I was just reading my blog from two years ago (that no longer updated blog is thirdstreet.blogspot.com). This was written just days after the Tsunami of 2004. That year, like most, was filled with tragedy and pain around the world. But also the joy in small moments of connection.

The last day of 2004 and we’re well rid of that one. It was a year, alright, quite a year. The pain and suffering this year has seen: Natural disaster, human suffering of unfathomable proportions, war, political disaster, tragedy, human cruelty…

And yet daily life goes on. The clock ticks, the internet connection hums, the children need lunch, there is work to be done. The dailiness of things keeps us going when nothing else does. It’s the ordinary things that pull us through.

There’s a lot of talk right now about the absence of God, the existence of God in the first place, the reality that bad things happen to good people often, unremittingly, all the time, a lot. Too much.

There are a lot of people who are very angry at their God right now. And there are many whose belief in their God will pull them through. Those without a belief in God are also in a quandry. No matter what kind of God or no God you’ve got, you’re probably struggling to understand the breadth of this tragedy.

There is also the unpleasant feeling of uselessness. At this distance, other than contributing money, there is nothing to do but watch and cry. With this comes a kind of survivor’s guilt – guilt for the fact that our lives are (thankfully) untouched by this kind of pain and suffering. Guilt for our abundance, guilt for the superficiality of what ails us right now.

And then there’s the fear, a deep, penetrating one: what happens if and when our lives are touched by such terribleness. What would we do?

When bad things happen, Fred Rogers, that dapper genuis of children’s television, used to say, "Look for the good." Even in the worst of times, he’d say, there is good to be found.

In this case, one has only to look at the faces of the survivors who are burying the dead, beginning to clean up, helping one another heal. Good people the world over are also flocking there to help: Doctors Without Borders, the International Red Cross, and other local and international organziations are pitching in. There is good to be found.

For the moment, the world’s focus is on this tragedy — everyone is grieving for the missing, praying for the survivors, and trying to help in some small way.

Wouldn’t it be amazing if this shared moment could change the course of history? Wouldn’t it be amazing if the world came together and recognized the importance of daily life, the power of the ordinary, the simple things that everyone holds dear?

Wouldn’t that be amazing?

Oh Glory be Prospect Park on a Sunday autumn morning. Oh Glory be.

Smartmom
was composing a euphoric post, an ode to her great park, so blessed did
she feel out in the morning air, the trees changing from deep red to
brown, And she was running with no pinky toe pain — so it was a great,
great day. Okay, some guy was wretching over by the lake, a skeezy
looking alocoholic puking into a rusty garbage pail. "Ignore that," she
said aloud to noone, "It’s getting in the way of my poetic moment."

But
truly the park is every runner’s secret paradise. That 3.2 mile loop
around the park provides a pleasing view of meadows and trees, the
lake, the Grecian temple, the skating rink, the boat house, the
carousel (some days even the caliope plays), the zoo, the dog walkers
and their dogs in the dog run, Grand Army Plaza and more.

And
there are so many runners out there. Even this late in the season. The
park is a symphony of harmonious difference: body sizes, abilities,
skin colors, ethnicities, languages, styles, accents, and attitudes.
And there’s this feeling of harmony as you go around — smiles of
encouragement and familiarity, of shared pain and accomplishment.

See
the Russian ladies walking; the serious yuppie runners — track stars
in college; the Carribeans running and talking; the middle-aged women
in pairs yakking about their lives, their jobs, their children; the
super serious Rastafarian runners; the lone runners with their i-pods;
the hip young black girls running to stay fit; teenagers running track;
the big, big women and men running slow with cardio meter arm bands;
the fathers running with jogger strollers (the babies sleeping through
it all); the guy who seems to run all day, every day; the marathoners
who speed by; the mothers running with overweight children saying,
"Keep going, you eat too much!"; the Hasidim walking with their big
families…

Some run in packs, some in pairs, some brave it
alone. Alone is a wonderful way to hear yourself think, to sing, to
compose blogs, to admire the park in its majesty. Alone is a great way
to feel alive on a Sunday autumn morning in the park oh glory be. So
blessed is Smartmom to be part of the great symphony of runners, the
runners of Prospect Park.

YESTERDAY WAS OTBKB’S OFFICIAL ANNIVERSARY AND OTBKB FORGOT. DUH. Here’s a piece from two year’s ago.

There’s something  about a blog that makes a person want, no, need, no, desperately need, some sort of response. It’s a big shout into the universe for attention. A yearning yelp into an echoey tunnel as in: Hello, is anyone there? Does anyone want to play? Is anybody listening? Hello? Hello? Hellooooooooooooooo?

Pathetic, eh?   

Actually
it’s a little embarrassing. And yet, why write a blog unless someone is
going to read it? Isn’t that the whole point of the exercise. And it’s
not just Smartmom out there blogging — though her blog is, by all
reports, wildly original and fun. There are tens of thousands of blogs
at Blogspot alone. Haven’t you ever wondered what that small button on
the masthead that says "next blog" means? Try it someday and you’ll
see. There’s a whole world of blogs out there, people from all over the
world desperate to
communicate.(Smartmom
has read blogs from Adelaide, Australia; Florence, Italy; Stutgart,
Germany; Singapore, Thailand, Lebanon, even New Jersey.)

Kind
of gets you thinking, doesn’t it? Is all this blogging a cry for help
or the proverbial note in the bottle thrown out to the proverbial sea?

Yes,
indeed. Blogging has has become one gigundo phenomenon. And Blogspot is
probably just one of hundreds of blog-generating sites for those desperate
to be heard. In a sense, Blogspot is a global village for the
graphomaniacs of the world. Marshall McCluhan could never have imagined
such a thing. And he thought television was going to be the big global
municipality.

Fact is, there are millions of blogs out
there worldwide. Imagine: a small virtual universe of people striving
for connection.

Now that’s really profound, isn’t it? It’s
friggin existential. Contemplating it now, Smartmom feels like a tiny,
tiny speck in the blog universe. So very small and insignificant. Very,
very teeny tiny.

So the question arises: Is anyone reading
these blogs? Smartmom thinks the answer is a resounding "yes." While there are clearly hundreds of thousands (alright, millions) of
people with the voracious need to tell-all about the minutae of their
daily lives, there are also hundreds of thousands who are hopelessly
voyeuristic, dying to read the dirty and the well-pressed laundry of
others. Hey, you just know it’s true. Smartmom and the bloggers of the
world are banking on it. Btw, is there any money in blogging? Answer:
Nope.

Which isn’t to say that there isn’t a value to writing a
blog that no-one reads. Surely blogging, like writing in a journal, has
many purposes. For one thing, it a great way to get in touch with your
inner Erma Bombeck, your inner Sylvia Plath, and your inner Maureen
Dowd. All at once. Really, truly, it is immeasurably pleasurable to
write just to write.

But there are limits.

Writing for
writing sake is something that writer’s do. But come on, isn’t writing
all about communication? And communication requires a recipient…

Does the word interactivity mean
anything to you? Hence, the "comment" link on the bottom of each and
every one of Smartmom’s posts.

Maybe the real reason Smartmom
created this blog is because she leads the lonely life of a freelance
writer—alone day in and day out in her basement lair. Her officemate,
Real Fruit Jelly, isn’t around much anymore. Smartmom and Real Fruit
Jelly, like many good friends and office mates, used to spend an awful
lot of time analyzing their lives. That’s what they love to do. And it
was like free therapy around here.

Now, Smartmom’s only
companion is a rather spiffy laptop computer. In a sense, she’s had to
create an imaginary friend who will listen to her.

Hello? Is anybody there? Is anybody really listening? Helloooooooooooooooooooooooo…

–originally posted October 2004

 

Here’s a winner from Groovy Aunt’s blog, Mamainwaiting. Groovy Aunt is now Diaper Diva (for obvious reasons). Ducky just turned two.

I think that Groovy Aunt’s words convey a great deal about the hurt that
is inflicted when friends and family, in an effort to be helpful, say
the darndest things. Even Smartmom has been guilty of one or more of
these inconsiderate statements. Groovy Aunt definitely "gets" that
people are well-meaning but sometimes they just don’t "get it." Thank
you Groovy Aunt for telling it like it is and making us understand how
difficult this process has been.

Don’t Say Anything
by Groovy Aunt

It
has become clear to me as I’ve struggled through infertility and the
process of adoption that, on the whole, people tend to say the wrong
thing. Yes, intentions are well and good but people usually say
something irritating and irksome. That’s why I’ve compiled a list of
things NOT TO SAY:

If
someone is telling you about their difficulty getting pregnant, don’t
tell them to relax or take a vacation with their spouse.

If it
is obvious that a couple is struggling with infertility don’t tell them
that you just look at your wife and she gets pregnant.

Don’t say anything.

Don’t
tell anyone that infertility can be cured by doing yoga, taking
vitamins, or eating properly. Especially, don’t tell anyone to stop
drinking coffee.

Don’t say anything.

As I’ve moved into the world of adoption, there are also numerous conversational pitfalls people fall into:

Inevitably,
someone will tell you that once you stop the infertility treatments,
you’ll get pregnant, or once you adopt, you’ll miraculously get
pregnant because the pressure will be off, once again suggesting that
tension and anxiety are the causes of infertility.

Don’t say anything.

If someone is telling you they are adopting from Russia, don’t tell them how "cute" the Chinese babies are.

Don’t say anything.

If
someone is telling you they are adopting from Russia, don’t warn them
about chronic diseases and F.A.S. (if you don’t know the acronym, don’t
worry, you will if you ever decide to adopt from Russia.) Yes, these
warnings are important. Nevertheless, a person about to adopt is
probably going to already know about these issues – and probably stays
up at night worrying about them. It is best to not say anything.

If
someone is telling you that they are adopting from Russia, don’t tell
them how easy it was for your friend, aunt, sister, etc. to adopt from
the U.S. "It was so fast and easy, I’ll get you the number…"

Don’t say anything.

The
truth is, you can’t stop people from saying whatever they want to say.
Instead, you must harden yourself to deal with other people’s opinions,
words and innuendoes. This is true in all areas of life. Perhaps this
has been a good exercise in holding onto myself and not letting other
people rock mty resolve. It has certainly made me tough.

It is
hard enough to hold onto one’s fragile sense of hope when one is
vulnerable to the opinionated chatter of others. The lesson here is to
stop listening to others, and start listening to what is inside your
heart.

I am adopting because I want to be a parent and to love
a child. I know there are many risks but I am willing to take this
great leap of faith. This requires a certain amount of bravery and a
good pair of psychic ear plugs.

Oh Glory be Prospect Park on a Sunday autumn morning. Oh Glory be.

Smartmom
was composing a euphoric post, an ode to her great park, so blessed did
she feel out in the morning air, the trees changing from deep red to
brown, And she was running with no pinky toe pain — so it was a great,
great day. Okay, some guy was wretching over by the lake, a skeezy
looking alocoholic puking into a rusty garbage pail. "Ignore that," she
said aloud to noone, "It’s getting in the way of my poetic moment."

But
truly the park is every runner’s secret paradise. That 3.2 mile loop
around the park provides a pleasing view of meadows and trees, the
lake, the Grecian temple, the skating rink, the boat house, the
carousel (some days even the caliope plays), the zoo, the dog walkers
and their dogs in the dog run, Grand Army Plaza and more.

And
there are so many runners out there. Even this late in the season. The
park is a symphony of harmonious difference: body sizes, abilities,
skin colors, ethnicities, languages, styles, accents, and attitudes.
And there’s this feeling of harmony as you go around — smiles of
encouragement and familiarity, of shared pain and accomplishment.

See
the Russian ladies walking; the serious yuppie runners — track stars
in college; the Carribeans running and talking; the middle-aged women
in pairs yakking about their lives, their jobs, their children; the
super serious Rastafarian runners; the lone runners with their i-pods;
the hip young black girls running to stay fit; teenagers running track;
the big, big women and men running slow with cardio meter arm bands;
the fathers running with jogger strollers (the babies sleeping through
it all); the guy who seems to run all day, every day; the marathoners
who speed by; the mothers running with overweight children saying,
"Keep going, you eat too much!"; the Hasidim walking with their big
families…

Some run in packs, some in pairs, some brave it
alone. Alone is a wonderful way to hear yourself think, to sing, to
compose blogs, to admire the park in its majesty. Alone is a great way
to feel alive on a Sunday autumn morning in the park oh glory be. So
blessed is Smartmom to be part of the great symphony of runners, the
runners of Prospect Park.

In Fall of 2004, OSFO was enjoying Pippi Longstocking at bedtime. In honor of OTBKB’s second anniversary, here is Inner Pippi.

Smartmom, OSFO, and Teen Spirit (listening in from the other room) are
reading "Pippi Longstocking" at bedtime. Smartmom had forgotten just
how kooky a character she is. But what a winner.

Written in
1950 by the Swedish author, Astrid Lindgren, "Pippi" is the tale of a
9-year-old girl with bright red pigtails who lives all by herself in a
house called Villa Villakulla. Her mother and father are nowhere in
sight and she can do pretty much as she pleases. "Once upon a time
Pippi had had a father of whom she was extremely fond," writes
Lindgren. "Naturally she had a mother too, but that was so long ago
that Pippi didn’t remember her at all."

Pippi’s dad is a sea
captain who is now living on an island of cannibals. "’My papa is a
cannibal king, isn’t every child who has such a stylish papa,’ Pippi
used to say with satisfaction."

Like so many famous children’s
books the author conveniently banishes the parents right from the
beginning. With a dead mama and a papa far away, Pippi is one free
little girl

Living by herself in a small Swedish town, Pippi
causes quite a stir. She’s traveled the world on her father’s ship and
has experienced more than most people twice her age. And what a mouth
on her — she always says exactly what she’s thinking. She has never
gone to school, lives with a monkey named, Mr. Nilson, drinks coffee,
makes exotic Swedish cookies and entertains her very conventional next
door neighbors, Tommy and Anneka, with her outrageous antics, including
lifting up her horse with one hand.

You get the picture.

As
you can imagine, OSFO just loves Pippi. It isn’t everyday that a
free-spirited anarchist is valorized this way. What kid doesn’t long
for the life of freedom that Pippi enjoys — no one to tell you what to
eat, when to do your homework, what time to go to bed, On the other
hand, it’s probably a little scary too. Kids are big talkers when it
comes to wanting complete freedom. "Freedom’s just another word for
nothing left to lose," and kids are secretly comforted by the rules and
routines of life just as they rail against them.

OSFO is a
roller-coaster of emotions as she listens to the book. She’s goes from
wide-eyed shock to exclamations of "Oh my God." There’s hysteria,
indignation, even pride as Pippi insults her teacher at school (the one
day she goes to give it a try), tells a pair of policemen to be on
their way, or feeds the kids next door copious amounts of coffee and
treats.

OSFO reveres Pippi (the Oh So Spunky One), whose love
of adventure, outrageousness and fun makes her a kindred spirit worth
emulating. OSFO dressed like Pippi for a dinner party the other night.
With mis-matched socks, a kooky jumper, big shoes and two braids in her
hair, OSFO was one adorable Pippi!

Who wouldn’t want to be
Pippi? Even Smartmom longs to indulge her inner Pippi. Call it a
mid-life miasma: Smartmom would love to say, "scram" to the
conventional world and dance to the beat of her very own drum set.
Everyone — kids and adults — needs a break from what’s expected of
them — the relentless rhythm of contemporary life.

Kids too
need a break from the rigors of contemporary childhood. And it’s
downright refreshing to read such an alternative vision of that
"magical" phase of life. Lindgren’s book portrays childhood as a time
of freedom and frivolity. How different from 2004 Park Slope. Here a
child’s life is all about school, homework and extra-curricular
activities. Kids are expected to be as driven as their parents. It’s as
if childhood is one long list of accomplishments to put on a college
application.

From birth, all eyes are on the dreaded
developmental growth chart. Is the baby lifting her head, rolling over,
crawling and walking on time? How about talking — if she’s not verbose
by the age of two, it’s off to the speech therapist. If the kid isn’t
reading and writing according to early acessments, it’s time to be
tutored and drilled. And afterschool and weekends, for God’s sake,
don’t be idle. Learn an instrument, take a dance class, play a team
sport. Nobody said it was going to be easy being raised by the Yuppie
generation, that’s for sure.

Whatever happened to riding bikes
or spending an afternoon transforming a refrigerator box into a house?
It’s not like this stuff doesn’t happen, but it doesn’t happen enough.
Childhood is pretty idyllic in Park Slope, but sometimes it’s not as
idyllic as it could be. Smartmom can see why OSFO’s eyes light up when
she hears about Pippi’s wild and carefree days.

That said,
Pippi can be rude, unpleasant, and not very P.C. Teen Spirit’s first
grade teacher was reading the book to her class years ago and
discovered that it’s actually a bit racist. As far as Smartmom knows,
"Pippi Longstocking" isn’t read in PS 321 classes anymore But those
brief "racist" passage can be quickly deleted at bedtime, letting the
book stand as a great portrait of a spunky and independent little girl.
She sure makes one feminist mom proud and puts a smile on OSFO’s face.

Two years ago, Smartmom was obviously feeling a tad blue. Back then, TS was on the cusp – just begining to morph into being a teenager. It was a tough time for SM: TS’s last year in middle school with high school on the horizon. She’s feeling much more cheerful now. He’s a different person now – bigger, wiser. While he is still in need of a great deal of supervision, he is  also beginning to grow into his teenage self nicely. Some things have changed: the Mojo is no more and OSFO and SM aren’t reading "Charlotte’s Web" anymore at bedtimes. We’ve moved on to other things.

Tonight at bedtime, Smartmom read couple of chapters of E.B. White’s
"Charlotte’s Web" to OSFO and Teen Spirit (he for the umpteenth time),
and was struck once again by this poetic and poignant passage at the
beginning of Chapter 15. "The
crickets sang in the grasses. They sang the song of summer’s ending, a
sad monotonous song. ‘Summer is over and gone,’ they sang. ‘Over and
gone, over and gone. Summer is dying, dying.‘"

Unfortunately, we can’t hear the song of the crickets  in Park Slope. It’s possible that there are some crickets in Prospect Park or The Brooklyn Botanic Garden. But we can’t hear them above the hum of the neighbor’s air conditioners and the noisy traffic racing up Third Street.

Fact
is, we really don’t need crickets to tell us that summer has come to an
end. There are already too many reminders that its leisurely days have
been replaced by our action-packed, high-speed lives.

Ever
since Smartmom and family got back from their idyllic California farm
vacation in late August, summer has been, as E.B. White wrote, "over and gone, over and gone. Summer is dying, dying."

First
there was the Republican National Convention, which rocked the city
with an outpouring of anti-Bush, anti-war protests. Then came the
aniversary of September 11th, which has now become the official end of
summer for most New Yorkers in the way that it signifies the loss of
innocence that came with the terrorists, the rubble, and the mournful
white ash.

Then there was the start of school. Groan. The
children never look forward to getting back into the swing of things.
But it’s the parents who really dread the return to tension-filled
mornings, homework, and the other stresses of school life.

Still,
autumn is probably the most beautiful season in Park Slope. Slopesters
are blessed to have Frederick Law Olmstead’s magnificent park when
summer is changing into fall. And on the Slope’s tree-lined streets,
the multi-colored leaves mesh pontilistically with the brownstone, red
brick, limestone and stained glass of this 19th century neighborhood.

In
other ways too, the Slope welcomes the change of seasons. The stores on
Seventh Avenue are festooned with Halloween costumes, ghoulish make-up
and party decorations. And at the facing Korean markets on Garfield
Place, there are dueling pumpkins, gourds, and autumnal flower
arrangements.

But fall also brings with it the realization
that the children of Park Slope are growing up. Last year’s baby’s are
this year’s toddlers. Yesterday’s pre-schoolers are lining up at PS 321.
Elementary begets middle school And perhaps most shocking of all, an
inordinate number of the kids of Park Slope have become bona-fide
TEENAGERS.

Has anyone else noticed the huge crowds of just-hatched teens around The MojoPS 321.
As the mother of a 13-year-old, perhaps Smartmom is particularly
attuned to this age group. Consequently, she spends a prolific amount
of time spying on them fascinated as she is by their outfits (grunge
meets punk meets goth meets psychedelic); their habits (some are
smoking and it ain’t just tobacco); and their big-time ATTITUDE.

And
many of these Slope teens are, well, huge. Over the summer, the girls
became women and the boys became men. And it’s just so freaky. They
look like stretched-out versions of themselves as children. But, truly,
they are not children anymore. How quickly the years sped by. Just
yesterday they were being pushed around in McClaren strollers on
Seventh Avenue sipping from sippy cups and eating string cheese. How
did this happen?

As Joni Mitchell wrote,  "And the seasons, they go round and round…"

Fortunately
OSFO and Teen Spirit still enjoy lying in the big bed listening to
Smartmom read "Charlotte’s Web," a book that depicts a magical
childhood on a farm, a world away from 21st century Park Slope. They
love to hear the story of Fern, a girl who understands the language of
a pig, a spider and the other animals in the barn.

Smartmom
knows that OSFO and Teen Spirit won’t always want to read "Charlotte’s
Web" and that one day they too might be hanging out in front of The Mojo
(Teen Spirit is already growing out of the nest in some ways). But
Smartmom is so grateful for these bedtime readings, these loving
cuddles before sleep. She knows that Teen Spirit and OSFO will change
and grow. That’s the way it goes. Just not yet, please. Not yet.

In honor of the second anniversary of OTBKB, here’s another post from two years ago. This one from September 23rd 2004, just weeks after Zuzu’s Petals Seventh Avenue store burned down. Two years later, Zuzu’s Petals is back in business on Fifth Avenue and on Berkeley Place. Lorraine and Fonda learned how beloved they are in this community when Park Slope came to their aid after the fire. A key angel/helper at that time was Jackie Connors, who died in the past year. She was on the scene within hours of the fire and helped out every way that she could. The corner of President Street and Seventh Avenue has been officially named Jackie Connor’s Corner. (picture of the new Zuzu’s Petals on Fifth Avenue by Frank Lynch from Flickr).

On the way home from the office, Smartmom spotted Lorraine, the exotic
looking woman wth reddish hair from ZUZU’s PETALS selling
flowers and potted mums in front of BLUE APRON on Union Street, the insanely good gourmet shop. As everyone probably
knows, there was a terrible fire in the kitchen of OLIVE VINE on
Seventh Avenue that spread to the Korean market on one side and to the
beloved ZUZU’s PETALS on the other. Smartmom has heard rumors that
ZUZU’s Minabird died in the fire. Fortunately, her dog, Bear, was at
home at the time of the fire and is doing just fine.

The gate
in front of ZUZU’s burned-out storefront is full of heartfelt notes to
Zuzu from loyal Park Slope customers and a very touching note by Zuzu
herself written just after she found out that her store, which has been
in existence for over 30 years, had been destroyed by fire.

Smartmom
bought a gorgeous bouquet of blue delphiniums and chartreuse roses and
felt like she was doing a good deed spending TOO MUCH on flowers, to
support ZUZU’S PETALS. Great news: Zuzu has found a new location on
Fifth Avenue between Fifth and Sixth Street where she will continue to
feature the most beautiful (and overpriced) flowers and plantings this
side of Flatbush. Turns out Zuzu is NOT the owner of ZUZU’S PETALS. The
owner’s name is Fonda and Smartmom isn’t even sure what she looks like.
Zuzu gave Smartmom a big hug and said, "You should know better than to
think that the person who’s in the store all the time is the owner!"

–OTBKB, September 23, 2004

Continue reading TWO YEARS AGO IN OTBKB: ZUZU’S PETALS →