Journal of a Sabbatical

June 28, 1999

cocooning

Today's Starting Pitcher: Bret Saberhagen

Yesterday's Starting Pitcher: Brian Rose

Today's Reading: Before the Dawn by Shimazaki Toson, The Secret Reader by Willis Barnstone

Yesterday's Reading: The Boy Allies in the Balkan Campaign by Clair Hayes, The Secret Reader by Willis Barnstone

Yellow trucks, guys with chain saws, and a giant white truck arrived this morning and cut down the roost tree after all. I guess the de-limbing the other day was just a warm-up. The mockingbird was fluttering around a bush near where the tree used to be. I haven't seen a single startling, grackle or crow all day. Score one for the forces of neatness.

The view from this window is already depressing enough since I've had it propped open crookedly with a stick. The refenestration guy is supposed to come tomorrow to give me an estimate. I have no idea how long it'll be 'til I can get an appointment to actually have it fixed. I suppose I could renew my efforts to fix it myself, but nothing they sell in Home Depot looks anything like the spring that sprang out of it. For all I know, the glass place won't have the part either - they'll probably be more than happy to sell me a new window.

I've been trying to figure out how old the building and its windows are. I will have been here 21 years in October. I believe the building was 8 years old when I moved here, but for some reason the number 12 keeps popping up. I'm sure I must have documents somewhere that contain that information. Not that it matters. I don't think these windows were meant to last more than 10 years anyway.

I'm not sure whether having the window propped open with a fan balanced on the windowsill is all that good an idea but otherwise I'd be forced to retreat to the bedroom. I supposed if the heat wave goes on much longer I'll end up moving the computer and my desk to the bedroom. Well, maybe not. The heat wave has to end sometime. Yes, it's officially a heat wave now since the temperature in Boston has been over 90 degrees for three consecutive days.

All I want to do is stay indoors near the air conditioner and away from the evil heavy polluted haze that passes for air.

The walking buddies insisted on walking on Saturday at 10:30 (far better than 1:30 PM as we have been doing) despite the air quality alerts. Rita canceled out because she was having an asthma attack - and she hadn't even been out in it yet. Joan-east and Priscilla and I went yard-saling so it wasn't as strenuous as a regular walk.

There was one street in Lawrence where several houses were having yard sales all at once - a group thing - so we had a slow walk with frequent stops. Priscilla is a champion yard-saler. She carries lists of things she needs for herself and Harold as well as for the grand kids, and a separate list of which Belva Plain novels and other books she's looking for. We teased her, reminding her to check off the ones she bought so she didn't look for them again at the next sale. I bought a bright yellow straw hat for 50 cents to keep the sun off my head.

The heat is making my brain mushy and the yellow hat only helps just so much.

Nancy has been bugging me to take her to see the new movie Buena Vista Social Club about these aging Cuban musicians. She's got all their CD's. I figured an air conditioned movie theater is almost as good as staying home, so I fetched her from the bus station and headed to the Harvard Square theater. We got there a half hour before the scheduled show and waited on line in blazing sun. I think my brain turned to a fried egg over easy. When we got to the ticket window, they only had one ticket left! I told Nancy she could see it without me, but she didn't want to do that so we browsed in the travel bookstore nearby for guidebooks to Bosnia, Macedonia, and Kosovo but found none. There was one for Croatia though.

When the novelty of sweating in an un-airconditioned bookstore in search of books we knew didn't exist wore off we trudged across the square to Casa Mexico for dinner. Aside from Nancy colliding with tables in the dark, we had a great time. The enchiladas rojas are as good as they have always been. So a nice Mexican dinner in a cool basement restaurant and a long browse in the Harvard Coop bookstore, which does have air conditioning, rounded out Saturday's foray out of the cocoon.

Sunday was even hotter. We stayed in and enjoyed each other's company, listened to CDs from both our collections, listened to Brian Rose pitch an excellent ballgame only to have the bullpen blow it for him in the 9th. Tim Wakefield is Nancy's favorite player and he's been invincible as the replacement closer since Tom Gordon hurt his elbow - until Sunday. Must be the heat. Sox lost 7 to 6. We did finally venture out of the cool cocoon to mount an expedition to New Mother India in Waltham - kind of out of our way but worth it for the Kashmiri mushrooms.

Back in my cocoon, I read sonnets from Willis Barnstone's The Secret Reader, an autobiography in verse, which I picked up at the Coop on Saturday. I liked them so much, I called Nancy in her cocoon and read the best ones aloud over the phone.

The cocooning continued today with more fiddling with the TV antenna - with a brief foray to Radio Shack for a splitter, reading Before the Dawn - I'm up to page 366, cleaning the bathroom, weeding the desk, and trying unsuccessfully to connect to my ISP to fetch e-mail and do some web surfing. I think the heat has gotten to world.std.com at least at the Lawrence and Lowell modems. Guess I'll have to wait 'til the heat wave and the thunderstorms blow over.

Oh, yeah, I got my hair cut. Really cut. Really short. Really really short. I've been growing it long for the past three years because the nieces were freaked out by my boyish appearance at the height of their gender identity obsession years. Girls (not all, but a lot of 'em) get really into what it means to be a girl around the ages of 6 and 7 and my boyishness bugged Lizzy at that age and bugged Andrea even more at that age. Apparently these days being a girl means having really long hair (among many things) so I let my hair grow. The kids are out of their gender freak out stage now and my hair is considerably grayer than it was when I decided to let it grow. Believe me, long straight gray hair does not look good. Besides that, with this heat I wish I had no hair at all! So I marched over to Supercuts and demanded a short hair cut. It now looks salt and pepper instead of mousy gray.

Jose Offerman is beating up on White Sox pitching and Saberhagen is holding them scoreless, so if the static descends on the radio again I can shut it off without feeling like I'm missing a close game.

Still no answer at world.std.com. And so to bed - with the a/c on full blast.