Winter & Brunswick, Maine

I decided to board an Amtrak train to Brunswick, Maine. This was months ago, just when New England seemed to be at the peak of an already long and cold winter. There was an opportunity to tour one of the most elite colleges in the country. We’d heard things about this place: the campus is small but charming, the food is phenomenal, there’s an Arctic museum on the grounds. And because we all seemed to be suffering from cabin fever, we booked a hotel across the street from the school and called it our Winter 2019 Family Vacation.

Matt decided to drive to Brunswick where he would meet us at the station while Elle and I hopped on board the northbound Downeaster express. The route took us through Old Orchard Beach, Portland, alongside the L.L. Bean flagship store in Freeport, and along the coast. From our huge windows we saw Ferris wheels, frozen rivers, and the ocean. It spit us out right in the center of downtown Brunswick. Admittedly, Brunswick is small. And it was cold. Not Brunswick’s fault. But the town’s smallness was much appreciated by those of us traveling on foot. Not so far to go to get to where you’re going.

The college tour was cold, of course. Led by a sophomore government major in a miniskirt. She’s from Montana and therefore immune to winters. And I, while not even close to being immune to winters, am starting to find all things beautiful in these icy cold climates. I dream of visiting Newfoundland and consider risking seasickness in order to seek out puffin colonies on the North Atlantic coast. Iceberg spotting from Twilingate. Sighting auroras from the shores of the Labrador Sea. Eating a proper Scotch egg made by a Nova Scotian. These kinds of things.

Yet the closest I’ve been to any of these places is Brunswick. Our feet were frozen and raw from the walk around town. I got to touch a narwhal tusk. We ate delicious food.

Back in 2016 Malcolm Gladwell trashed Bowdoin College for spending more money on their dining services (they consistently rank #1 in best college food) than on providing financial aid packages for low-income students. It’s an unfair assessment on how Bowdoin spends their endowment and generates funding for its stellar dining options. And would you know we opted not to eat at the college. Why? Because we’re a bunch of idiots and we just wanted to go home after a long, cold day on campus. Tired, cold idiots. Nobody thinks rationally when they’re tired and cold.

The good news is Elle graduated an entire year early, so the chances that we’ll get to take another tour around Bowdoin are good.  I’m totally going to eat on campus and I’m totally only taking another tour during the non-winter months.

We drove home together the very next day. The Amtrak train ride to Brunswick was a practice run of sorts. We’d just recently found out my brother was getting married in Orlando in April. My husband wasn’t sure he’d be able to go, conflicting schedules and all. And I certainly wasn’t going to drive from New England to Central Florida without him. Flying? Out of the question.

That’s next…

Nathaniel Hawthorne, Plymouth’s Most Famous Guest

There is a ridiculous amount of well-marked history in this region of the country. In fact, I’m almost certain that any patch of grass or pavement on which I stand has played a crucial role in something: An historic railroad junction; the deathplace of a notable townsman; a natural disaster with a terrible story that remains only in the buried memories of a bunch of dead people. This place is teeming with it all. Teeming, I tell you!

So I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised at all when I happened upon a small town in the southern foothills of the White Mountains, stopped to have a small bowl of graham cracker ice cream (it exists, and it’s delicious), and unexpectedly discovered, in the tiny town commons, a memorial in honor of Nathaniel Hawthorne.

I will admit I have never read a single novel by Hawthorne. The only thing I actually knew about him, up to that point, was that he wrote The Scarlet Letter (a novel my friend, Katy, absolutely loathes), and that he was so ashamed of his family’s connection to the Salem Witch Trials that he changed the spelling of his last name so he would likely never be associated with them.

But what’s his association with Plymouth, New Hampshire?

It turns out that Hawthorne and President Franklin Pierce, a native New Hampshirite, were BFFs. Like, for a really long time, going back to their college years. Pierce had invited Hawthorne to travel to Plymouth where they both hoped the crisp, mountain air would alleviate Hawthorne’s many ailments. It didn’t, and Hawthorne died in his sleep on May 19, 1864. Pierce discovered his body just hours later. And while this was likely a somewhat traumatizing moment for Pierce, who had endured great loss in his life, it may have been exactly how Hawthorne hoped to die. The New York Herald wrote, ““It is a singular and happy circumstance that friends who have lived so many years upon terms of unrestricted intimacy as Franklin Pierce and Nathaniel Hawthorne should in the final hours of one still be so near to the other as to enable the survivor to hear, as it were, the last whisper of his friend as he entered the portals of eternity.”

And so, the town of Plymouth perhaps endears itself to fans of literary tourism by memorializing Hawthorne’s unexpected passing in a hotel that used to exist just across the street from this park. And I have no problem with that. Hawthorne probably wouldn’t have a problem with it, either. It seems that he, too, was a fan of trauma tourism and, because of his work, he even introduced the concept to those who vacationed to New England in the 19th century.

In 1835, Hawthorne wrote and published a short story called “The Ambitious Guest.” It was based on the freak deaths of seven members of the Willey family and two others who died in an avalanche of rockfall the occurred on August 28, 1826. The area in which the disaster occurred experienced a boom in tourism shortly after the Willey family’s story got around. The Willey family had fled to what they believed was a safe house, which ended up being buried in the rockslide. The Willey house itself sustained no damage at all. Artists of all kinds flocked to Willey Mountain in the area of Crawford Notch. Painters Thomas Cole and John Frederick Kensett, along with Hawthorne, are often credited with either promoting the beauty and history of Willey Mountain, or just flat out exploiting the deaths of an entire family through their chosen art forms.

The title character in “The Ambitious Guest” has no name. He is simply a stranger whose arrival brings to the family a sense of excitement, a newfound desire to live a more meaningful life than the sleepy one they have chosen on the mountainside. They share with each other what they wish to have engraved on their tombstones, to tell others how they lived their lives. The children in the group joyfully announce all that they will accomplish before their deaths, now that they’ve been encouraged by this ambitious guest of theirs. The stranger, who refers to himself as “a nameless youth” declares, “But I cannot die till I have achieved my destiny. Then, let Death come! I shall have built my monument!”

Moments later, he ponders, “I wonder how mariners feel when the ship is sinking, and they, unknown and undistinguished, are to be buried together in the ocean–that wide and nameless sepulchre?” Suddenly, a rumbling from outside begins to sound and the family, with their guest, flees to their safe house. An avalanche of rockfall crushes them all. They are never found. They are buried together in the ocean of rock and debris–that wide and nameless sepulchre.

That kind of anonymity does not apply to Nathaniel Hawthorne obviously. He died in Plymouth, and by god, they’re going to announce it to everyone with this monument. There is a statue of him in Salem, Massachusetts, the place where was born but never felt like he belonged. And his grave site is located in Concord, Massachusetts, where he shares cemetery real estate with the likes of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Louisa May Alcott, and Henry David Thoreau. They were his equals. They were his friends. They were also his pallbearers. But Hawthorne, according to Emerson, suffered from his own loneliness. It is believed by some that his solitude and suffering are what ultimately killed him (it is now known that he died of stomach cancer). In death, Hawthorne is revered and celebrated. But in life, Hawthorne may have endured an existence aboard what his own creation, the nameless youth, called a sinking ship.

“I shall have built my monument!” This is what the stranger wanted, yet, could this really be what Hawthorne wanted? I don’t believe Plymouth is exploiting Hawthorne’s death at all. The monument is merely a desire to be a part of the Hawthorne narrative. Plymouth inspired Hawthorne and welcomed him whenever he came through. The town was clearly one facet of his life that helped keep his ship from sinking even sooner.

Here, in Ohio…

Every morning I wake up, stare out the window, and say to myself I can’t believe I get to live here. 

Our little house in the Northeast Ohio woods is surrounded by a creek and covered by a canopy of trees I have yet to identify. One of my favorites, the one I kept referring to as a weeping pine, was determined to be a Norwegian spruce by my father, an Ohioan by birth. It turns out Norwegian spruces were my grandfather’s favorite tree. A Dayton native, my grandfather passed away in South Florida just months after I was born. I have no memories of him, but it’s nice to know that our mutual affection for these Norwegian spruce tree still connects us.

While we have only lived here a month, we have been keeping ourselves busy at home, at school, and around town. My parents and younger brother came to visit for a week, prompting me to actually leave the house. I took them to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame one day and the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo the next. One morning my brother borrowed the car to drive to Cuyahoga Valley National Park and did a short solo hike to Brandywine Falls. Then he and my dad tested out Cleveland’s mass transit system and took a train down to Little Italy while my mom, Ella, and I shopped at Ulta. Poor Matt had to work all week, though he was able to break free a few times. Jobs – always getting in the way of all the fun.

One place we all really seem to enjoy is the village of Chagrin Falls. I find myself there at least once a week, either browsing the bookstore, meeting other Great Pyrenees parents (there are a lot of Pyrs in this area!), or walking down to view the waterfall. Of course, while my family was visiting we took them out there a few times: once to view the falls, another time to eat dinner, and, finally, to try Jeni’s Splendid Ice Cream (which was recommended by my brother at the insistence of a local-but-now-New Hampshire-based friend of his). Ice creams puts me in literal physical pain, but the Gooey Butter Cake and Lavender Wildberry flavors were worth it. I’m going back soon for a scoop of Birch and Marshmallow, stomach ailments be damned.

As I write this, all four dogs are snoozing away, some more loudly than others (ahem…Teddy). The squirrels are chattering away, as are the birds. I hear absolutely no traffic besides the scattering of leaves while the chipmunks scurry all over the place. I can’t see them but I hear them.

It’s so quiet here.

Go West!

We took a vacation. Like, a real vacation. And by real I mean there were no relatives to visit and no friends to catch up with, which has been the basis of all our other vacations. This time, though, the three of us piled into our van and headed west to visit places we’d never seen and to be surrounded by people we didn’t know. Do you remember my excitement at crossing the Mississippi River pretty much every single time I cross the Mississippi River? Well, last month I crossed the Rio Grande. TWICE! It was just as exciting, even though the river was barely a trickle in the dry New Mexico landscape.

As you’ve probably noticed, I haven’t posted in quite a while. An 8-week condensed graduate class on the History of the American West pretty much took up any desire I’ve had to write anything for the last two months. I was clever enough to make sure this class and our trip to the Rockies happened at the same time. Why? Because I have never in my life had a desire to go west. I just figured I’d read about something interesting in one of my textbooks that would get me excited. And it worked. Partly through New Mexico I saw a sign for the Chisholm Trail and didn’t shut up about its namesake and history for a good twenty minutes.

We spent our first night in Santa Fe. The town closes up pretty early, which surprised me since it’s both a booming arts community and historical tourist destination. After a quick dinner downtown and a stop at a local bookstore, the three of us went back to our hotel to binge on HGTV. We don’t have cable at home so this HGTV thing turned out to be a heavy theme on our family vacation.

We headed north the next morning, toward Colorado and Great Sand Dunes National Park. I don’t remember how I discovered this place even exists but the NPS website photographs are incredible! Basically, there are these gigantic sand dunes that sit right at the base of the Rocky Mountains near a town called Mosca. The elevation change from 1,200 feet above sea level in Oklahoma City to over 6,000 feet in Santa Fe had made us all tired and headachy. Even though visiting the Great Sand Dunes was my idea, I was starting to second-guess this side stop. My husband insisted, though, and thank goodness he did. It is really one of the coolest things I have even seen – the tallest sand dune is currently 699 feet high. Visitors can walk to the top and head back down the dunes…on sleds! Of course, walking from the parking lot to the visitors’ center was difficult enough because there is NO OXYGEN up there so I commend anyone who makes it ten feet up the dunes.

We rented a cabin in the tiny Colorado town of Twin Lakes. Our view was spectacular! We spent the first two days learning how to breathe (again, no oxygen!) and cursing ourselves every time we had to go up and down the stairs. Even turning over in bed left us winded. Since moving our bodies was such an uncomfortable thing to do, we tried not to do it. And this is where HGTV comes in. Like, HEAVILY.

We skied on day 3. It wasn’t a complete fail, but tempers flared and tears were shed. It’s probably best that I do not go into detail. Was it fun? After a while it was, and only for two of us. Will we do it again? Er…maybe the two of us who had fun will do it again, but skiing is an expensive sport. Why? And all the layers! When you’re that close to the sun, and the UV index is off the charts, the fewer clothes, the better. At least that’s what my mountain-top panic attack said. But, no details.

On most days the deer visited our cabin while we acclimatized to the thin air. We found a restaurant/brewery in nearby Buena Vista that we really, really loved. The town of Leadville, just north of the cabin, is full of all kinds of mining history. I convinced the family to humor me and we hit up the National Mining Hall of Fame & Museum. It was so interesting! And practically the only thing open in town…well, that and a Safeway grocery store. So Leadville was a bit disappointing, especially when one considers how much history could be shared in the off-season. (I hate that term.)

 

By the time we figured out how to breathe without oxygen, it was time to head home. I had been arguing for the Santa Fe route again, since we’d had no time at all to tour the town. My husband was arguing for Denver, though. Elle sided with him and, since I was outnumbered, we went to Denver after our 5-day stay in the mountain top cabin. Denver is really, really cool! Breweries everywhere, it seems, and the landscape is such a contrast within the city itself. To the west are the Rockies and to the east is nothing but flatness. It was a nice change to see flatness. For me, anyway.

I have no photos of Denver, unfortunately. Our short time there consisted of walking to Steuben’s for dinner (where I enjoyed the most delicious macaroni and cheese, hands down) and driving to a brewery downtown. There was more HGTV, but then we decided to spice up our television viewing by watching a spin-off of What Not to Wear called Love, Lust, or Run. When you don’t have cable, hotel television binging is always allowed as part of the vacation experience.

The next day we drove through Kansas. Everything you’ve ever heard about Kansas is probably true. There are no trees in Kansas but the speed limit is, like, 75 mph on the interstate, so that kind of makes up for it. Gets you out of Kansas a lot faster, I guess?

By the time we made it home Oklahoma City was in bloom and I had one week to research and write a 12-page paper on the history of the American bison. I wrote it in three days. Then, I think, I slept for two more. I decided to take a month off from school and it’s done wonders for my mental health. My family thinks I’m a nicer person when I’m not in school and they enjoy the fact that I’m cooking again. In fact, I woke up this morning and made blueberry pancakes then turned around and baked a bourbon bread pudding with homemade caramel sauce.

Free time is fun. Speaking of which, here’s what I’m up to book-wise:

What I’ve read:

The Martian by Andy Weir: One of the most enjoyable books I’ve ever read. There’s a lot of space-science and technology talk, but don’t let that get in the way. It’s one of the few books that’s made me laugh out loud. You’ll be recommending this one to all your friends, too.

The Returned by Jason Mott: I just finished this one last night and I was sad to let these characters go. However, if you’re familiar with the French version of the television series, the characters and plot are quite different from the book’s, but not so much that it distracts. It’s more like another version of a great, great story. The American version, though, is not streaming on Hulu or Netflix or anything else, so I don’t know how closely it follows Mott’s book. Read it, though.

The Bear by Claire Cameron: I listened to this on audio while traveling. The story is told from the point of view of a child. It’s…okay. It’s not Room, but good enough. And it’s always interesting (I think) to try to see a story from a perspective outside of the norm. I recently discovered a book about the Battle of Appomattox told from the perspective of a rabbit. I’m not sure how I feel about that one, but it’s getting decent reviews.

I Am Malala by Malala Yousafzai: Malala spends little time talking about the event that led to her becoming a household name, and more time sharing the history of Pakistan and her family. It’s a beautiful story.

What I’m reading:

Redeployment by Phil Klay: I’m taking in this collection of essays little by little. It’s overwhelming, the sadness. Everyone I’ve told about this book has been warned about the language and the violence. It’s a part of war. But I’ve also mentioned that I believe anyone who is considering enlisting in military service should read this book, just so they’re aware of what they’re getting into. I read maybe one essay every few days. I can’t do more than that in one sitting.

There Once Was a Woman Who Tried to Kill Her Neighbor’s Baby by Ludmilla Petrushevskaya: Don’t let the title throw you off. There is a short story included that is about that very thing, a woman who tries to kill her neighbor’s baby, but it’s only a few pages long. It’s a good story, as are all the others I’ve read so far. If you like dark fairy tales and otherwordly characters or parallel universes, this is the short story collection for you.

Fall in Southeastern Oklahoma

Things I did this past weekend:

1. Got a surprise root canal. As in the specialist immediately said, “Yeah, I would take care of that right now if I were you.” Surprise! The biggest surprise was learning that his father and mine were both stationed at the same base in Northern Italy at the same time – over thirty years ago. His sister and I were in the same grade. There were only two 2nd grade teachers at the school. That means there’s a 50/50 chance his sister and I were in the same classroom in 1983.

2. Immediately drove 3 hours to Southeastern Oklahoma to accompany my husband on an off-roading trip. Except I never actually went off-roading. My historiography professor suddenly decided to move up a fairly important assignment by three weeks, making this weekend not one of relaxation but a weekend of trying to snag bits and pieces of internet connection while in a BFE bed & breakfast-type house in the mountains. In the meantime, my professor continued to be argumentative regarding my research topic, insisting that I was making things too hard on myself, and wasting my precious laptop battery before finally agreeing that I should’ve stuck with my first topic.  Oh, yes. I forgot to bring my laptop charger because I, ladies and gentlemen, am a freaking genius.

3. Rediscovered the joy of getting in a car and just driving until I find something interesting. I found three something-interestings.

• Clayton Lake State Park

• Choctaw Village and the Choctaw Nation Capitol Building & Museum (which, sadly, was closed)

• K-Kountry Kitchen II. Not I, but II! I have no idea where K-Kountry Kitchen I is, or if it even existed at one time.

A confession:

These photos above show that fall is happening in Southeastern Oklahoma, and the area we visited is closer to Louisiana than it is to Oklahoma City. When we returned home to Oklahoma City only two days later, I was certain the colors had changed while we were gone. I appreciated it. Unfortunately, it looks like we might be getting ourselves some snow here in the next week.

This is not the confession.

Of course, the possibility of snow bothers me. It means things are turning cold. Very, very cold (our high on Wednesday will be 36 degrees). On our way back home from tiny Clayton, Oklahoma, we were listening to A Prairie Home Companion on NPR. Garrison Keillor was in Duluth, Minnesota, hosting the show with various musical guests and the very cool mayor of the city. Locals joked about the weather and Garrison sang songs about how skinny people would most certainly die in that kind of chilly environment.

Here’s the confession…

We almost moved to Minneapolis this year. Well, I say almost but we’ll never know how close we came. A job opportunity got us very excited (the kid was, surprisingly, not very excited). There were phone calls and interviews. There were online house hunts and neighborhood research. There was a scheduled visit to the city. A few days before that visit, though, I called it off. Something told me don’t do it. We discussed it as a family and decided we’d stay put.

Just a few minutes ago I saw this on my Facebook feed. The same winter storm is heading toward my childhood hometown of Marquette, Michigan. Meanwhile, in South Florida, they’re experiencing record cold temperatures in the mid- to high-60s.

Winter. What a fickle, fickle beast.

The hot tub is broken again but I have access to Vitamin D. And there is about an hour more of sunlight left in the day. That means I can enjoy fall for a little while longer before the cold weather moves in tonight and covers everything in frost. One meteorologist referred to this arctic front as a “bomb cyclone”. What happened to a simple arctic blast? Or the polar vortex? I’m totally convinced now that Oklahoma-based weather people just make this shit up.

A Tour of the Midwest: Part Five

For this vacation we had an actual agenda, and we followed it quite well. Most of our days in Wisconsin were left open so that we could reunite with family members or head off on spontaneous day trips. Chicago, on the other hand, was a well-planned and, I might add, a well-executed adventure in timing. My husband should be a travel agent.

The plan was to visit five major Chicago attractions in just three days. We managed to get through only four. Part of the trick of timing is to shell out ridiculous amounts of money for meals from museum cafes. A Cuban sandwich is never worth $12, but sometimes convenience is.

DAY ONE:

Museum of Science & Industry

We left Little Cedar Lake at 8am and headed straight to the Museum of Science & Industry. This really was our first stop, before we’d even checked in at the hotel. It’s a great museum to take kids since it encourages hands-on interaction. This, by the way, is also one of its drawbacks. Chaos aside, all of us managed to find something we enjoyed. Elle almost signed herself up for a dissection class (she’s into forensics and anatomy) but backed out when she learned they would be dissecting a cow’s eyeball (the one body part that makes her squeamish). Matt was excited to tour the U-505, a German u-boat captured by the US Navy in 1944. It has quite the storied history. However, while our CityPASS museum tickets allowed us a free guided tour aboard the U-505, the tours were all completely full by mid-morning. There was never any indication given to us that this could happen, or that we even had to sign up for the tour. Shame on you, museum staff. You disappointed us here, and I’m sure many other folks were disappointed, too. For this reason, we gave the Museum of Science & Industry two fat thumbs down.

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After checking into our hotel we had dinner at an Italian restaurant where a strange man, apparently a regular, proceeded to engage us in conversation with a set of plastic eyeballs he used to puppetize his right hand. He was originally from Tulsa, and a retired librarian. And odd. He was very, very odd, but he gave us some great recommendations.

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DAY TWO:

Field Museum

Oh, Field Museum, how fantastic are you!?!?! I could have spent all day, nay ALL WEEK!, in this place. There are dinosaurs (hello, Sue!), minerals and gems, birds from around the world, Egyptian tombs and child mummies, and a Maori hut! Can you believe I actually agreed to pass on the Plants of the World exhibit because we were running out of time? Now I have to go back.

That Maori hut blew my mind. I’d spent so many months last year writing my thesis on the American narrative and our culture of national and personal memory. Part of my thesis compared other cultures’ earliest personal memories based on what parts of the world the children were raised. Yes, I know this rant is a bit off-topic, but it explains why I was so enamored of this structure. Americans and other westerners are from very individual-based cultures and recall first memories from around the age of four. Asian-based cultures, many of which reflect nationalism, avoid individualism which reflects in a person’s first personal memory much later in childhood, usually around the age of six. The Maori tribe of New Zealand maintains a culture that prizes personal family history above all else, and they often recall memories from the age of two. TWO! And here I was standing in a still-used meeting house? Whoa.

Finally, my thesis research can be used to inform someone other than my thesis advisory board! And now back to our regularly scheduled touristing…

Shedd Aquarium

The Shedd Aquarium is another favorite of ours! There was a dolphin and beluga show (which a staff member graciously let us see for free), penguins, playful sea lions and river otters, etc. Really, it’s the same thing you see at any aquarium around the country, but this one was near perfection. Again we had lunch in the cafe, with a gorgeous view of Lake Michigan. A beluga whale talked to us, and a sea lion was also quite the conversationalist. One of the coolest things was the shark fetus!

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Dinner? A Chicago-style deep dish pizza from Gino’s East, delivered to our hotel room because I’m lazy.

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DAY THREE:

Willis Tower

Most people know this as the Sears Tower (and some refuse to call it by its new name). Willis Tower’s Skydeck was going to be my biggest challenge, or so I thought. I’d already had to back out of climbing to the top of Oklahoma City’s Skytrail and that’s only 8 stories. The Skydeck is 103 stories. The only way to get there is to be crammed into an elevator with about 30 other people for a 60-second ride to the top. It’s not a quick trip down either, so I knew if I was going to panic that I’d have to do it in a very controlled way. BUT I HAD TO MAKE IT TO THE TOP. PERSONAL CHALLENGE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Let’s back up an hour or so to my first ride on Chicago’s L train. I’m a fairly seasoned DC Metro veteran, yet it dawned on me that the Metro is a much smoother ride than the L train. The fastest way from our hotel to Willis Tower was via the subway. That little nagging voice in the back of my head that kept saying Willis Tower Willis Tower Willis Tower clearly had no idea what riding the L train was like. I rode the train out of necessity, but I don’t ever want to do it again.

Willis Tower? No problem. Except I have to touch a wall, or a human being, on the elevator, and it doesn’t matter to me if I know who you are. It might matter to you, but I was lucky enough to ride up and down with a bunch of strangers who didn’t care. Another hint – bring gum, to pop your ears. I felt like I was yelling the whole time because I couldn’t hear anything.

The view is absolutely incredible, though.

By the time we made it down to solid ground again, we were all exhausted. Matt’s plan was for us to hit up the Goose Island Brewery, accessible via another line on the L train. All above-ground, this ride was easier for me to deal with. But after walking block after block from the train station, deeper into an obviously industrial side of town, it was learned that the brewery is simply that – a brewery. No restaurant, no tasting room, nothing.

Remember the crap my family gave me about Ella’s Deli in Madison, Wisconsin? This is where Matt and I called it Even Stevens, pretty much while we were standing in front of a property filled with shipping and storage containers. Notice THERE IS NO RESTAURANT. But there was plenty of whine…we were hangry, and tired, and hot, and hangry (again).

In lieu of the Adler Planetarium, attraction #5, we decided that shopping at Ulta for makeup would put us girls in a better mental state. And it worked. A few hours earlier I had snapped while eating a French dip in the Eleven City Diner, which we’d found after a train ride back into downtown from Goose Island Brewery. There were tears. There were apologies. There were new plans, most of which involved retail therapy and heading back to the hotel to binge on cable television.

I don’t want to rehash the hellish experience that was my $28 pasta takeout from the hotel restaurant that evening, so instead I’ll leave you with more photographs from Chicago. It’s a city I’m happy to have visited, but I’m happier to be home in Oklahoma City.

A Tour of the Midwest: Part Four

We are Green Bay Packers fans. That fact is one of the first things people learn about me or my family. Politics and religious beliefs can be overlooked within our clan. It’s where your loyalty lies within the NFL that matters. For example, before Matt and I were married he claimed no loyalty to any team. He isn’t much of a sports guy. But then he joined my family in South Carolina for the holidays while we were still dating and woke up to find his very own Cheesehead under the Christmas tree.

He’s a fan now, too.

When he and I were planning our trip to Wisconsin, I told him, “There is no way I can be that close to Mecca and not visit!” If you’re a Cheesehead, you understand that Mecca means Lambeau Field. If you’re not a Cheesehead, well…

Matt, Elle, and I headed to Green Bay on Sunday afternoon and checked into our hotel, the Tundra Lodge. It has a waterpark inside! We took a few relaxing trips on the lazy river and spent some time outside in the giant hot tub. Later we decided to go to a local brewery for dinner.

Titletown Brewery is now a brewery and restaurant, but it used to be the Chicago and North Western Train Depot. For forty years the Packers used this station to travel back and forth for away games in Chicago and Milwaukee. It is located next to the Fox River in downtown Green Bay, and across the street is the Neville Public Museum.

If you go there to eat, I highly recommend the cucumber salad. Matt recommends the poutine. They also make their own root beer with an old family recipe. It comes highly recommended by Elle, who I sometimes think is a root beer connoisseur.

Moving on past a horrible night’s sleep (preceded, however, by hours and hours of CABLE TELEVISION!) (which we obviously don’t get at home or I wouldn’t be so excited about it), the three of us checked out of the hotel and went straight to Lambeau Field. With tour tickets in hand, we waited while the family drove up from West Bend then we all had lunch at Curly’s Pub. There was more poutine and even more fried cheese curds and hamburgers with the Packers “G” grilled into the buns.

And then…

It was so cool to visit this place with my family – my parents from Florida, my aunt and uncle from West Bend, my husband and kiddo from Oklahoma City. I only wish my brothers could’ve been there. I mean, we all saw the world’s biggest G together! Family memories, man. Family memories.

There was so much to take in – over 90 minutes straight of Lambeau history. Our tour guide was just a kid when he sat down on the bleacher seats during the infamous Ice Bowl but he told me that even employees don’t get special perks to attend games.You can add your name to the season tickets waiting list but it’ll be about 14,000 years (yes, fourteen thousand years) before you get called up.

That patch of concrete is a significant part of the Green Bay Packers history. It has been moved from each stadium the Packers have called their home field to finally land here at Lambeau. That means every single Green Bay Packer has run across this exact concrete patch since the team played its first game.

The Brett Favre situation is still discussed, though I think without so many hard feelings. Reggie White is the last Green Bay Packer to retire his number here. Favre is expected to retire his number here, too. In fact, the rumor is he’ll do it before the year is out. And wouldn’t that be a good pair of names to see next to each other again? Reggie White and Brett Favre, together again at Lambeau Field.

Exhausted from walking and from spending so much money in the Pro Shop (Dog collars! Coffee mugs! Children’s books written by Donald Driver!), we all went our separate ways. I said goodbye to my parents that evening and our little family of three packed up for the trip to Chicago the next morning.

 

A Tour of the Midwest: Part Three

A few months ago I listened to the Laverne & Shirley theme song a ridiculous number of times. That song, and the whole show, really, help keep vivid a memory I have of touring my first brewery in Milwaukee, which was the Pabst Brewery. I was young, too young to enjoy the samples of free beer at the end of the tour, but I remember watching the bottles fly past me on the assembly line. There were high hopes that a glove would stow itself away on the neck of one of those bottles and wave to me as it made its way out into the world, a la Laverne & Shirley.

Everything I just mentioned is important to me for these reasons:

1. The glove on the bottleneck never appeared. Disappointing, but life goes on.
2. The next time I took a brewery tour I was of legal age, but then I was too pregnant to enjoy the free samples of beer at the end.
3. While in Milwaukee this month, we had lunch at Lakefront Brewery but decided to skip the tour. Later in the week, while standing in the atrium of Lambeau Field, a gentleman struck up a conversation with my husband about Lakefront Brewery and mentioned the tour. “Oh, it’s one of the best in the city. They have the whole group sing the theme song from Laverne & Shirley at the end!” OH MY GOD. WHY DID WE NOT TAKE THE TOUR!?!?!?!

So, here. Just because.

MILWAUKEE

We didn’t plan too much of our day around Milwaukee. Matt and I had three goals. Visit the Pabst Brewery gift store. Eat lunch at a brewery. Dip our toes into Lake Michigan (okay, that one was my goal).

The Pabst Brewery was fairly easy to find. I mean, you kind of drive into the area like it’s a subdivision or the town’s historic district, with signs a’blazin’: YOU ARE HERE!

Lakefront Brewery is situated in the middle of a what looks like a condominium farm. A former industrial area? Probably. At least that was my guess after finding the nearby train bridge had been turned into a pedestrian walk-through. And there was thistle, just like here in Oklahoma!

It’s beautiful there. I like how the wild things are very obviously trying to take the area back, and I especially like how the people around here let it.

After a lunch of polish sausage on a stick and fried cheese curds, we headed toward Lake Michigan via Brady Street and the rich neighborhoods of the lakeshore. There was a beach volleyball tournament going on which involved a national championship. Naturally this left us with nowhere to park. And here is where we leave Milwaukee.

PORT WASHINGTON

Forgive me, BUT MY GAWD THIS IS ONE OF THE CUTEST TOWNS I HAVE EVER SEEN! Our timing is impeccable seeing as we Oklahomans rolled into this quaint little town at the exact moment they were testing their tornado sirens. Was it noon? Yep. Was it Saturday? Yep. We know the drill.

The sky was a bit overcast when we got into Port Washington, but the air was not cold (believe me, I’m just as surprised as you are that I didn’t freeze in the 70 degree weather). We spotted a Duluth Trading Company shop at the port. Matt needed pants. I needed a hat with a strap. Elle needed socks. So we shopped.

Just across from this small strip of stores is the harbor and marina. Next door was some kind of fishing derby. And there were two walkways that led visitors to separate lighthouses. We chose the one that warned of slippery rocks, a sign blaring DO NOT ENTER in red (to convey seriousness, always use red), and joined the throngs of other trespassers. It was probably the most dangerous thing I’ve done this century.

Even if I’d fallen in, it would have been worth it (I spotted the lifesaver rings way before I stepped foot on that breakwater – those of us riddled with anxiety are always prepared). The sky even cleared for us.

Did I get to dip my toe into Lake Michigan? No. I’m actually okay with this. That water is COLD. This time I chose to stay dry and warm.

Next up: Our family’s pilgrimage to Mecca.

A Tour of the Midwest: Part One

We’ve just returned from a 10-day vacation around parts of the Midwest. It went by too quickly, yet at the same time I was thrilled to pull into our driveway last night, unpack, and crawl into my own bed. Normal life resumes. The 13-hour drive from Chicago treated us much better than the 20-hour drive from North Florida last summer (a torturous haul I wouldn’t recommend to anyone).

During our short stay in Northern Wisconsin, I considered having the family drive a few extra hours north to Upper Michigan where my would-have-been high school reunion was taking place. Late last year I was invited to attend, even though I had moved away from this tiny Michigan town when I was twelve years old. Keeping in mind all the other hours we would be car-bound led me to stay put. A good decision, I think.

How do I recap this vacation? We visited eight cities – some of them were big, most of them were small, and two of them were Springfields. Missouri has the most beautiful roadside wildflowers; Illinois has the most boring landscape. Lake Michigan has cliffs and seaspray and it is breathtaking. And, for just a little while, I felt like I was on top of the world.

So, how do I recap this vacation? Place by place! Or segment by segment, really. The distance between Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and Green Bay, Wisconsin is approximately 976 miles. We made a few stops in between.

*****

SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS

We actually spent the first night in Springfield, Missouri, with my in-laws and had breakfast there. We made a spontaneous stop in Springfield, Illinois because of my Abraham Lincoln-mania and had a convenient lunch there. My husband is the one who pointed out our “eating in Springfields” trend that day. Dinner was not in a Springfield, sadly. But hey, IT’S ABRAHAM LINCOLN’S HOUSE, Y’ALL!

I am starting my master’s degree in American history next month, so what kind of student would I be if I let this opportunity pass me by? We took the tour of Lincoln’s house and learned a lot. Too much for me to retain. What I do remember is this: the top photo is of the renovated house. Lincoln bought the home as a one-story building that had only a few rooms. As his fortune grew, so did his house. The kitchen, pictured above, ended up being a favorite of Mary Todd’s. When Abe was elected and readying the family for a move into the White House, she begged him to allow her to bring this stove. It was top of the line back then. Her husband assured her the White House was adequately equipped with a functioning stove and she finally agreed to drop the subject.

The bedroom featured above belonged to one of the boys, though I never did catch which one. Truthfully, this was my favorite room (besides the nanny’s). It was the only one I can remember that didn’t feature gaudy wallpaper and a blindingly hideous curtain fabric (again, besides the nanny’s). I’m not knowledgeable enough in historic preservation to decide if that’s the fault of the Lincolns or historical interpreters. The photograph of the house is purely for tourist purposes: it is the most popular angle from which to capture a shot.

This photo featured below was a happy accident that led me to find my own personal connection to Lincoln. The reason for this trip to Wisconsin was to visit with my mother’s side of the family, half of whom are Hamlins. And yes, it turns out they are related to Hannibal Hamlin, Lincoln’s VP. HISTORY NERD SCORE! Another Hamlin-esque note of interest: Hannibal Hamlin’s son, Charles, was at the Ford’s Theater the night Lincoln was assassinated. When you think about how many presidential assassinations Lincoln’s son, Robert, witnessed, it makes you wonder how much smaller the political world was back then. Or is that just me?

MADISON, WISCONSIN

I take full responsibility for this slip-up. Here’s the thing: my daughter’s nickname is Ella and I have known for years about Ella’s Deli in Madison. I’ve been instructed, for my daughter’s sake, to visit Ella’s Deli one day. So the family agreed to drive nearly 90 minutes off our travel route to have dinner at Ella’s Deli. How could we not? WE WERE SO CLOSE! And be sure to try the noodle kugel!!! (whatever the hell that is)

I’m still trying to process this experience. It was an alarming super-sensory adventure. The menu itself is 20 pages long, often featuring the same dish multiple times but it SO MANY DIFFERENT FONTS AND COLORS!!!!!!!!! There were trains making the rounds near the ceiling and mechanical toys flying above our heads. Near our table was an Elvis the Pelvis who sprung out of the wall like a cuckoo bird. Above my husband was a pantiless Betty Boop doll (who’d seen better days) swinging lazily on a swing. It was some creepy, overwhelming shit.

We watched more than one kid lick the windows all while a little girl sitting behind me coughed and sniffled daintily just inches from my hair. It was disturbing to realize the dried…er, stuff (?) on the menu might not be food at all and was probably months-old kid boogers. Ella, my Ella, hilariously declared that she would wait out the next 72 hours to see if she’d caught a virus. The whole family was concerned. (Note: WE ARE FINE! Our next virus watch wouldn’t hit us again until I accidentally stuck my finger in my mouth after touching a Chicago subway rail. Ewww.) Check out the website and decide for yourself, unless your eyes explode from this visual circus, if you’d like to visit one day. Don’t forget the Excedrin.

As for the noodle kugel – I still don’t know what the hell it is, but up there is a picture of it. It wasn’t necessarily awful, instead I found it to be surprisingly edible. Imagine your mom’s creamy homemade macaroni and cheese, baked to a tender crisp on top, and sprinkled with…cinnamon? And dipped in sour cream? I ate it because I was hungry but I don’t ever want to eat it again, that’s for sure.

(I took the hit for making my family suffer through Ella’s Deli but things evened out later during our trip when my husband suggested we take the L train in Chicago to some brewery restaurant that didn’t exist and had us walking around for blocks in the industrial part of the city.)

Next stop: Little Cedar Lake

Reveling with the Fishes

Bull sharks at the Oklahoma Aquarium. I bet they miss the ocean, too.

In a roundabout way, and hardly as dramatic as I may make it sound right now, I kind of lost my marbles a few weekends ago. Utter loneliness, boredom, feelings of uselessness, and cabin fever have all taken their toll on me. So badly, in fact, that I demanded my husband find a job somewhere near the coast and move us all to an ocean town immediately. Instead, he suggested we take a weekend trip to Tulsa.

It worked, guys. It totally worked. And now I’m calm.

While I was genuinely having a good time in Tulsa touring a retired American Airlines jet and eating Scotch eggs (not simultaneously), I wasn’t aware that any particular feelings were missing. As someone born with a black cloud over my head, I immerse myself in those situations fully, in those moments when I’m happy enough. I feel like if I ask for anything more I’ll be branded as boring, selfish, or, quite frankly, undeserving.

Oh, it’s such crap, I know. But that’s sometimes just how my mind works.

And then it hit me the following day, that moment when things went from happy enough to…well, I don’t know what you call it, but the feeling is pretty fantastic.

It’s funny how our sense of smell can lighten our mood when it catches just the right scent. In the summertime, it’s the smell of charcoal grills and sunscreen. In the winter, it’s pine trees and maple syrup. The right scent for me, for just this weekend, happened to be stagnant aquarium water, but with equal parts fishiness and salt (it’s really not as disgusting as it sounds). A precise measurement, if you ask me.

On Sunday afternoon, I found myself standing next to a turtle exhibit, dipping my nose down closer to the surface and inhaling deeply. A poorly designed replica of a salt water marsh, complete with a fake egret, actually sent my heart racing. The puffer fish, the parrot fish, and even my Resting Bitch Face broke into a smile.

All those neurons that occasionally shoot off messages of happiness around my brain? They were pinging like crazy.

A smiling puffer fish

A smiling parrot fish

Note to self on how to endure future winters:

• Vitamin D
• SAD lamp
• acquire tangerines from parents’ backyard tree
• coconut scented hot tub water
• visit an aquarium
• close eyes and listen to this