don't remember it is improbable.  As I said this afternoon on the video chat, My head was exploding. We were discussing the beautiful baby she calls her own, a child named for the earth and the sky.  Her mother grew up in an SSR; she has no religious traditions to speak of.  (In Ukraine, the day on which one chose to celebrate Christ's birth last year was a political statement.  )  She has embraced my son's cultural Judaism with enthusiasm and introspection.   They want the baby to have a Hebrew name.  She asked if her husband had a Hebrew name.  I couldn't answer.  The thought had never occurred to me.  I couldn't believe the thought had never occurred to me.  How was is possible that 40 years after his birth I had never considered the fact th...

At our 4th of July celebration yesterday, I was introduced to the notion of a piston powered golf ball. After a nice long laugh about exploding club heads and volatile golf balls they were able to explain the concept to me.   Apparently, lining up the club and the ball and the hole is the secret to success.  Most people lose that connection on the down stroke.  They lose power, they tilt the club, they yank it one way or the other, all while trying to connect with an object that doesn't move. This handy dandy, $1100 gizmo solves all that.  You figure out your line, put the club head in position, and push a button. WHOOOSH!  For courses that eschew carts, this presents a whole new dimension in assisted golf.   Or, is it AI taking over the golf world?  Will we need our bodies any more? The whole thing seems fairly ridiculous to me, except as an adaptive device in rehab. Isn't the whole point of sports to move?.

It was a beautiful day.  She was surrounded by family, on a blanket next to the parade's viewing stand, perfectly situated so that they wouldn't miss a thing. Then the bullets started flying. She  is a friend from our Chicago days.  She is having her moment in the spotlight, as the one year anniversary of the devastating injury that's up-ended her life throws yet another spotlight on yet another human tragedy. Someone on NPR made a point this morning, one I've been mulling over all afternoon.  It brought me back to Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, where he hopes that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from this earth. If we are a government of the people and for the people then why are 8 mass shootings in two days still a thing that happens?  Seems that the people, 70 or 80 percent or more, want sensible gun legislation - that's the of the people and  for the people  part.   But that whole  by the peopl...

    reworked, revised, revisited...yes, you've read parts of this before The sky is pure blue,   painted that way  as G'ma said every time she looked up.  The occasional fluffy white cloud drifts by, and I'm hearing G'ma remark on that, too.  The flag in front of the house is swaying, the pole wedged between the base and the capital of one of the front columns, secured with thin, silver, crafting wire.   It's an elegant solution to TBG's reluctance to put holes in his house;  I feel like Daddooooo every time I wrap another ring around the post. Daddooooo was big on ingenious remedies to intractable problems.  He was also big on flags and the 4th of July.  We always went to the beach.  We always stopped at Custom Bakers on the way home, where the owners always let us go back and stick our fingers in the vats of frosting. We always went to the Boardwalk in Long Beach, arriving as the sun was setting.  Skeeball and mecha...

Blasting affirmative action but leaving legacy admissions in place is probably not the best way to reduce the lingering effects of systemic racism.  Then, again, my guess is most of the justices haven't read the book. Here's a long but relevant passage, from page 437 In the 1970's newly emergent "conservatives" as they self-identified, broke from the liberal past/future refrain that the nation still had a ways to go.  They pointed to the legislative gains of the preceding decades to claim that the nation had arrived; Black people in the here and now were no longer facing racism  Conservatives framed supporters of affirmative action as "hard-core racists of reverse discrimination" against while people, as Yale Law professor Robert Bork claimed in 1978. Let's not address the wealthy parents who endow a building or donate to the athletic department to aid and abet their applicants.  The Cuters went to school with those parents.  It felt just as unfair a...