The Marathon Post

It was a pretty nice day today. The first kind of summer-y day this year that I can recall. I'm looking out the window into the parking lot behind our apartment towards a pretty decent sunset. A woman just walked through the lot in shorts and a tank top carrying something like a cooler. Festive. Barbecue-y.

I thought that today would be the day I finally wrote about this year's Boston Marathon and maybe about the lockdown that followed four days later. This could be a long-ie though so we'll see how far I get.

Patriots' Day, the day the Boston Marathon is run, is an unusual holiday in Boston: a non-drinking holiday. Of course many spectators do drink quite a bit even so. It's just that Patriots' Day isn't a regular holiday that involves a specific celebratory meal like Thanksgiving (wine, beer) or a meal and a series of festive parties like Christmas (Champagne, wine, punch, whatever booze is handy) or exclusively about celebration like July 4th (beer) or almost entirely about drinking like St. Patrick's Day (beer beer beer beer and beer) Officially one celebrates Patriots' Day by re-enacting the first battles of the American Revolution. No doubt some of the re-enactors are also armed with flasks. Maybe there's also some wine in the generals' tents for the sake of historical accuracy.

I haven't done any research but I feel it's safe to assume that most people in the Boston area have some interaction with the marathon on Patriots' Day (a.k.a. Marathon Monday) if only because it passes through some very bustling, strategically located suburbs and through the heart of the city. It cuts off large swaths of at least a few towns for hours.

It's also free, really easy to find and cool to watch. I mean those athletes are so impressive. Some of them are your friends and you can see them go by and cheer them on. And once they've gone by and you remark to the people you're standing there watching with about how amazing that was, it's pretty festive to head into the local pub for a pint. Right? I mean, why not? After all, your car is parked on the other side of the road and you won't be able to get across the street to it for another three hours. Oh wait - you took the T? Well you're probably thirsty anyway.

Pub or no, watching the marathon is a fun way to spend an uplifting chunk of the day outside. Cheering the runners on makes you feel good. Watching people do something amazing makes you feel good. Seeing someone running a marathon dressed as the Old North Church imparts a deep sense of awe.

My friend, Lisa, and I have recently developed a loose tradition on Patriots' Day. She usually has some event to go to later in the month that she needs an outfit for so we go shopping downtown at the Prudential Center. Here it is on a Google map. It's right down at the finish line.

It's a lot of fun to come up out of the T station into an alternate reality of milling tourists, mylar blanket-clad runners, first aid tents, marathon-logoed-windbreaker-wearing marathon volunteers, hydration stations, port-a-potties and school busses filled with yellow bags containing the runners' personal belongings. It's very different from a normal downtown Monday.

This day the scene was no different from any other Marathon Monday. I enjoyed the sights as I walked across the Common and through the Public Garden from the Downtown Crossing station. Lisa was coming from the South End so we texted each other about the crowds as we neared the mall.

The shopping was fun. Low-key. We tried on a lot of perfume. I bought a lipstick. I don't remember if Lisa bought anything. As you walk from store to store sometimes you cross the streets on elevated walkways and you could see runners approaching the finish line a block away or so. We had a delicious fish sandwiches and a Bloody Mary each (she asked for six stalks of celery, clever girl) at Legal Seafoods and parted ways.

Okay, don't kill me but I had to be back in Cambridge for a 3 PM massage. Don't be jealous - just schedule one for yourself. I left downtown at 2:15. There were marathoners on my T car wearing medals, carrying their yellow marathon gear bags, looking very relaxed and satisfied and being congratulated by the other passengers. Everybody seemed to be in a pretty good mood. All was calm.

The best I can figure it, the train I was on was in Cambridge, somewhere between Harvard Square station and Porter Square when the first bomb went off. Our train arrived in Davis Square, where I got off, without incident. There was no hint of anything out of the ordinary as I walked to my appointment.

I had a great massage. Matt, the masseur left the room while I changed back into my clothes. When I came out into the waiting room he looked up wide-eyed from his iPhone and said "Someone's bombed the marathon."

I said - like an idiot - "But I was just there!" It seemed impossible though. Everything was great when I left. Everything was fun and happy and normal. I was just there and it was fine. I couldn't believe it. Matt pulled out his laptop and we watched videos of what had happened. It was so shocking.

Finally I paid him, walked home and turned on the T.V.. For hours - no sound. I mean they were showing the same brief footage over and over again and talking and talking incessantly though they had no real information to impart. There was no point in listening.

I texted Lisa (I didn't know if she'd left when I did - she was fine) and my family in California and e-mailed Pete and other friends and relatives to let them know we were all safe. I don't remember what else I did that night. My journal says I went to the grocery store and cooked food for the week. Homey stuff. I must have Facebooked so I could track my friends and make sure they were okay too.

The next day I took the T as usual to my new day-job. The only unusual part was that there were armed National Guardspeople (some were women) at the stop where I got out. We uneventfully wished each other a good morning.

The next few days were pretty normal until Friday but that's going to be another story for another post.

Now I have to go to bed. I've been waking up at five AM these days so I have to go to bed early. I know I haven't been around here much lately. I've been incommunicative. I've been completely rearranging my life and my mind and my attitude over the past several months. Things are looking pretty good these days. Life is much more fun now. I'm hoping that soon I'll figure out how to reclaim my blogging time - and my blog reading time.

For now, goodnight!

Whine!

A quick, kind-of mini-complaint:

I started running again over last summer. Since this past February I'd been pretty hardcore about running three days a week (doing the program in The Beginning Runner's Handbook: The Proven 13-Week RunWalk Program like I do every few years) alternating with yoga. I'd have the occasional setback where I couldn't run for three or four days in a row and I'd have to start a week or two back in the program but I was up to week 10. I even joined a gym in March and went regularly.

A couple of weeks ago I had my annual physical and it turned out that the small cough I'd picked up two days earlier was pneumonia. Boo! Pneumonia bites! Okay, I only had about three days when I felt truly terrible and then the antibiotics kicked in. I was able to have A LOT of fun even though I was still sick. However I was not able to think much (I guess fighting the infection made my head kind of foggy) and I didn't move my body much for two weeks.

I started running again a couple of days ago, back at the beginning of my program. Week one. That's okay. I figure I can run faster this time. It still counts as the same amount of exercise as far as I can see. My metabolism is keeping up. My cardio's even pretty good. I wasn't sure how it would go after having so much trouble breathing but it's okay.

My poor body is so sad and decrepit now though! My legs ached after the first run that no one should have trouble doing! I did yoga for the first time today and all my nice, formerly stretchy muscles have retracted and I'm all tight again. Sigh.

Gotta keep going though and not be discouraged, otherwise it's not going to get better. At least I get to run again. I CAN'T TELL YOU HOW MUCH I LOOOOOOVE RUNNING! Love it. I'll just have to struggle through the yoga again. The yoga bug has yet to bite me. I still do it though because it's good for me. Oy.

So many people have so, so, so much more to complain about than I do. I'm just venting. Sorry.

Not A Snow Day

I was going to blog today about the Boston Marathon bombing. I was down there by the finish line this year but I left before the bombs went off.

Today my city is on lockdown due to the manhunt for the bombers. I hear they caught one of them. There are A LOT of rumors going around.

In our Cambridge neighborhood things sound pretty normal. I hear traffic on the street, construction sounds, garbage pickup, fuel truck reloading. No sirens, no helicopters. Do they not use helicopters for manhunts anymore?

Instead of writing what I was going to write I will wait and see what happens. I expect that whatever happens will not directly involve me. Whatever it is, I hope it resolves soon.

It's a nice, sunny day, already over sixty degrees out. I think I want to have a hot dog for breakfast. Then maybe I'll paint my nails. And stay glued to Twitter, Facebook and Boston.com. We're not supposed to leave the apartment, after all.

Don't get me wrong though. This is not a holiday. This is sad.

Little Boston-y Things

I have been a very bad blogger. So bad that I hesitate to even call myself a blogger. That said, I couldn't go to bed without reporting two funny city incidents that occurred today.

First, I saw a guy going running in a full-on chicken suit. Yes, I did. I saw this from my T (subway) car on the red line as it came in over the bridge from Cambridge and into the Charles Street station. The chicken guy was running over the footbridge that leads to the Esplanade. Everyone runs on the Esplanade. I've even run on the Esplanade. I have been passed my many old men who ran better than me on the Esplanade. I have never been passed by a guy in a chicken suit.

Later in the day I was in something of an industrial no-man's-land, crossing a bridge over some railroad tracks and headed under route 93. I was on my own and a man was approaching from the opposite direction. He stopped me and asked me if I'd button his shirt cuff for him. He said he'd been trying and trying to do it himself with one hand but he just couldn't get it. He put his arm out and I tried to button the button. I said "I'm having a hard time and I'm using both hands!" Finally I got it. He said thank you and moved on. He was a smily, raspy-voiced guy with a diamond pinky ring. I wondered if he was a mobster or something. Probably just a regular guy on his way to a decent lunch with a perfectly innocent buttoning issue. I very much enjoyed the encounter.

Now I feel like I'm on a little bit of a roll so I'll add two recent photos:

A sign I was delighted to spot in Bukowski's in Boston. There's a Bukowski's in Cambridge as well but this is from Boston. I want to drink beer while sitting on the fucking moon. I also want to wear that hat.

We've had quite a bit of snow in the Boston area this winter. Shovel fatigue has set in. The person who shoveled this walk seems to have been a bit punchy. Definitely not a regulation job - this isn't wheelchair friendly. I found it entertaining though.

Oh I have more of these amusing city incidents. Just not tonight. It's bedtime now.

Installation From 2/1/13

Pete and I had a show on February first. Here's what I showed:

People LOVE to take photos

The shoes I wore

Pete and me with our gallery-mates, Denise and Shaun. Sorry for the revolting face I'm  making.

Boston Area Winter Plus A Note From Vermont

I drove out to Wellesley today to go to my sister-in-law's Stella and Dot open house. While driving on Route 2 I was amazed by how ashy everything looks on a day in January when it's supposed to snow but it hasn't started to yet.

When I left Wellesley I took the Mass Pike from 128 to Prudential Center. As I drove under the city I looked at the gritty, blackened, concrete ceiling above me and thought "By God I love this filthy town." I really do. It's filthy and freezing and I really love living here.

Meanwhile, Pete is in Vermont, warm and cozy in his studio, looking out the window at an owl hunting:

Photo by Pete.

Bravery Log

This is my new Bravery Log. In the interest of expanding my life, making it richer and making me more happy and engaged, I'm on a quest to try new things. I'm trying to do things that I wouldn't normally do. I'm trying to be brave.

It's been going pretty well. I've met a number of new people, I'm having more fun and I feel like I have more internal resources. Sometimes, though, I need a little nudge to continue to be brave. That's where the Bravery Log comes in. Each time I do something that's hard for me (like R.S.V.P. "yes" to a party where I won't know many people or sign up for a class at an aerial gym - yes, I did) I write in the date and the brave thing I did.

Now each day I wonder, "will I have an opportunity to be brave today?" It makes me look for an opportunity. It's good incentive. I'm more likely to follow through on an idea if I can write down that I did it in the log.

Bravery is subjective though. Some days I'm more chicken than others. Some days just looking for more information on the web counts as bravery. Just looking can lead to e-mailing which can lead to signing up which will lead to showing up. Every step in the sequence counts. I'm being generous with myself. Baby steps.

So far everything I've taken a risk and tried has payed off nicely. I must remember that it won't always be that way. I'll likely be shut down or embarrassed some time. When that happens I'll just have to congratulate myself for having tried. Right?

City Stuff

I am hearing the unmistakable braying of a beagle in the parking lot behind our apartment right now. I love that sound. Beagles are the most awesome pain in the ass dogs you can get! Noisy, unruly, escapey and adorable. Love that sound. Not a breed I'd choose for this urban an area but then I don't know everything.

It reminds me of a couple of other lovely city experiences I had in the last couple of days.

Sunday was No Pants Day on the T. I got on at Davis Square as I normally do. Things proceeded as usual until we pulled into the Harvard Square station. I spotted a couple of people on the platform who weren't wearing pants. They weren't completely naked from the waist down - they had tiny short-like things on - but they were less dressed than the usual T patron.

Odd entertainment stuff happens occasionally in Harvard Square - it could have been a dance troupe or some street circus performers, you never know. A couple of guys got on our car and the train moved off. Then the guys started taking off their shoes, taking stuff out of their pockets, fiddling with their belts. They were seated on the same side as me so I could see them reflected in the car window - you know, city style, so you're not looking directly at anyone.

The woman across from me started looking a tad bit uncomfy. She was across the aisle from them, looking straight at them. She'd had her back to the station when we pulled in so she hadn't seen the no pants people on the platform. I smirked at her to ease her mind. She got it. She could see I was watching in the reflection.

The dudes took their pants off and put their shoes back on. One guy listened to his iPod, another started reading. When we pulled into the Central Square station there were a few more no pants people on that platform. That's where I got out. The no pants guys from our car got out too. Not much of a T ride if you ask me. If I was going to ride no pants I'd want to get a bit more mileage out of it. But then, I don't know everything.

Today it was sixty degrees out. It's mid-January. This is not normal. You don't get beautiful, warm, sunny days in the Boston area in January. Only you did today. So I took a walk over to Porter Square to do some errands.

They're doing some construction at St. James Episcopal Church. I happened to notice that stretch of sidewalk because they had rented some "Rent A Throne" (or something) brand porta-potties and the name amused me. Then I saw a handsome dreadlocked guy coming towards me from the other direction, listening to his iPod and grinning a beautiful grin. The sun was shining, it was a pleasant city moment. I kept going into Porter and hit the drugstore, the hardware store and the craft store.

On my way back, on the spot where I'd had that pleasant city moment on my trip in, I had to step around a fresh vomit stain. It was just a damp stain - someone had cleaned up the bulk of it. I thought how glad I was that I had missed the incident when it had occurred. I was glad that someone had been thoughtful enough to clean up the mess. All in the forty-five minutes that had elapsed since I'd passed that spot. Another series of events that you wouldn't experience in the country.

That's what I have for you today. LIfe is a wonderful thing. You never know what it will bring.

Where'd They Go?

Something interesting has already happened to me this year: Pete and I went to a party where I spoke most of the night with a number of people I'd never met before and never stressed or felt freaky about it. It never even occurred to me to notice anything unusual had happened until I was in the car on the way home.

Progress is possible!

The party was on my birthday but it was unrelated to me other than I was invited. I didn't feel birthday-y this year. I think I just wanted my life back from the holidays. Instead of doing something specifically for my birthday we went to this party.

Maybe it was an unnoticed birthday vibe or plain resignation but my social anxieties deserted me. Good riddance. Hope they're gone for good! See ya later - much!

The next day we did do something special for my birthday and my friend, Janna's, birthday which was a day later. It was over-the-top. You can read about it here. Seriously over the top. Wow.

Post Hijacked By Crab Pretzels

You know what's in here?

Guinness!

No, I will not drink Guinness from a styrofoam cup.

Pete and I are in a motel in South Carolina. One that does not have glasses available, only styrofoam cups. 

Christmas is over and we're headed back north from Florida. Tomorrow we hope to make a stop in Hagerstown, Maryland, for some of these:

These are crab pretzels, which I am shocked to see that I haven't yet blogged about. We stopped in Hagerstown on the way down south. Growing up in Maryland I had heard about Hagerstown all my life on the radio for traffic reports and school snow-day closings but I'd never known where it was. We had a chance to stop there this trip so we did.

Hagerstown is great. It was founded in 1762 and has beautiful architecture downtown: colonial and newer brick and stone row houses. There's almost a New Orleans-y feeling to it, though waaaaaaaaay more laid back. Nowhere near as party. Tons of character. It's sandwiched between Pennsylvania and West Virginia but it's still definitely Maryland. Therefore you get crab pretzels. Pretzels from the Germans and fresh crab from the bay.

If, by chance, you are driving through the American Mid-Atlantic region and want to avoid the Beltway around D.C. I would recommend going through Hagerstown. We dined at Bulls & Bears Restaurant. If you hit the link the page will say it has "a New York style atmosphere." I don't know about that, but the crab pretzels are damn good and they have a great beer selection. Most of the beers on tap were of the artisanal variety, high alcohol. Tasty, but watch yourself if you're driving - which most likely you will be. I had the Yeungling's which is local, of normal alcohol content and very fresh on tap. A tasty lager.

That's probably all you need to hear about for this installment. No doubt there's more to come another time.

Christmas 2012

I'm hoping we have a new Christmas tradition: Christmas Bocce. This was really fun. Pete, Marnee (Pete's mom) and I arrived first at the bocce court. Soon after Marc and their dad rode up on their bikes.

Here's where Marnee explained the rules to us:

Pete got those pants for Christmas. Sort of. Marc got them for Christmas, didn't like them and gave them to Pete.

Christmas Bocce!

Christmas Eve 2012

I'm at my in-laws' house in Vero Beach, FL, sitting in a rocking chair on their patio. My father-in-law has come out with his toy train track to see if he can figure out why the track is buckling. Pete is inside setting up his father's new fax machine. He keeps popping his head out of one door or another and saying "hi."

I'm not bored but I feel like I'm in a really boring play. Or maybe a very dull version of "The Nutcracker" with no music or dancing.