Musings from a Mad Cow

emily · October 27, 2016

As I have bemoaned, the house renovation has taken over more of my life that I would like. Work obligations have pushed many renovation chores onto the weekends, and the poor Vachette has been dragged to all of them. So, we took her to a craft store and told her she could buy any Halloween decoration she wanted. The fact everything Halloween related was on sale made this Mommy feel extra generous.

And what fun we had! Even this bah humbug of a mother. Seriously, who knew there was such a thing as Halloween bouquets. The Vachette and I really delighted in making our house “spooky”.

Of course, no Halloween home would be complete without jack o’lanterns. We had a little pumpkin carving party with our tenants this past weekend. A merry Halloween to you all!

emily · October 12, 2016

When we came home from our Europe trip with a good six weeks before the start of the school year, I thought about making a bucket list of local activities, fun that could only be done in the summer. Beaches to explore, playgrounds to check out; boat rides, lighthouses, amusement parks, etc. But then the renovation happened, and with it, all good intentions got demolished like the hideous floors and the layers of dated wall paper. No matter, I thought. We had a fantastic time on our mega-trip. I’ll plan a bucket list for fall, when the renovation dust will be close to settling, and we’ll have our new household routine done to science.

Wishful thinking. Three weeks into the new season, the peak season for life in New England, and I have no bucket list. We did get the Vachette out apple-picking, a family fall tradition, so that has to count for something. And September was so warm that the trees are reacting as slowly as I am when it comes to making the most of the season.

I asked the Vachette if she would like to do anything fall-related this weekend. Her response: rake up leaves! Unfortunately, there aren’t that many leaves on the ground to rake up yet, but Halloween is nineteen days away, so maybe we are better off focusing on costumes and jack o’lanterns, and maybe we can up our Halloween house decorating game this year. Maybe that’s a better use of my time than brainstorming a fall bucket list that would be easier to achieve next year, when I won’t have to run to tile stores on my weekends.

emily · September 27, 2016

I like bright, natural light (I know you could ask “why do I live in New England?”. I really like bright, natural light when I am cooking. So that seems like no-brainer focus point in planning our new kitchen. But, like some many things with our quirky house, that is easier said than done.

One of the challenges with original kitchen (isn’t it lovely?) was the windows. More precisely, the size of the windows. The kitchen had three windows, none of which were equal in size and placement. Two of them, when push came to shove, were close enough in size that we could have possibly finagled something, but the third one was so glaringly big in comparison that creativity was not an option. And it was so oddly placed that the refrigerator was right in front of it when we moved into the place.

Long story short, we were left with two options: keep the windos and arrange in countertops in some creative fashion around them; or, get new windows, patch the holes in the siding left by the old ones, and have a more conventional countertop layout. We decided to go with option two.

Clearly, only minimal patching has taken place so far. But one day, we are going to have to do something about our soon-to-be mixed matched siding. And we’ll just have to hope no one can see this side of our house from the street.

emily · September 22, 2016

On this first day of fall, or autumn if you are in the UK, let’s take a moment to consider why there are two words for the season that starts with the autumnal equinox and ends with the winter solstice. Before you think too hard, read this wonderful article summing up some of the reasons why this season, unlike the other three, has two names. After all, a rose by any other name should still smell as sweet, and the sap from any maple tree should taste just as good on pancakes. But I digress.

Finish reading? Good.

First of all, I already knew the reason why Americans say “fall” while Brits say “autumn” had something to do with when the British started colonizing North America. But those older terms for spring and fall — Lent/Lenten and Harvest— how fabulous are they. Especially Harvest. So appropriately literal. Naturally, anything appropriately literal makes me think of German, and the German word for fall, Herbst, sounds a lot like Harvest.

The article makes reference to romance language names for spring, like printemps in French. If you take that term literally, I get this idea of a sense of newness. The Modern Greek word for spring, άνοιξη, means opening. Perhaps, the most apropos season name is the Greek word for summer, καλοκαίρι, which literally means “good weather”. Anyone who has spent time in Greece in the summer would likely agree with that. It never rains and there is not a hint of the miserable humidity that plagues the East Coast of the US in the summer.

Of course, in New England, there is no better season than fall. Regardless which word you use for the season.

(Photo of New Hampshire in Autumn via Someone35)

emily · September 15, 2016

Thanks to the freedom of Kindergarten, I’ve been doing more writing than I have done in years. I love the Vachette, and I love being her mother, but how I love flexing some writing muscle again. Serendipitously, the universe sent me this interesting list of writing tips by Rebecca Solnit, a writer I admire greatly.

I love the fact the first thing she lists is to write. Write, write, write. The most important thing you can do as a writer is to write. I hear you, sister. And now that I have more time, it feels so glorious to just write.

The other most relevant point she is makes, or at least to my current circumstance, is time. Time, time, time. There was nothing like motherhood to teach me some valuable lessons about time. Like how precious it is, how limited it is, how quickly it flies if you don’t create pockets within the day for a specific task. Because otherwise, it will never get done.

And thus, now that I have time on my hands, I write. Unless I have to look at light fixtures. Then I drink.

(Quill and pen photo via Craig Sheldon)

emily · September 14, 2016

There are some people out there who have a really good sense of design. They can spend hours pouring over pictures of beautiful home ideas and then curate them together into something fabulous. Unfortunately, I’m not one of them. Don’t get me wrong. I can, and do, appreciate the aesthetics of a beautiful space. I’m just bad at creating them. Even more unfortunate for me, Mr. Mad Cow and I are several weeks into a big home renovation project, and all I want to do is stick my hand in the sand until a new kitchen and second bathroom magically appear without me having to make a single decision. Too bad it doesn’t work that way.

In order to afford owning a home in the neighborhood we live in, Mr. Mad Cow and I had one choice: a fixer-upper. So that’s what we did. Our kitchen came with no counters, no cabinets, a hodgepodge of random holes and some seriously hideous wall paper. So, after spending a good six months making do with bookshelves and some Ikea butcher blocks, we contacted an architect and got this renovation project started. Because, clearly, this was too big project for us to handle on our own.

Fast forward several design options, contract bids, and one building permit later, we got to briefly move out (our contractor respects Massachusetts lead paint laws) while the pictured-above beauty got demolished and we got to start our kitchen from scratch.

I wish I could say this whole project is fun, but as I said, I am not a design person. I get easily overwhelmed by too many choices. Fortunately, we’re still very much in the not sexy phase, plumbing and wiring, so my design hand has not been forced yet, but that day is soon coming. And even more fortunately, Mr. MC is a mad cocktail maker, so I can at least look forward to a stiff drink after making every hair-yanking decision. Because that’s what looking at light fixtures is doing to me. Having my refrigerator in my living room is easy in comparison.

Serenity now.

emily · September 9, 2016

Yesterday was the primary day for Massachusetts state and local elections. (The Massachusetts presidential primary took place this past March.) Local elections don’t get the same amount of turnout as presidential elections. To be perfectly honest, since turning eighteen, I rarely gave them much thought. I either didn’t bother with voting, or, in the case of local Pennsylvania elections that affected my parents, I filled out an absentee ballot according to my parents’ wishes. Not the best example of informed and active citizenship, I know.

When we were living in Switzerland, Mr. Mad Cow and I always voted absentee ballot in federal elections. Plenty of Swiss elections took place when we lived there, but, as non-citizens, they were mostly a sideshow. Especially the blatantly racist SVP posters. Click here to see what I mean. As expats, it’s all too easy to sit on the sidelines and think “not my problem”, or when it came to the SVP ads, “at least it’s not the US who looks politically bad”.

But now that we are back in the US (at least for the time being; you never really know with recovering expats), Mr. MC and I are making an effort to be better citizens, especially when it comes to local elections. I made a point to vote yesterday, while Mr. MC made a point to request and mail an absentee ballot since he could not go to the polls in person. Then, during the Vachette’s dinner, a Get-Out-The-Vote (GOTV) volunteer knocked on the door to make sure we made it to the polling stations for the candidate we pledged to support. This brings me to canvassing, and the power of a face-to-face conversation.

In August, I did more than put my money where my mouth is. I did some canvassing for the Hillary campaign in coastal New Hampshire. I have to admit to being somewhat nervous about the whole thing, but I went anyway. After I was paired with another volunteer with previous canvassing experience, a 20+ year veteran New Hampshire canvasser gave us all a pep talk and a general introduction to why canvassing can be so helpful for a campaign. In particular, he said a face-to-face conversation can make a real difference in getting someone to engaged in the voting process.

Two days later, at home in Somerville, I got a knock on my door. It was a canvasser for our incumbent state senator who was facing a primary challenger.The veteran NH canvasser was right. I had seen election related signs around town, but I hadn’t given the primary election much thought. By having someone come to my door and talk to me about the upcoming election, I was inspired to get more engaged in the process. I listened to what the canvasser had to say. I did some research of my own into both candidates, and then, most important of all, I wrote the election down on my calendar, so I wouldn’t forget to go vote.

And vote I did. The Vachette was pretty excited about the sticker.

(Phote of the “I Voted” sticker via Dwight Burdette)

emily · September 6, 2016

Today is a momentous day in the Mad Cow household. The Vachette has started Kindergarten! She is both ready and excited for this next step, and I am excited for her. I have no doubt she is ready for the challenge ahead of her. She has grown into the most wonderful little person. I may be biased, but just the fact she exists makes the world a better place.

I am, however, somewhat ambivalent about this milestone. As you may have surmised, I have been the primary parent in our house for the past five years. Every family needs to make the best choice for their situation, and in our case, it made the most sense for me to stay at home. For all the ups and downs Mr. MC and I have experienced over the course of parenthood, I have no regrets about my choice to stay home with the Vachette. That said, mommying is physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausting in a way that does not leave room for much else. So I’m excited to now have the time and space to do something other than mommying, but I’m also going to miss her. Metaphorically, she will always be my baby, but, now that she’s in Kindergarten, there’s no doubt. She’s a big girl. I hope the world is ready for her.

One more quick thing. I want to make a shout out to neighborhood schools. I cannot begin to say what a luxury it is to be able to walk to school, even in the rain.

emily · August 30, 2016

Coming back from vacation can often be a downer for me. So just imagine how it felt to come home after five fantastic weeks in Europe visiting some of my favorite places (Karpathos is always a pleasure) and reuniting with some of my favorite people (you know who you are). I had some great intentions about making the month of August awesome. But of course that is easier said than done when you have a major house renovation project ready to start and you plan to live in said house while all the chaos goes on.

Instead, much of the month has been an exercise in the Serenity prayer:

{Deity of your choice’s name here} grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can; and the wisdom to know the difference.

In the realm of house renovation, there is much one cannot change. Like when the permit fairy at city hall grants you permission to start your project. Then there are lead paint laws that require you to get your under-six-year-old out of the house for demolition. And let’s not forget all those not-so-sexy structural surprises that come up with a 100+ year old building, i.e. floor joists that need better support.

But at least the project has finally started, and school starts next week, so it can only get better from here, right?

emily · August 5, 2016

Considering a day trip to Maine, I looked up the hours for Colby’s, our favorite breakfast restaurant in Portsmouth, NH; and an ideal stop on a drive to Maine. Through my search, I came across a quote-worthy Yelp review:

It is very small, has outdoor seating available, and an air conditioner which is rarely turned on as northeasterners always have to suffer just a little.

OMG! That line about northeasterners and their need to suffer, it’s funny because it’s true. And this northeasterner is guilty as charged. Especially when it comes to air-conditioning. Seriously, you should see how manic I get about the thermostat in the summer.

For the first time in my adult life, I live in a place with central air. In fact, Mr. Mad Cow and I had it installed last fall within a week of buying our house. Boston is not exactly known for brutally hot summers like Washington, DC — central air is definitely a luxury feature in these parts — but summers can be relatively sticky in the city, especially if you don’t live on the ground floor. And let’s be honest. Open windows and fans don’t do much to combat humidity, which can make an already unpleasant heat wave more miserable.

Our unit has two thermostats, one for each floor. You would be surprised to see how many times I find myself running upstairs in a panic if I hear the air-conditioner come on. God forbid cold air is blasting through an empty floor. Then before I go to bed at night, I make sure the thermostat on our main floor is set to a relatively high temperature (85F/29.44C) so there is almost no chance the air-conditioner will come on during the night. Then when we wake up in the morning, I make sure the upstairs thermostat is turned off, and then I open up the windows downstair to fill the air with fresh air. Even on the hottest days, mornings in New England are almost always pleasant.

I admit part of my mania is economic. I just don’t want to pay for the energy to run an air-conditioner in an empty room. I also admit there’s a part of me that is inclined to “suffer”. For what it’s worth, I behave comparably in the winter. Instead of turning up the heat, I usually put on a sweater, or three.

(Painting, “Surf at Ogunquit, Maine” by Edward A Page)

Musings from a Mad Cow

The Advent of Halloween

Seasonal Bucket Lists, a lesson in wishful thinking

Windows, Kitchen Renovation Headache Number Two

Why there are two words for “Fall”

Writing Tips from Rebecca Solnit

Intro to our Renovation

Local Elections and the Power of Canvassing

First Day of Kindergarten

Serenity in August

Northeasterners Always Have to Suffer, Just A Little