LANDLOCKED NEAR THE SEA

I could never be landlocked. I'd live near my favorite beach if it weren't so bloody far from work.  Of course, work is like a prison sentence at this point of my life, so maybe I should just pick the beach and drive my life away since I'm working it away already.

It's winter break right now, or it is for another 24 hours, so I take a detour to the beach on my way to Maine.  I don't know why I expect February in New England to be warmer than it ever is, but I am surprised when I check the outside temperature: 12.  Yup, twelve degrees Fahrenheit, which is damn close to what we here in New England call "snot-freezing weather," when your inner nostrils ice up as soon as you open your front door.

However, as those of us near the coast will attest, any day and every day is a beach day, so off I go.

Maybe I'll explore, I tell myself.  Maybe I'll park in a few different spots and get some different shots.  Maybe I'll drive straight up the coast from Salisbury after ..., after ... After what?  Looking at the deserted stands and arcades and trash barrels?  Driving past the empty motels and boarded up bungalows?

Nah.  Screw that.  I'm going to The Wall.

The Wall is a popular surfing spot, and the waves, when they're cooperative, can be impressive and constant.  The only shops are down the street near the bath house, and even then there are only three or four businesses tucked into one small structure.  This beach is a true beach-goers beach.  No frills, no teeny-boppers with arcade prizes and sticks of cotton candy, there is convenient parking thirty seconds from the sand, and no noise from the street due to the massive retaining wall to curb erosion.  At low tide, the sand stretches for a mile or more.  At high tide, about two hundred yards of sand are all that remain uncovered, but the large granite rocks protect sunbathers who dare to defy the tides and ride it out until the sand, wet and refreshing and cool, reappears within two hours.

Today the air, now at a whopping twenty degrees, is still.  The recent winds have died down, and it almost (since it has climbed eight degrees since I left the house) feels like spring.  I grab my phone, ready for waves galore and fabulous photo ops, and grab my down vest, ready for the blast of spray and salt air.

What greets me instead is a surprisingly calm ocean and strong sun against the rocks.  The ocean is nearly motionless except for small laps of water that gently stir along the sand with no more power nor pomp than a placid forest pond.  The raucous surfing mecca of the area is smooth as a glass serving tray.  If I didn't smell the sea in the air, I'd swear I was overlooking a lake.

I wait a long time, nearly fifteen minutes, for the ocean to get moving.  The swells start out about one hundred yards, but by the time they reach the usual breaking area, they gently overtake the tide already resting at the edge and disappear into nothingness.  Finally, a small wave breaks no deeper than ankle height (if I were actually in the water, which I am not).  I wait until another wave comes and then another, breaking with a bigger sound but no bigger finish.

All in all, in the twenty or so minutes I am there, I see maybe three or four small waves.  I also see maybe three or four people walking along the sidewalk above me and on the other side of The Wall, but looking left to right I realize that I have the entire beach, all mile-plus of it, to myself.  There is not one other single soul on the sand or rocks, though I do see recent paw prints and sneaker tracks, so I know I'm not the first one here today.

Packing up I roll down my car windows (damn the temperature) so I can hear the ocean as I leave.  I drive north along the coast through Rye and Portsmouth, drinking in the blue and the calmness of the water.  Oh, to live here.  Damn working.  If only I could see this every day, life would be perfect.  Though I say I could never be landlocked, when I go back to work on Monday, I will know in my heart that I am.

I SPY A NEED FOR DRAWING BOOKS

What starts as an innocent, mindless activity in my classroom somehow morphs into a daily game of I Spy.  Before Thanksgiving break, I decide to start drawing a winter scene on the whiteboard behind my desk, the board reserved for important notices like homework and upcoming assessments.  It starts with a turkey then turns into a holiday-type/winter scene.

In January when we return for the dog days of winter, I remove the turkey and Christmas tree and menorah and other holiday-themed stuff, and continue adding one new drawing every day as the countdown to February break approaches.  I think this is just my way to keep my mind of all the other crap happening at work.  You know, bring some color back into the dark, horrid days of dissension; keep a running count to the mental health break mid-February.

Instead of being my personal coloring calendar, though, it turns into a game.

At first I don't realize that the kids care what I am doing.  At some point in January, I notice that they are examining the board and challenging each other to figure out what I've added for that day.  Sure they notice the homework written there, but the true gazers are searching for something they haven't seen before.

At first I make the additions obvious: a pond with a skater, a large tree, Snoopy and Woodstock.  But as time goes on, I get devious: a flower, apples on the snowman, children (stick figures) lining up at school, birds in the sky.  It's fabulous fun to see if I can trick them.  "Nope, the penguin was last week.  Nope, the house was yesterday.  Nope, the snowboarder has been there for weeks."

I don't honestly know who's having more fun with this glorified game of I Spy - the students or the teacher - but the countdown is the best part of it all.  On Friday, the final day before the school's winter break and with my last class in attendance, I erase the board and clean it with spray and paper towels.  The kiddos are horrified as the entire scene comes down after four months of watching the board change and grow.

It's okay, though.  We have thirty-eight school days until April break once we get back from this one, days that will include grueling New England weather changes, academic open house, and state-mandated testing.  That means thirty-eight days of a new I Spy game ... easy the first week, progressively more difficult as we go.

Time to get some drawing books; I am in need of some fresh ideas for spring and beyond.

CRASH ... AGAIN!

I am definitely going to have to stop driving on Central Street.  For the second time in five years, someone jumped the stop sign at Brook Street and slammed into my car as if I were completely and totally invisible.  Not from a small stop, mind you; both times the person jumping the stop sign did so at a ferocious speed (pedal right to the metal) while looking in the complete opposite direction of oncoming traffic.

Duh.  When driving, it is usually best to be looking AHEAD.  You know, in the f*****g direction that you f******g car is going.

The good news is that no one was injured.  The better news is that the car (mine, anyway) is still driveable.  The best news is that the offending driver has accepted 100% liability, so the insurance claim process runs relatively smooth.

However, the accident and resulting long-term damage is what ultimately led to my last car's demise.  I had to get this current car in a pinch as a result of that other vehicle.  I never really liked this current car that much, but it's nothing against Hyundai or the Sonata itself.  I just plain flat-out am NOT a sedan gal.

Does it make me a terrible person if I kind of wish the frame were to be damaged?  I mean, it was a minor crash, and bless Hyundai for making a car that suffered so little damage when the impact was both startling and caused my car to spin about thirty degrees into the other lane.  If Brook/Central slowly killed my car once over the long term, might it be able to do the same but make it a bit more instantaneous so I am not continuously shelling out money for accident-related damages?  I already had to replace a brake light that jostled itself out during the impact, so there's fifteen dollars I'll never see again.

Okay, okay.  I know.  I'm very lucky, the person who hit me is lucky, and we are all just living in a lucky, lucky kind of world.  But, please.  If I am driving the invisible car, maybe it's time to trade in for a more visible one, like the monster truck I used to drive.  Yeah.  Hit that and you'll lose your cranium.

Here's to Monday, the body shop's expertise, and whatever tiny rental I end up with for the duration.  With a little MORE luck, I'll never see that Sonata ever again.

LAUGHTER AND MOTHER NATURE PISS

Winter in New England has totally sucked this year.  For real.  The snow has been just about nonexistent, but this is actually a plus when I meet my sister (each of us driving about forty-five minutes to meet in the mid-point) to tag-team babysit her grand-twins.

My sister and I meet early, act like idiots in a store by trying on a slew of dresses that are not flattering.  (One of the ones I try on is a flower-printed dress that is the color of stomach bile.)  Next, we have lunch at Panera and play cards for about an hour, entertaining the occasional nearby patron and employee with our Cribbage and Rummy mastery.

When the time comes, I insist on following my sister in my own car to the grand-twins' house, about a ten minute ride away, so that she doesn't have to return southbound (my home direction) yet again, just to turn around go northbound to her own home.  After all, the weather is supposed to turn and rain quite a bit later on.

Rain.  Not snow.  No big deal, she convinces me, so we leave my car behind and head to our babysitting gig.  After we are alone with the babies for a while, we hear the wind pick up (not unusual; the house is on an inlet) and then we hear the rain start.  It's a hard rain, a steady rain, but by no means is it an unmanageable rain.

This is New England; weather changes are what we do.

Eventually my sister and I are kicked out, sent packing so the babies can be put back on schedule and re-oriented to the correct parenting and not the Snap-Chat filter, photo-bombing afternoon we have enjoyed, turning the babies into princesses and bears and puppies and clowns and lipstick-wearing hotties.

To leave, my sister needs to back her car up so we can drive back to my car, still parked at Panera.  I wait patiently in the driveway in the slow but steady cold drizzle as she unlocks her car door, gets into her car, and ...

HOLY SHIT ON A SHINGLE.

The sky opens up.  In the minute it takes my sister to get into her car, start it, back it up, and position it so I can get in the passenger door, I am soaked.  I drip all over her car and all over her and basically just plain drip every damn where.  As usual, with our mad adventures of dress-shopping and Panera lunching and card playing and pseudo babysitting, we start laughing uncontrollably.

Thankfully, Panera is still open when we return, and, also thankfully, it is near-empty.  We sit in front of the fireplace, mostly so I can dry off a little bit, but also so we can split a tuna sandwich and enjoy a tiny bit more quality time together.

It rains and rains and rains buckets upon buckets the whole way home until about ten percent of the ride is left, which also cracks me up for some reason.  It's almost like Mother Nature is taking an hour or so to just piss all over.  Rain or not, it doesn't deter the fun.  My sleeves and knees are still damp from the deluge when I arrive home, but the only ache I have is in my stomach from the laughter.

GODZILLA AND THE SKIVVIES

I finally have a scheduled day off from work, but I still feel horrible, so I decide it's "Sit On My Fat Ass and Do Nothing" day.  This means turning on the television.  Anyone with a brain knows that daytime television is made for morons and radicals because nothing is being broadcast except slanted political talk shows and  weird repeats of old reality TV.

I start changing channels, wondering the whole while how the world continues to turn at this level of stupidity, until I stumble upon the COMET channel.  The COMET channel is having a day-long Godzilla festival, and not the new stuff; black and white gems of the horror genre.

Oh, sure, I must have better things to do, like make soup and grade papers, maybe dust a little bit.  But no, I decide it's time to watch Raymond Burr attempt to speak English to an entire cast of Japanese-speaking actors, hitting his mark every damn time.  The dubbing (and over-dubbing) is side-splitting, which flies in the face of the fact that this is, with all that is true and honest, an "genuine horror classic."

It's fun to try and decipher which scenes are real footage of ships and planes and buildings, and which are done on sound stages or, worse, in bathtubs.  Godzilla is, of course, a mechanical marvel and superior to the fake electricity lines.  In the end, a one-eyed, semi-maniacal doctor saves the day, sacrificing himself, his speed-date fiancee's wedding-night fate, and all of the oxygen in Tokyo Bay.  Sorry if I ruined it for you, but after the city is flattened, the humans do what they always do: Destroy innocent creatures from the nature they perverted in the first place.

The one thing I didn't realize though, is that Raymond Burr is not totally un-handsome.  Even in black and white, it is clear that he has huge blue eyes with decent lashes, and he is a tall and not pudgy young man.  However, even those revelations are not enough to hide my shock when he is lounging in a tent with a Japanese cohort.  The two men are chatting away when the monster's

approach causes a sudden gust of wind, toppling their tent.  Burr and sidekick run to a tree and hang on.  This is when I notice Burr is clad in a partially open shirt and white skivvies.  Yes, the cleanest white skivvies his mama could ever be proud of should he be in a car accident.  Then, the rain starts.  Raymond Burr is in the rain in sheer white skivvies and ... Geezuslouizahs, I never realized that Godzilla was borderline porn!

Well, it just goes to show that #1, things aren't always how we remember them (I never noticed the skivvies before), and #2, daytime television really is a wasteland, and, probably most important of all, #3, Godzilla maybe isn't truly dead since there is a marathon of more Godzilla movies on all day.

IT'S (A) SNOT FAIR!

Ugh.  I caught the cold grippe.  No, not the pukies, thank gawd; I caught the snot-filled, headache torturing, double-earache, knock-ya-flat-on-yer-ass, beat-ya-til-yer-wishing-for-death grippe.

Of course, much to the hatred of my colleagues, I have to drag myself to work because grades are closing, common assessments must be administered, and I cannot take time off before a long weekend (MLK Day on Monday).  Like a pariah, I sit away from people at meetings, use the student bathroom so as not to leave germs in the teacher one, and eat lunch by myself at my desk.  At the end of each work day, I collapse on the couch and pray for relief as I tear through my third or fourth box of tissues.

At the end of the week, I drive directly home, put laundry into the washing machine, make myself soup, change the laundry over the the dryer, sit on the big comfy chair with a blanket and ... fall fast asleep.  Yes, my big Friday evening involves snoring in my living room as soon as the sun sets.  I don't feel any better when I wake up, but at least the laundry is done and ready to fold, so something has been accomplished.

I drag myself off to bed after ingesting copious amounts of cold medications and Tylenol, have strange dreams, but manage to piece together another eight-plus hours of sleep.  When I awaken on Saturday morning, I should jump up and start my day.  Yes, I should get out of bed and do something productive.  I ought to run errands or go wine tasting or ... or ...

Or maybe I'll hang out in bed under the multiple quilts, prop myself up with flannel-covered pillows, and play some games on my phone for an hour or more.  To be fair, later I actually do get up and work on decorating some of my empty walls and hanging sheer curtains in the living room, and I have great intent to bake a pumpkin pie now that the snowstorm is moving in.  My daughter brings me gingerale (because "feed a cold") and orange juice (because "Mimosas" plus vitamin C), so I am totally ready to continue the TLC.

However, the morning is recovery time, and I intend to savor every moment.  Thank you, warm bed, and thank you, fluffy quilts, and thank you to the tissue companies who've kept me sane these last few days.  Bless you (quite literally), all.

THE ART OF SURPRISE IN PORTLAND

I'm heading up to Portland, Maine, for the weekend.  Part of my motivation is due to the incoming snowstorm.  A few days earlier a storm arrived with a snow prediction of a few inches of snow, and southern Maine got about a foot of the white stuff, so I don't trust my luck when the forecasters are calling for real snow during my travel plans.  My one-day trip now becomes two days, and this means I have a few hours to kill off in downtown Portland that I wasn't expecting.

I decide to visit the city's art museum.

Obviously there are some big name museums that can hold their own with the likes of Boston's MFA and Washington's National Gallery of Art, but, to be honest, Portland Museum of Art isn't one I'd put on the list.  Of course, the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford blew my socks off, too, so I shouldn't be such a snob.

The payback, of course, is that when I walk into the PMA, I look like an absolute fool.  My eyes are wide, my mouth is gaping open, and I stand in the lobby like an idiot, absolutely transfixed by what I am seeing, and there is a lot to see.  Sure, I expect the Wyeth collection, but I guess it didn't register in my brain that N.C. Wyeth was such an extensive literary illustrator, and his diversity is astounding, mesmerizing, even.

I'm also not expecting the Monet, Manet, Cassatt, Picasso, Rodin, Hopper, Homer, and Renoir masterpieces.  Yeah, yeah, I know: I'm a snob, like these amazing pieces don't belong in ... well ... downtown Portland.  But here they are, right in front of me, and I'm drooling like an amateur.  And I'm not an amateur. I grew up in a house where art was revered and where we played games like Masterpiece: The Art Auction Game (of which I still own the original board game).  My mother was an art history major and we had art books all over the house.  I could hold a conversation about Marc Chagall by the time I was ten.

This is all very fascinating, I know, but the strange twist comes from the part of the museum that fascinates me the most, and there is frightening little conventional art to see in it.  The 1801 McLellan House (the original art museum, I believe) is a New England architectural gem.  Of all the art I photograph (legally and not) inside the museum, I simply cannot stop taking pictures inside this building.  The meticulous, handmade woodwork and the attention to design are haunting.  Once I walk into this part of the museum, I'm thinking, "Picasso who?" and wonder how the lame delusions of "contemporary art" can even bear to exist with this classic marvel connected to the rest of the building.

I spend hours at the museum, twice the time I intend, and eventually indulge in a cafe lunch so I can rework some of the photos I have while the experience is fresh.  And speaking of fresh, the snow I drove up early to avoid, the change of plans making this entire excursion possible?  It never arrives.  It is a mere dusting, not even worth shoveling.  It does make Portland shine, though, as if it needs anything more beautiful than the museum to make it so.