Charmed, I'm Sure

My little dog-walking client, Berto, wasn't so sure he should go with me this afternoon. Fortunately, I had one of his besties, Lucy, with me, so he hesitantly left his house. He did not want to go far from home, though, and I can respect that. His side-eye said, for all the world, that he was sure I was dog-napping him, and even the treats I brought offered little comfort. 

He's a sweet dog, though. Rescued as a puppy from Puerto Rico after Hurricane Ernesto in 2022, he has every right to be suspicious. But I? 

Am going to win him over!

Back to Back Ws

I was full of bowling news as I settled into the dentist's chair. My cleaning and checkup had been scheduled months ago, before the bowling league changed our start time from 10 to 11, and I'd had to rush to make the appointment on time. 

I had also told my team and our opponents I was on a deadline, so everyone picked up the usual leisurely pace. Whether because of or in spite of my focused game, I ended up bowling pretty well —winning two of the three games myself with scores of 145 and 139. 

My hygienist has been cleaning my teeth for about five years now, and he is wonderful: fast, gentle, unscolding, and a good conversationalist, too. When I was working, he always asked about school, my classes, and students, and now that I'm retired, we talk about my other activities. He was really into the bowling conversation, too, or at least he convincingly pretended to be fascinated by the minutiae of the game, the weighted balls, oil patterns, and arcane league rules. He was also interested in the fact that even though they are senior leagues, some of the bowlers still crush it.

"Oh yeah," I told him during a spit break, "they regularly call out the people who have bowled over 200, and there are at least five every week."

"That's going to be you someday soon!" he said as he finished polishing and flossing. "We are just about all done here," he added. "And you definitely get the prize for the easiest mouth to clean today!"

"Thanks!" I replied. "I'll report back in 6 months."

Traces of Change

There was just the slightest hint of a cool breeze when I took Lucy out around 6 this evening. And the shadows were on the verge of getting long in the faintly golden hue of sunlight. All the pools were closed, and there were no signs of any cook outs or picnics. 

Then, as we rounded a corner we met a neighbor and former colleague who is now a high school principal. She, too, had her dog on leash, but they were not on a walk, far from it. She was wearing her pajamas, and seemed about ready to turn in for the night.

So long, summer.

Mad Money

"Would you have any interest in walking Berto a couple of times a week?" a neighbor texted this morning and offered me a nominal payment.

"As long as you're flexible about time and days," I replied. 

"Very flexible!" she answered.

And since I usually walk Lucy every afternoon, unless it's really hot or raining, why not? I can help out a neighbor, and bonus! It's yet another addition to my retirement resume.

Never Too Many

Every year, I remind myself not to plant too many Sungold cherry tomatoes, but it seems like no matter how many or how few plants I start with, I end up with a hell of a lot of cherry tomatoes. This year, my response has been to dehydrate them and then grind the desiccated little fruit into powder. It's an elegant solution, for the result is jewel-toned, golden, and intensely flavored, both beautiful and delicious. 

I guess there's no such thing as too many tomatoes.

Pumpkin Power

As I carried my big pumpkin home yesterday, I remembered the last time I'd had a tiny bit of success with pumpkin growing. The year was 2019, and despite the garden being a bit neglected because we had spent the entire month of August in Minnesota with my mom as she battled cancer, by early October I had a pretty little softball-sized pumpkin, which I proudly posted a picture of on our family photo blog.

Coincidentally, some good friends of my mom's shared a picture of the huge pumpkin they had grown with her the same day. When she showed the photo to my sister, who was out there with her, Courtney said, "Don't show Tracey!" I saw it anyway, and I've always thought it was funny and sweet how they wanted to shelter me from pumpkin envy. 

Next, my thoughts turned to Anne and Lowell, the pumpkin growers themselves, and I wondered how they were, because we had fallen out of touch in the seven years since my mom died. You can imagine my amazement then when my phone buzzed a few minutes later with a text message from Anne! 

It turned out that she had inadvertently texted me instead of another Tracey she knew, so we exchanged a few messages catching up, and she ended our conversation warmly: Guess I was meant to say hello and connect with you today, too!

The Great One

Welp, it's taken me sixteen years of gardening, but I FINALLY did it.

 I grew a big pumpkin!

Sneex Peak

My friend Mary and I usually take a walk whenever we get together, but it's been a few weeks since I've seen her, and it's been so hot that I suggested doing something else today. What that might be, I had no idea, but fortunately, Mary was more resourceful than I. How about the Inventors Hall of Fame? she texted, with a link. 

Once I clicked? I was in! 

The IHF is in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office complex located just west of Old Town Alexandria. Street parking was easy to find, and once we turned onto Dulaney Street, we followed the colorful trademark seals on the sidewalk to the Madison Building. Security guards checked our IDs on the front steps and ushered us through the huge revolving door into an atrium lined with banners showing trademarked items such as Haas avocados and Honeycrisp apples, and small display cases with miniature prototypes of familiar, patented items from history, like a horse-drawn fire truck and a railroad light. 

We were a little confused as to where the actual museum was, but as Mary pushed through the door to the gift shop, we were greeted by a friendly docent. "You actually have the museum to yourselves," she told us. "Let me give you an overview and show you around a little."

She led us into the gallery space and explained how the exhibits were arranged. "On this wall you'll see information about the most recent inductees," she pointed. "Like Sara Blakely. She's the billionaire who invented Spanx!" 

"And they are actually installing the newest exhibit down there," she said, waving to the far end of the room. "It's the dress she wore to the gala when she was inducted."

We nodded appreciatively, and she left us to explore the museum. It was very fun! We started by watching a movie about Esther Takeuchi, who invented a compact lithium battery that can last for up to 10 years in implantable defibrillators. Then we sat in the vintage Mustang on display and tried to guess six trademarked products from clues on the walls. Next, we took a quiz on trademarked mascots in advertising, which we aced, followed by another on the color palette of familiar logos, which we did not ace. 

We were good at spotting the knockoffs in a display with authentic items and their counterfeit counterparts, and had just come back into the main gallery when the same docent hailed us again. "They just finished the display," she said. "You will literally be the first visitors to ever see it!"

We hurried down to where a couple of women were dusting off their hands with satisfaction. "Tell them about the dress," the docent asked one of them. "It has the designs of some of her patented items on it," she told us.

"This was her first patent," the young woman explained, pointing to where the mannequin's right hand rested near the hip. "Sara wanted it in a prominent place. And the shoes are down here near the hem. She knew what she wanted when we talked about the design."

"Wait, you're the designer?" I asked in surprise.

"Yes, ma'am," she answered, nodding humbly.

"What!" I laughed. "We get to be the first ones to see the exhibit AND meet the designer! How are we so lucky? And where is the press? This should be a VIP experience!"

300 Pins a Week

I received more than a few spontaneous hugs and countless high-fives and fist bumps this morning as my bowling league season commenced. It was fun to catch up with the ladies as we cheered for each other across all ten lanes, hooting up a 7-10 pickup here and applauding a nice turkey there. Even though I personally was more than a little rusty, I eked out my average, in an inconsistent sort of way. 

And one other thing was clear-- I'm not the rookie anymore.

Here's Looking at You, Kid

"She's the most skeptical baby in the world!" Pebbles' dad told us when we finally met her yesterday. "All she does is give you the side-eye whenever you change her, feed her, talk to her, whatever."

"She may come by that honestly," I laughed, because he is the questioning, analytical type himself.

And, sure enough, she did side-eye me with raised eyebrows as I cooed and rocked her, but you know who she looked right at? Heidi! 

No one can resist those big blue eyes, not even the most skeptical baby in the world.

My Next Retirement Project

I'm going to try to eat every dish on The Washington Post's list of the "40 most essential dishes" of the D.C. area. 

So far? I've had five, which puts me in the top 24 percent of readers who've used the interactive checklist so far. And that does beg the question of exactly how essential these dishes are to our area, but nevertheless, I will carry on.

So, this week I'm going with low-hanging fruit: Chiko's "orangish chicken," since there is a location right down at Shirlington, and the fish tacos from Taqueria Picoso, which is also very close to home.

Of course, there are also some delivery options, but eventually I will have to venture a little further from home than usual, and isn't that really the point?

S-M-L Talk

"Are you going anywhere for the holiday next weekend?" the nail technician asked me as she cleaned up my cuticles.

"No," I answered, and then employed my favorite conversational move: "How about you?"

"No," she replied.

"Were you able to take any vacations at all this summer?" I asked, building on my first question to keep the conversation going.

"No," she said, shaking her head again. 

I was just about to give in to the not unpleasant silence when she added, "My kids finally moved to this country," she told me, "and we've been very busy getting them settled."

"That would take a lot of time," I agreed. "Do they have any children who will be in school?"

"Yes," she said. "He starts on Monday."

"In Arlington?" I clarified, because everyone else has started already. "Which school? I used to be a teacher in Arlington."

"Kenmore," she answered. "Eighth grade."

"Did he learn English before they moved?" I asked.

"No," she said. "He has a lot to catch up."

"They're really good at that at Kenmore," I assured her. "They have a lot of students who are learning English. Does he like school?"

"He loves it!" she said proudly.

"Oh, I know that kind of student," I laughed. "I bet he'll do really well."

"I hope so," she smiled, and our conversation flowed effortlessly from there.

What's Flat, Round, and Obsolete?

Besides the penny?

I recently read a recipe for a tuna tostada. Topped with seared, rare tuna, avocados, and a fresh salsa of melon and cucumber, the dish appealed to me as a quick, easy, light, and summery meal. Try as I might, however, I could not find tostada shells for sale at any of my local groceries. 

At first, I was confused because I distinctly recall buying the flat, crunchy shells all the time for all sorts of southwestern-inspired dishes. But then I took a minute to consider the last time I had made or ordered a tostada of any kind, and I realized it had been well over thirty years. 

I knew I could fry my own soft tortillas, or even just break crunchy taco shells, but even so? I mourned the loss of something I didn't even know was gone.

Board of Bulletins

"I swear half the people I went to grad school with only wanted their teaching degree so they could do bulletin boards," a teacher laughed yesterday when she saw us carrying the telltale roll of fadeless paper. "Personally?" I think they're a tedious waste of time."

"They do seem low priority when you have so much other stuff to do," I agreed. "But they are so old-school, literally, that I can't imagine ever getting rid of them."

I thought back to my own years in elementary school and those standard letters and cardboard cut-outs of presidents, Cupid, snowmen, punctuation marks, math operation symbols, shamrocks, etc. And those classic wavy borders! I do admit to a bit of a thrill when I put up the first bulletin board of my own! But the novelty quickly wore off, and by the end of my career, I had resorted to year-long displays with just a few rotating pieces. (Opening the stapler and punching it with the heel of my hand never got old, though.)

Heidi tells a funny story about a student at the special ed school where she first worked who loved to tear down papers as he went by the bulletin board next to his classroom. "Put his work on there!" suggested a behavior specialist, and that did the trick. He never bothered the board again.

I have my own story of bulletin board defiance. Years ago, when we got a new assistant principal, he walked through the hallway at preservice week and ordered all the teams to "freshen up" their bulletin boards. As team leader, this edict rubbed me the wrong way, especially coming without context from someone new to the building, so rather than take any time for the bulletin board, I put in a work order to have it removed from the wall. No board? No problem.

Of course, the guy never noticed, because he had no idea where the bulletin boards were; he was just planning to inspect the walls. A few years later, though, at the beginning of yet another school year, the administration assigned instructional assistants the task of doing the bulletin boards. "We noticed you don't have one in your area," the principal told me with concern, so we're having one installed."

By then, I was no longer team leader, and I had a great idea for our board. It was called "Advice from Dolphin," since we were the Dolphin Team, and was based on the "Advice from Nature" series of posters by Ilan Shamir, combining his poetic guidance with practical suggestions from former students. One of the maxims in his poem is, "Find your life's porpoise."

Evidently? One of mine has to do with bulletin boards.

On Call

I waited three days into the new school year to put in an appearance at my old school. In my defense? I probably could have stayed away a little longer, except my friend and former colleague texted me to request an assist on his bulletin board.

"I thought you'd never ask!" I replied.

That was our story, and we stuck with it today as we strolled through the bustling halls of teachers getting ready for the first day on Monday.

"It's so nice of you to help out!" another friend said as we were catching up.

"It's practically a tradition," I answered. "This is the third year in a row we've done it."

"Wow!" she replied. "That means this is your third year of retirement!" She shook her head in amazement.

"But if you ever just want to see her," the first friend said, "text and say it's your bulletin board."

"That's right!" I laughed. "I'll come right over."

Found in Translation

I recently stumbled across access to some cooking magazines in other languages through my public library account. Not that I'm proficient in any language other than English, but when it comes to cuisine, my knowledge of cooking and basic familiarity with some of the languages I learned and lived with in school are almost enough to decipher the recipes. Some of the techniques and ingredients are uncommon here in the States, and that's really what I love about spending the time it takes to figure out how to prepare the dishes. 

Today, though, it occurred to me that there is an easier way. I was using a search engine on my laptop to translate some of the ingredients in Italy's premier cooking magazine, GialloZafferano (literally Yellow Saffron), when I thought to try the Google Lens translation feature on my phone. All I had to do was hold my phone up to the screen, and the Italian was magically decoded into English. Because recipes are so simple, syntax, which is the trickiest part of an automated translator, is barely a problem. I could even screenshot the translation if I wanted to save the recipe to try later.

It was amazing! And I spent a happy hour or so virtually leafing through a couple of magazines I've never had the pleasure of reading before!

P.S. Baci makes gelato ice cream cones! But they aren't available in our area.

A Wee Touch of the FOMO

I was a little sad when Heidi left for school this morning, and I think it was a combination of missing her and missing having a place to be.

And since I had a temporary gig at my old school last spring, I'm still on the staff email, so I'm right in the loop as teachers return today for preservice week. I confess I opened the agenda for the faculty meeting, looked through the slide deck to see how everybody introduced themselves, and checked the master schedule to see who was teaching what and with whom. 

After two years of retirement, I would have thought I was done with all that. Maybe next year? And I do have bread to knead, floors to vacuum, a garden to weed, a workout to do, and a dog to walk on this lovely day, so who am I to complain?

Baby Sun Signs

It's been day-to-day for our friend who is nearing the end of her pregnancy. She has a C-section scheduled for September 1, but it's likely that Pebbles, as we affectionately call the infant-to-be, will make her appearance before that. Of course, we are excited to welcome a new baby into our friend circle, and we have been getting daily reports on how likely it is that we will meet her sooner rather than later. 

As part of that conversation, I've been contributing astrological information. "If she comes this week," I told her mom as we were floating in the pool the other day, "Pebbles will be a Leo."

"I don't know what that means." My friend shook her head.

"Well..." I started, considering how to put it. "Leos are brave and bold, like a lion. They have big personalities."

She smiled and nodded.

"They can also be willful and stubborn," I added.

"I'm stubborn enough," my friend sighed. "She might just take after me."

"If she's born next week, though," I said, "she'll be a Virgo."

"And that means?" my friend asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Virgos like routine," I told her. "They are generally calm and practical, also observant and helpful."

"I can get behind that!" she laughed. "That would totally work in our family."

And so, when this morning passed with no word of a new baby, Heidi texted. "Congratulations! Pebbles is officially a Virgo!"

Stick Your Head in Gravy

The past couple of days have brought the inconvenience of resurfacing the parking lot in our condo community. To be honest, I felt the paving company did its best to accommodate us by splitting the job into two parts, so part of the lot was available at all times. 

But it's hard to account for weather, uninformed neighbors, and a perception of scarcity, so the whole experience kind of devolved into a shit show, complete with tow trucks, verbal altercations, and outright outrage at what was really no more than a nuisance. The entire project actually ended up being done on schedule.

So this morning, when I was moving both our cars and a neighbor's, who was out of town, back into the complex, I gasped when I saw the sandwich board that sits on the driveway and provides basic information for the community in a light tone. Someone had stripped it of its message describing the paving project as "just a bump in the road" and repurposed the letters to express their frustration with our management company:

Differing Priorities

As we drove north on the Parkway, we could see the glint of the gilded statues across the bridge (🏷️ $5.1 million) leading the way to the Lincoln Memorial and the botched reflecting pool restoration (🏷️ $16 million, so far). We knew street closures and other security and route preparations were underway (🏷️ $125 million) for the IndyCar road race on Sunday, so we stayed on our side of the river. 

Arriving at Great Falls National Park, I was appalled to see that entrance fees had risen to $20 per car, and I was glad I had a lifetime pass. Once we parked and unloaded Lucy, we strolled south from the parking lot toward the visitor center, overlooks, and trails. The disrepair we encountered along the way was notable. In the ladies' room, several sinks were broken, stalls were marked out of order, and many of the split rails marking the trail boundaries were broken or missing. All of the water fountains had notices informing patrons that the water was untested and not safe to drink. There were also many unemptied waste baskets and broken picnic tables. I sighed and hoped conditions would be better once we were on the trail, but along the way we found boardwalks, bridges, and stairs with rotting and missing boards, not to mention faded and missing trail blazes.

The operating budget for the park is roughly 3-5 million dollars a year, which is generally covered by the visitor fee revenues. However, in the last two years, much of that revenue has been diverted for other "beautification" projects in and around Washington, D.C. Added to that are the 25% cuts all national parks have faced during the same period.

That? Is a travesty.