summer time

 


My little guy loves making fence music. Whenever he sees an iron fence, he has to find a good stick to make a little fence music. We also have fun looking for loose manhole covers that rock from side to side, or metal grates to jump and bang on. But mostly it's about the fence music.

Between our little apartment and summer camp were three blocks of perfect fences. We'd have to leave early to get them all played before camp started.

Tomorrow we go to Paris for a quick change to Orly Oest, trying to make a flight in under two hours. It's about an hour's ride between the two airports. I am not panicking about this, no. We'll make it. Somehow. I hope my poor little guy is up to being dragged through the airport at breakneck speed.

Insh'allah, the next time you hear from me will be from the clear waters of the Mediterranean in sunny Corsica. Insh'allah. 

Escape to the beach

 
We got the chance to run up to Lewes with a dear old friend and a lovely new one. Nothing quite like a weekend at the beach… well, except perhaps a week at the beach. The house we stay in when we go to Lewes is my friend Mine’s sister’s, full of old advertisements and antique toys, comfortable furniture and good beds. They don’t rent it out, which makes staying there SUCH a treat. The King of Everything ran around the backyard chasing fireflies, then dropped off to sleep while the girls went grocery shopping. Grown up time. My kid and I have been staying in an efficiency apartment while in DC – very rough on us both. No privacy, and I either go to sleep when the kid does at 7PM or sit hunched in the dark over my computer or a poorly lit book, listening to him shift and sigh in his sleep. At the beach, he was upstairs in a lovely room while I sat downstairs listening to music and enjoying conversation with grown ups, people who didn’t require that I repeat myself fifteen times in a row every time I was asked a question.

Beach culture in the States is quite the state of mind. The journey to the beach is a part of the experience, naturally. Families and friends gas up their cars and go, driving eight, ten hours to get to the shore of their dreams. Luckily for us, it’s only three hours, tops, to Lewes. On the route down to South Carolina, the signs begin for South of the Border a good hundred miles before you ever set eyes on Pepe or the insanity that is this home grown roadside attraction.

On the drive to local beaches, it’s the farmer stands that attract attention. Local sweet corn, hefty heirloom tomatoes, sweet peaches and watermelons are good reason to stop and stretch. Out the window, the view offers a crazy quilt of soy and corn fields, buffalo and more conventional cows grazing in pasture, a gaggle of goats straying right up to the roadside to catch a glimpse of the cars whizzing past. Ruined barns and double grain silos compete with quaint farmhouses for the best, most picturesque view… if you’re a photographer, plan to stop often.

We were serenaded by thunderstorms all night, and rain threatened to stop play in the morning, coming down in morose sheets, grey and lacklustre. As soon as there was a break in the weather we were off to the state park and the beach. Cold water. Very cold water, but there were plenty of surfers riding the waves, little kids fighting over beach toys, and grownups of every description thankful for a respite from the daily grind of their ‘real lives’.

Beach culture. Beach weekends. The stuff of life in workaholic America. Sunday brunch at the local dive. Wander down to the corner store for a newspaper and a cuppa, then sit and people watch on some gingerbread porch. I fantasized for a moment that Lewes was my town, the beach my life. It’s a sweet dream. If ever I am allowed to be a homebody, stay at home mom, a Salt Cod home on the beach could be my little slice of heaven. Sigh. Back to reality. 

soothing the beasts

 

Magical places.

During this trip to my home town, the Pitame and I were happy to go to the Western Shore (that’s on the Maryland side of the Eastern Shore) near Solomon’s Island to visit friends who have known me since I was a little girl. There are some places on this earth that are truly magical; oh my, was it a treat to watch my son realize that Old Spout was one of those extraordinary places. On a high bluff overlooking the Bay, my son sank, mesmerised, into one of eight white loungers strewn along its length to catch the view. He sat, statue still, and stared at the sails weaving their picturesque way across the water. He stayed that way for ten minutes, absorbed, elsewhere, soul-filled and waiting. My father sank quietly into the chair next to him and put his arm around the little guy. It’s a memory for forever, etched into my mind by a calm of thankfulness for such a gift at this difficult moment in my personal timeline.

Old Spout is an old farmhouse, built in the 1700’s and added to twice in the hundreds of years since. You enter the property through a cathedral arch of birch trees sheltering a path of yellow gravel… there is no hint of the beautiful view behind the house. It’s just a friendly yellow farmhouse with wisteria and a porch swing. But there is magic there. True magic. The farm’s sweet water well was one of the last places sailors could fill their casks before putting out to sea: the well is still there.

We swam in the black-bottomed pool, perfectly warm, cool and refreshing, and just the right size for a tired mother and an adventuresome child. Brilliant blue sky punctuated by white, careless clouds. A perfect day for floating on your back and letting your thoughts sink below the waterline.

After a lunch of crabs caught fresh from the water (imagine that, living off the land), sweet corn, farm ripe tomatoes and cold soda, the kid found himself hanging out on the sunporch with my father and our family friend, a man of a certain age with no children of his own and little experience with small people. When finally I checked up on the guys, I found my father asleep on the chaise longue, while the kid and the friend were in an animated conversation about jungle animals.

Magic place. Boxwood mazes and crepe myrtle trees. Birds of prey making off with snakes writhing in their talons while grumble bees make slow work of an old, wooden birdhouse. Plenty of space to run, play hide and seek, look for shark teeth, or simply lay on your back and feel the earth tilt beneath you. 

Magical places

  

When the spirit moves you

It’s almost too hard to keep coming back the US for these long trips. It seems I’m destined to miss wherever I’m not. My lovely lady friends keep in touch, sending emails and text messages, I know I’m not forgotten there. Thank goodness! I miss them all and will spend so much more time with them in the afternoons when we get back to Sharjah. Did I write about the fantabulous BG yet? Another woman it’s taken months to see again, after a spring picnic with she and her husband, and the ever present Pitame. We sat on the public lawns of her compound and enjoyed Turkish delights of the non-sweet kind, tomatospicy rice and dolma and sautéed chicken livers. The Pitame played American football with her husband while we lounged on the blankets and talked about our original homes, our mothers, our lives. I wandered a bit away when she heeded the call to prayer that afternoon, and then we talked some more. Then there was that long spell where I had no car, so visiting in Dubai became difficult. And she had some health challenges to overcome, which limited her mobility, as well. But we kept in touch by email and knew someday, insh’allah, everything would work out.

While my mother in law was visiting, I took her and the boychild to Mall of the Emirates, as she wanted to treat the kid to an afternoon in the snow. I was close to my friend, well, closer to where she lived than I’d been in a long time, with time all to myself, so I rang her up. Huzzah, she was available!

In she walked to the coffe shop, resplendent in a colour of green I adore but haven’t the guts to wear, bright bright bamboo green… with a hint of orange mesh scarf following her forehead beneath the green of her overscarf… orange eyeliner the exact shade of the peeking scarf, and the long covering gowns of a modest Muslim woman in brilliant, joyous, amazing green. “YES!” my heart cried in delight.

She gave me these adorable slippers her mother had made – that fit perfectly, of course. And a small, sparkling square of cloth of great significance. It’s the cloth that women use to cover their hands while the henna is drying. As part of the wedding ceremony, the bride is lavishly decorated on her hands and feet with henna, in swirling floral patterns and solid henna fingertips. If you’ve never had henna applied, it’s an exercise in patience and luxury, as you can’t do much for hours afterwards. No chasing children, no serving tea and coffee, no washing dishes. The longer the dark brown henna paste stays on the skin, occasionally moistened with a secret mixture of water, lemon and sugar, the darker and deeper the design will be. Since some traditions say the bride shouldn’t begin domestic duties til the henna from her wedding is faded, it’s in her best interest to make the design stick. At the wedding ceremony, all the women dance with these small cloths, waving them in the air, trilling that blood-stirring ululation with covered mouths and revelling in the fact of their being. And true to my friend, it’s a brilliant, shiny, hot pink piece of cloth. No drab cream colour for her, no. 

So I’ll go out dancing with my friends here in DC one night, that tiny scrap of happiness waving in the air above our heads. I will wish I were dancing with my lady friends in Sharjah and Dubai, while wishing I could somehow have all my women friends dancing together. Wouldn’t that be joy enough to move the world? 

simple pleasures

 

Do you remember balsa wood gliders and rubber band planes? Do you remember how carefully you poked the pieces out of their sheets? Did the planes actually fly, back then, or did we just have such fun putting them together and making the effort that the results, however mediocre, seemed sublime?

I still love balsa planes. And slinkies, and marbles, and jacks. String games and jump rope. And all those simple, ancient games... well, not slinkies, we know how old those are. The game of marbles is over 3000 years old. Knucklebones, played in ancient Egypt and all over the world wherever it was civilized (and i'm sure well before that), was the precursor to our rubber ball games. String figures were made by indiginous cultures the world over, sometimes in competition, sometimes as illustration to a song or story. Jump rope was first documented in Medieval times.

Nintendo, eat your heart out.

Yesterday we went to one of the parks of my childhood and tried out the planes. The Kid was thrilled, for about fifteen minutes or so, and then he wanted to go play on the equipment. But I was bathed in the diffuse, kind light of nostagia and happily fiddled and futzed with the planes, long after the boy had lost interest in them. Thanks to D. for the brilliant idea. It was great to feel like a kid again, and not just the mother of one. 

Who's afraid of advertising?

 


I want that.

I hear this hundreds of times a day... because my son is watching commercial TV for the first time in his life. Every commercial, he says, "I want that!" Sometimes the advertisement has hit its mark and he wants the product, the fruit juice, the Lysol, the Swifter. But sometimes he’ll say, “I want that house”, or “I want that little girl!” But what’s always apparent is the need, the message of want, that commercials inspire. Its chilling. My three year old is a consumer junkie, hooked into the endless cycle of acquisition.

There is an interesting movement in the US; groups of folks vow to not buy anything new except for food, underwear and socks. Everything else comes from thrift shops, swaps, Craig’s List, dumpster diving, however it can be done. I’m sickened by the amount of money I’ve had to spend just on the ‘basics’ here in the States. My friends bought a fixer upper house and found all the fixtures second hand, for little or nothing. Unforutnately, the free kitchen cabinets came just after they’d given up and gone to Ikea… but I really admire their perseverance, their dedication to leaving a lighter footprint on the Earth. I wish there were something like that in the UAE. There are a few thrift stores in Dubai, mostly for clothes. I’ll get all of Nico’s Dubai clothes at a little thrift store near my Aunt’s house before we go, and spend about 1/10th of what I’d normally spend on new clothes, for beautiful stuff you’d never know was already worn once around. Living in the UAE is still much less expensive than here. The traffic is just about the same…

What we do have here that just thrills and excites me is culture. Free museums. Free shows. DC is a testing ground for pre-Broadway shows, so the best of the future best comes through here. Small theatres are thriving. The Smithsonian is the best of America, an institution that embodies the generosity of this nation. Beauty and knowledge for free. Would that our colleges could be like this! And let’s not forget the hundreds of camps for children my son’s age and older, filled with amazing experiences. We’ve enrolled him in a French Language immersion camp half days beginning next week. The biggest reason we left the UAE for the summer is because I couldn’t find a camp for the Pitame. I can’t imagine an entire summer stuck indoors with an active, intelligent kid. I don’t know how other families do it. I wish Qanat al Qasba would dedicate itself to its original goals. There should be a summer camp there, and an ongoing after school program, for kids with an artistic bent.

You know. Something better for the kids to do than watch television.