Of Joy and Grief and Art

This holiday season has been wonderful.  I got everything finished on time (including a gift for Mona that I will share pictures of soon), our health is all relatively good, I got to perform some music with friends on Christmas Eve which is always nice, and despite the unseasonable nature of the balmy weather at least it's made all the driving easy.

Even work went unusually well.  I get people every year who want to buy a violin for someone to put under the tree as a surprise, and every year I talk people out of it saying that the player really needs to be able to choose a violin for him or herself.  (There are exceptions, but most of the time I can convince people that a smaller gift or card announcing that the player can go violin shopping is a better idea.)

A man came in last year whose young son was just starting violin and I pointed him in the direction of renting from the school to begin with to make sure his child actually liked playing and they weren't potentially stuck with a violin they didn't need (and I suspect couldn't easily afford).  This year he returned saying his son was working hard and loved playing and now they were ready to buy.  I suggested he bring the boy in on Christmas Eve where I let him try several student outfits.  It was lovely to watch him try different instruments and then light up when he came across the one that was a match.  The mom was beaming as her son didn't want to stop playing Christmas tunes on his new violin.  I assured them based on his age and situation that they wouldn't have to worry about an upgrade for several years, but explained what sort of maintenance they could expect when owning a violin, and told them to please pop in for checkups anytime.  I thanked the dad for his patience in trusting my advice, because I really do think it worked out for the best all around.  He agreed, and it was really satisfying.  It was not a big sale, but it was easily my favorite one this season.

We enjoyed a quiet Christmas morning at home.  I love watching my kids open gifts.  They never ask for anything, but they always like everything.  The big present this year was a new laptop for Aden, which is really a necessity for school and we found something good on sale that should last her for the next few years.  Before I left for my Christmas Eve gig I watched Aden struggling with her old laptop in the living room.  It has random issues and overheats and the kids have developed quirky habits for using it so that it doesn't lose all their homework at an inconvenient moment.  Aden smiled at me and said something along the lines of, "I think if I just remember to put it on its side when I get to this point it should be fine!"  She was completely willing work with the wonky laptop without complaint.  Made my night knowing that a new computer was waiting for her under the tree, and that she would truly appreciate it.

We made it to Detroit in time for Christmas dinner with my mom.  My kids are excellent travelers and were perfectly happy spending most of Christmas in the car.  My mom made us a beautiful meal and I loved having us gathered happily around the dining room table of my childhood.

Escape to the Cottage

Mona at the cottage

We got a little time up at our cottage in Michigan right after 4th of July.  Ian, the kids, and the dog all headed out first, and I followed a few days later on the ferry because I had a concert to play, but it worked out well.  With everyone gone I was able to clean areas of the house and enjoy that they actually stayed clean when I walked away from them.  (Proof I am old that that made me so happy.)

It was wonderful to be at the cottage.  It's the one place where I don't feel obligated to really do anything most of the time, and I need that periodically.  It's a place to just kind of be. 

Weekend Getaway

What a marvelous thing a three day weekend is.

I was recently considering the fact that it's a bit wearing that I don't normally get two days off in a row from work.  I have an assistant who takes one day at the store for me in the middle of the week, and I have Sundays off, but to not have two days off in a row means when I am home I have to decide between getting something done or enjoying myself, but not really both because time is limited.

Working outside the home means the house kind of slips into disorder while I'm gone, and my "days off" end up being cleaning and errand days.  Unless I decide to use that time to write or do something fun with the kids, but then I have to make a conscious decision to let the house remain a pit.  Two days off in a row means one day to clean and another to relax, but that hasn't happened in a long time.

For Memorial Day Weekend it was tempting to get a lot of house and yard work done and then just enjoy that whole Monday off.  But instead it sounded better to simply flee all of it and go to the cottage.  The house could be a pit by itself where I wouldn't have to look at it, and the cottage is easy to clean because there is so much less of it.

I love the cottage.  I've been missing my grandma a lot lately, and I feel like she's with me when we're in her cottage again.  She would have been so happy to know we still use it.

Midwestern Moments

The Midwest is beautiful.  My home state of Michigan was a wonderful place to grow up, and I'm glad when I get to go back and visit my parents in Detroit or spend time at the cottage we have there on the western side of the state.  People wax poetic about the grandeur of the West and lushness of the South, the colors of the desert and the interweaving of loveliness and history that runs along the East Coast, but I seldom read about the Midwest.  That's too bad, because there is much to love here.

Calder in the Art Museum, evening event

It's like a secret.  No one visits Milwaukee just to see it the way they would places like New York or San Francisco.  People visit Milwaukee because they have a specific reason to go, usually because they know someone here.  And when they come they are stunned by how pretty and vibrant it is.  There is an abundance of talent and activity and things to do and see, and it's for the people who live here rather than for tourists.  People who live elsewhere are surprised that my family seldom gets down to Chicago since it's so close, but the truth is we never run out of things to do in Milwaukee.  Often there is too much to choose from any given weekend.  It's an endlessly interesting place and I feel fortunate to be raising my kids in such a nice city.

Deer outside my window at the cottage

In the area north of Grand Rapids where we spent our vacation this year we had time to really appreciate the beauty Michigan has to offer.  There is something about the woods and the scale of things that feels knowable.  I'm lucky enough to have traveled a little bit in my lifetime, and I have been thrilled by many amazing sights.  There is beauty and wonder everywhere, but for me only the Midwest feels like home.  I find mountains somewhat intimidating, the desert alien, and the tropics overwhelming.  But when I'm in the woods in Michigan I always have the sense that with the right guidebooks or some walks with an informed friend or relative I would be able to name all the trees and the birds and the tracks on the ground.

When we visit the cottage we usually take the kids up the road to a ranch where for $5 they can be led around in circles a few times on a horse.  This year Aden was finally old enough that we had the option to go out on a real trail.  My sister-in-law kindly treated my daughter and me to a two hour trail ride and it was lovely.  My thighs are still a little sore, but it was a wonderful experience.  Aden loved it.  She rode a horse named Comet who was trained as a therapy horse for people with physical disabilities, so she was a nice, calm, starter horse for Aden.

Aden on Comet

View of Aden on the trail from my horse

Being on a horse was interesting.  The last time I was on a horse was over 20 years ago and I got thrown off and passed out.  Before that all of my experience was at day camps or birthday parties, and whatever horse I was on usually took advantage of my lack of confidence and ignored me to eat flowers or leaves.  I always feel awkward trying to order a horse around since it seems only a matter of time before the animal realizes the power imbalance and decides it doesn't want me on its back.  Watching people who know what to do with horses always impresses me.  One of the guides on our trail ride was only eleven!  She had perfect control of her horse, and her horse adored her.

In any case, seeing the woods from horseback was wonderful.  I had no interest in moving any faster than a walk, but the trail guides would split up the group periodically and let me go off ahead with one of them, and then the rest would catch up at a trot.  The look of delight on Aden's face as her horse picked up speed is one I hope to never forget.

Leaves illuminated from behind by sunshine is one of the most beautiful things I know of. 

The woods in that area are mostly quaking aspens and spindly looking oaks that never seem to get beyond a certain size.  Then interspersed here and there are patches of neatly planted pine forests with the trees all in rows and I'm reminded that the area was not always wild.  The landscape of the community where the cottage was built was artificially constructed in I believe the 1960s and 70s, and the look of it has weathered and changed in a good way from when I was a kid.  Nature has had time to fill in the spaces with ferns and sumac and Queen Anne's lace.  I love how it's grown. 

One of the best people to take a nature walk with is my brother, Barrett.  Nothing like being with an entomologist to make everything in a ten foot radius seem like a wild adventure kingdom.  When you remember to include incredibly tiny animals in your searches you see animals everywhere, and Barrett's enthusiasm for the insect world is inspiring (no matter how squeamish about bugs you may think yourself to be initially).  My kids cannot wait until we get to go to the cottage and have him along.  (They asked his identical twin what every insect was as they came across it on our walks, but Arno just kept tossing up his hands and saying, "Ask them yourself!  I don't know!"  As a neuroscientist he could have helped identify brains if there had been any on the trail, but thankfully there were none.)

It's also fun to walk with my mom, because as both a lover of nature and an artist she notices things the rest of us would overlook.  She's spent most of her life in Michigan and incorporates many local elements into her work, and has never thought the Midwest lacked for interesting subject matter.

There are many places in the world I hope to see before I die.  I've never been to South America or Africa or Australia.  I'd like to take my kids to see India and Europe.  If I get to visit even half the landmarks on the flashcards my kids like to flip through when I'm teaching them about the world I would be happy.  But I'm also happy to call the Midwest my home base.  I'm glad it's the place I get to return to, wherever I choose to go. 

Living Tribute

We just spent the last two weeks at the cottage.  It's still hard not to write "my grandma's cottage," but I'm getting closer to being able to say "our cottage."  It's finally starting to sink in after owning it for a year that it belongs to us now.

We signed the paperwork last summer on my grandmother's birthday, more than half a year after her death.  I think she probably pictured her summer cottage in the woods being shared by her children for a time rather than moving so soon into the hands of one of her grandchildren, but I think she'd just be pleased that it's stayed in the family.

When we are in Milwaukee living our busy lives and we get the bills from Michigan to maintain another house there, one with taxes and fees and things to fix, I wonder if it's worth the expense.  But when I'm there I know it is.  It's a home of my childhood that doesn't change.  When I'm at the cottage it's like being with my grandma again.  Like being with the family I grew up with while getting to share that with the family I have now.  It's magic.

The latest chapter of be careful what you wish for

I recently got back from a nice trip to Michigan.  I went out to visit with my parents and see my brother and my niece, and I had an amazing but all too short dinner out with my friends.  I loved it all and wasn't ready to come home.

My kids and my husband are still out at my parents', but with a business to run and teaching obligations to fulfill I had to come back early.  So I have the house to myself.  And it's weird.  I don't think I've ever been alone in my own house overnight since we've had kids.  I've been away from them before, but I can't think of another time when everyone was away from me.

How many times have I wished wished wished that I could have a vacation in my own house?  Where everyone would leave for a while and not undo all the cleaning as I'm doing it?  Or that there was no one to cook for but myself and I'd be free from the tyranny of meals for other people?  To do what I please without interruption?  To have it be quiet?

Well, it's quiet.

I'm starting to see that there is such a thing as too quiet.  And too clean.  And too simple.  

I straightened up the stray toys in the living room last night, and now the room looks less inviting.  There's no evidence of my kids' happy play and creative games.  I like things to be clean because it sets the stage for something fun.  But there is no one here to then step on that stage, and all that clean space just looks lifeless.

I'm being silly, right?  I'm being silly.  I'm probably just having trouble adjusting and by the time I'm used to it and it feels like a good thing it will be over.  But I miss the hugs and snuggles and the cute things my kids say and do.  I miss my family.  My days never feel complete when I don't have my husband to tell them all to, and any day that I don't see my kids I know I'm missing something.  All of that is worth more than a clean living room.  And it's lonely here.

Luckily, I have the dog.

Chipper on Aden, whom he misses very much

The dog, who was being cared for by a neighbor for a few days (that in dog time probably felt like weeks), and who greeted me upon my return by practically levitating with happiness.  It's nice to have somebody be glad when I get home from work, and I appreciate his company as he follows at my heels from room to room.

I think I'd be enjoying this more if I weren't stressed out about teaching at string camp (it's my twelfth year doing it and the first few days are always hard because it's impossible to imagine the kids will pull it together and be ready to perform in only a week's time, but they always do) and if I weren't drowning in work at the violin store.  It's harder for me to wind down when I have so much going on, so I'm not using this time the way I probably should.

Maybe tonight I'll do something insane, like read.  With the dog at my feet.  While blasting the soundtrack to The Book of Mormon, which I certainly can't do with the kids around.  (I am trying to think of anything wild I could be doing to add to this list, but I am duller than I realized.  I don't even drink so it's not like I can toss a glass of wine to this picture.  Sheesh.)

Anyway, I'm at least trying to file this away in my mind for the next time the house full of kids is driving me up a wall.  Because that wish for an empty house?  Emptied it of feeling like a home.

House of Dreams (Babble)

I miss my grandmother.  She died in November. I think of things every day that I wish I could share with her.  I want her to come help me make pie in my new kitchen that she never got to visit, and to hear about the people who come into my violin store.  I want to talk with her about books and movies.  I want her to see how much my kids have grown.

A few years ago, when she first had to be moved into a nursing home, her house had to be sold to help pay for her expenses.  This was a reasonable and logical step.  No one could argue with that, but it’s hard when the right thing hurts.  We want the right thing to feel positive, but that’s not always the case.  Sometimes the right thing feels wrong.

Since her house in Ohio was sold I have only been by it once.  I won’t do that again.  I just wanted to drive those familiar streets and see the place where I spent so many Christmas and Easter vacations as a child, the last place I ever saw my grandpa alive, the home where my parents got married and the first place that made my husband feel part of our family.  It was painful to see it and know I didn’t belong there anymore.  The house may remain, but the home I knew inside it is gone.

I know loss is part of life, and I know I am lucky to have had such a wonderful grandma at all.  I’m just not ready to let certain things completely go.  And the last place I still feel my grandma is at her cottage.

(Aden in 2009, standing on the steps my uncle built leading to the cottage porch.)


My grandparents had their cottage on the Western side of Michigan built back when I was in fifth grade.  My grandmother pored over dozens of house plans before she came across the perfect one.  The layout is such that you can comfortably live on one floor, (which they figured would be useful as they got older), but there is space to share with visitors upstairs.  It’s somehow cozy and spacious at the same time, and it’s the most relaxing place I know.   It’s a place for all the family to use, and the more people used it the happier it made my grandparents.

(Quinn and Mona jumping on and off the bed, cottage 2009)

Until my grandma became too frail to travel she used to spend a month up at the cottage every summer.  It’s been the site of family gatherings, weekend retreats, visits with friends, a big New Year’s Eve bash, and it’s where Ian and I spent our honeymoon.  My kids are crazy about the place, and when we go they catch frogs, play in the sand, and look for deer.  I love the cottage.  Everyone in our family loves the cottage.

But while talking to my mom recently, she mentioned the time had come to sell it.  The market is terrible in Michigan right now, so they didn’t expect to get too much, but the upkeep and the taxes and the fees have become a burden on the relatives who have been entrusted with it over these past few years.  It was time to let it go.

The thought of the cottage leaving the family broke my heart.  When I’m there, it’s home.  It’s timeless.  And my grandparents’ touch is in everything.  I don’t want someone else moving in and taking out the table and bookcase my grandpa made.  I don’t want the birds my grandma did in needlepoint to come off the wall.  I want her chair to stay where it is, and the oars to the rowboat hanging in the garage and the ancient collection of board games to be in the utility closet.  I want the cottage to stay the cottage.  I want the cottage.

(My kids at the same little beach where my brothers and cousins and I played)

Ian and I aren’t rich by any stretch, but we are careful with our money and we work hard.  And one of the things I love about my husband is he makes my dreams come true.  That sounds sappy and weird, I know, but it’s the truth.  If it weren’t for him we would not have the home we have, I would not have my own business, and the proof that I’m with the right person is in the smiling faces of my children.  I can’t ask for more.  And yet, when Ian saw how sad I was that the cottage was for sale, he pulled out his laptop and crunched some numbers, and said he thought we could afford to buy it ourselves.

It’s impractical, it’s expensive, it will probably be complicated…. But the worst case scenario in my mind is we try owning it, it proves to be too much, and we sell it ourselves down the road when Michigan’s economy improves.  In the meantime at the very least it buys the whole family a few more years of playing at the lake, walking the trails, and making s’mores under stars while the leaves of the poplar trees rustle like rain.

I think that would have pleased my grandparents very much.  I know it pleases me.

(Quinn at the lake)