At 90 years old, my Dad has good and bad days. If he doesn’t get enough rest, or hasn’t eaten well, or taken enough liquids, he can be a bit off. Luckily, he was in good shape for Father’s Day, engaging with the twins as he opened their gifts, and talking with us when we went outside on the porch after dinner. Summer days are ideal for wearing out the twins’ energy, and Dad’s too, which sometimes makes for more restful nights.
Mom made a feast of Filipino dishes – Asado and a sweet and sour fish that my Aunt Luz taught her to cook many years ago. I think she may have surpassed my Aunt in the preparation of this one dish, and it remains a favorite for bringing back happy family memories.
As for the twins, I joined them briefly before we left as they took their evening swim. We spoke of setting up a sleepover/swim meet at our house since their school year ends this week. They also indulged me by doing some Olympic dives, then insisted we play a few rounds of Truth or Dare. It seems they have some of my Madonna-loving blood in them too.
Befitting its tempestuous nature, Mercury refuses to leave retrograde without a battle, and as I write this the skies overhead have let loose with a torrent of rain, and the air is filled with the rolling rumble of thunder. This spell of Mercury in retrograde was as zany and chaotic as ever, but going into it with the expectation of such disruptiveness made it more manageable and, dare I anger the gods, even exciting. After a year of doldrums and dullsville, we could stand some excitement.
That said, I’m glad it’s come to a close. As I sit at the desk in our attic loft, I listen to the rain and thunder and feel cozily ensconced away from the riot of the outside world. This space will be a welcome escape when things turn cold and dark again come fall, and imprinting happy memories and peaceful notions into its physical realm will enhance the coziness. On this evening, it is an ideal location for riding out the first summer thunderstorm.
Being the first recap in summer comes with its own baggage, especially as this is the only post that I’m doing today. The last few entries have taken a lot out of me – time, effort, and the racking of a brain that gets more difficult to jumpstart every day. Besides, I know you didn’t read all of the posts for the past week, so go do that before I put out fresh and fabulous new content. On with the recap, and into the pool!
We started summer off early this year with ‘Where the Boys Are’ but on this official first day of the season, here’s another song to greet the sun: the exquisite ‘Sanremo’ by Mika. It’s definitely my song for this summer, even if the Sanremo conjured can only exist in my mind. After not going anywhere for most of 2020 and the first half of 2021, such mindful travels are neither foreign, nor disappointing. Within the imagination is where summer most fully blooms.
Light brown skin, Lips like Campari
And words like soda, Can I come over?
Just let me in I wanna go where the nights are blinding
The sun keeps shining
If I could I know where I’d be – In a little town in Italy
Close your eyes, come away with me Tomorrow we will be…
What shall this summer bring? It’s already brought a boisterous return of us boys to Boston for this year’s wedding anniversary, a roller-coaster of a BroSox Adventure that started at the Mandarin Oriental and ended at Fenway Park, and next up is a rendezvous with Chris in a few weeks where his cross-country journey lands him back on the East Coast. I have a trip to Connecticut in the works as well, where I get to see Missy and Joe and their fantabulous boys – the wardrobe is already worked out to a tropical cabana theme. (Oddly enough, I had all the necessary accoutrements in the attic.) That leaves us with a couple of weeks to welcome in the summer before JoAnn arrives for a too-long-awaited reunion.
Sitting by the seaside, drinking up the sunshine
You’re here so why don’t we go dancing in Sanremo?
We can be there in a couple of hours, to the place with the yellow flowers
Somewhere only we know – sunset in Sanremo
After being rocked so traumatically last year, we all seem to be in a collective state of hesitant hope. That’s not a bad space to be during the summer, when things slow down, when we pause and savor. The other day, I went for a swim and had to remind myself to take it all in, to enjoy the present moment, to stop racing ahead in my head. Summer is no time to rush, and sometimes – most times in fact – it’s ok to simply be.
To feel like this is one in a million
A suspended moment – can we seal it with a tender kiss?
Out of a movie made by Fellini, Love that you need me
Over there you shine like a star, doesn’t even matter who you are
Hold my hand and we travel far
Close your eyes and we will be…
Maybe that’s one of the lessons we should glean from the recent past. I take it to heart, and take the world around me in tiny steps. A small cut on my leg brings back summer stumbles as a boy. The pesky mosquito bite on my arm itches and tells me I’m alive. Squinting into the sunlight coming from its zenith, I survey the sky. Nearby the little cries of baby cardinals and baby robins sound from the hedge and juniper. You can just see the straining heads and necks reach skyward when a parent approaches with a worm or caterpillar. Life feels fragile in the summer. Indomitable too, somehow.
Along with its fragility and defiance, summer is time for celebration, whether it’s the simple opening of a daisy or the opulent parade of hydrangeas this year. A rather benign winter has allowed blooms to form and develop on shrubs that haven’t bloomed in literal decades. It’s a happy sight to see, and so lovely I may make motions to provide some winter protection for them in the hopes to preserve this wave of blooms for future years. Lessons in kindness and compassion, even in the plant world, are always welcome.
Sitting by the seaside, drinking up the sunshine
You’re here so why don’t we go dancing in Sanremo?
We can be there in a couple of hours, to the place with the yellow flowers
Somewhere only we know – sunset in Sanremo
There you can shine like a star
There’s a place for you whoever you are
I know you’re tired of the rain, but tomorrow we’ll be…
Music hits differently in the summer. It hits harder, deeper into the heart and head, and it makes a more potent memory than at any other time of the year. I can’t say why that is, and maybe it’s just me, but summer music memories are some of the most powerful and meaningful. To that end, I’ll be writing a few summer song posts as we slink through the sunny days ahead.
Sitting by the seaside, drinking up the sunshine
You’re here so why don’t we go dancing in Sanremo?
We can be there in a couple of hours, to the place with the yellow flowers
Somewhere only we know – sunset in Sanremo …
Summer can be serious, but I’m most enamored of it when it turns cheeky and fun and light and whimsical and flirtatious – teasing and smiling and giggling at its own effervescent charm and silliness. When all else fails, and the world fumbles and toils and troubles, summer comes again – all sunshine and grace and balmy goodness. It’s hard to be sad or serious on a sunny summer day. Beauty has that power, and the sensual pull of the sun reminds us of all the physical pleasures this world still holds for us. A bowl of ripe cherries, sweet and tart on the tongue. A tall glass of cucumber-tinged water waiting on a table and sweating in the shade. A coconut-scented bottle of sunscreen warmed in the sunlight by the pool. A sun shower prickling my skin and tickling the hair on my arms.
Sitting by the seaside, drinking up the sunshine
You’re here so why don’t we go dancing in Sanremo?
We can be there in a couple of hours to the place with the yellow flowers
Somewhere only we know… sunset in Sanremo.
So let us have this summer, let us celebrate it quietly and defiantly, gently and ferociously, in all the ways summer deserves and demands to be celebrated. It will go quickly, but it will go sweetly, and we will lean into the sweetness, embracing the warmth, the beauty, the joy.
Happy Father’s Day, Dad! You get to be the Dazzler of the Day, because no one exemplifies what a great father is better than you. Your example, your work ethic, and your unyielding support for your family was one of my first brushes of what real love was. Thank you for all that you’ve given to us – the laughter, the entertainment, the discipline, and most especially the love and compassion you showed the world. I love you – see you later today!
This concluding post of our 2021 BroSox Adventures falls fittingly on the first official day of summer. Truth is, we’ve been celebrating the season since we made our trip, so let’s get right back into it from where we left off. Greeting the morning at the Mandarin Oriental was an exercise in indulgence, so we lazily took our time getting ready for the day, sleepily tumbling out of the hotel and across the block to Newbury Street, where we had a casual brunch at Trident Booksellers. For all the bombast of drag queens who went from the Little Mermaid to Lady Gaga in the flash of an eye, or the excitement of a hard-won baseball game, it was the little moments of downtime that would always end up resonating in my mind, remembered more fondly than all the other hyped-up events. This Saturday morning stop on Newbury – one of our unplanned traditions, with a requisite stop at Muji, and a new browsing of Room & Board – was another quiet patch of time in which simply passing the morning was made more fun with Skip’s accompaniment.
New friends silver
Old friends gold
We’re like diamonds
Truth be told
People come and
People go
We keep shining
Soul to soul
We picked up some treats from Eataly, checked out of the Mandarin, and returned to the condo, our decadent time pretending to live way beyond our means suddenly over – and none of that seemed to matter anymore. Our Red Sox game wasn’t set to begin until 4 PM, but time was moving faster on this trip, and I felt the fleeting sense of its dissipation. We had a few snacks and moved onto the front steps for some stoop gazing with a glass of Macallan for Skip and a grapefruit seltzer for me. We may have also taken the rest of an edible – and the timing would be perfect for the game, and an epic Uber ride. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Shooting the shit on the stoop with a friend is one of life’s simple pleasures – and something that had been missing for too long. In that sense, I think we both realized that something had been lost in the last two years, and there was something very profound and moving about it. We felt it in the moment. There was loss, and there was gratitude. And suddenly, out of the sunny sky, there was a spattering of raindrops.
An isolated cloud passed overhead and we both felt a few more drops of rain trickling just on us. The cloud was gone, but we still felt water dripping from above. It was like our stoop was the only place where it was raining, and it made absolutely no sense. We looked up the next time more fell from the sky, and then we saw the silly bird hopping about in the drain, splashing water down upon the fools below. We cracked up at that, and the silly antics continued when we climbed into an Uber that would take us to the game.
The remaining edible hit just as we pulled onto Columbus. I was chattering away with the driver, Jean, who initially seemed an affable gentleman. We all had our masks on, even as much of Massachusetts had lifted its mandate (and we were vaccinated). Skip was conversing with Jean now, and I can’t even tell you what I found funny, but suddenly I was engulfed in a laughing fit. It was one of those that grew, feeding on itself to the point where my stomach was starting to hurt. Skip looked over and started laughing at my silliness. All I could see were his eyes above his mask, which only made me laugh more. I was quickly losing it, finding it difficult to breath with the laughter and the mask, and tears were filling my eyes, but it was so funny and silly I didn’t care.
Skip was losing it too, and to set Jean’s mind at ease I tried to scream out a simple declaration of ‘WE…. ARE… LAUGHING!!!’ so he didn’t think we were crying or having convulsions. At that, Skip completely lost it and let a fart rip right out loud. Poor Jean rolled down his window about a minute later. That was it. I was DEAD in this Uber.
Unable to breath for so many reasons, I slunk down and took my mask off for a few seconds because I really thought I was going to pass out from laughing so hard. “I am so sorry, Jean!” I sputtered, half screaming through my laughter. “That was so rude! I apologize for this person!!”
Jean was brazenly unamused by our nonsense, dropping us off at his first opportunity at the start of the bridge that led to Fenway Park. Of course traffic was then in a slow crawl so he drove beside us the length of the bridge, prolonging everyone’s mortification. I was still cracking up from the ride as we entered and took our seats after some confused fumbling trying to find them. Pulling open the Uber app to give Jean a five-star rating – it was the least I could do – I got a message from Uber stating that on my recent trip I had removed my mask and broken their protocol and would need to provide proof that I was wearing a mask if I wanted to use it again! Another fit of laughter ensued as we settled into the game.
Skip had recently referred to Fenway Park as the “Cathedral of baseball” and even as they were losing to the Blue Jays, there was something powerfully religious about this intrinsically American past-time. The sun slanted through the windows behind us, lending a church-like solemnity to the raucous proceedings, and the Fenway franks we had tasted better than any other hot dog in recent and long-term memory.
We were among people again, and I was glad to be experiencing such a re-entry into society with Skip. Over the last year and a half, my social anxiety had been largely relieved of potential pitfalls and difficulties. Starting a social life up again could feel daunting and draining, but a safe friend never failed to offer support, even if he was blithely unaware of the import of his presence. It was another moment of gratitude in the midst of a baseball game. The silly and the sublime, the sacred and the profane, the yin and the yang – another BroSox Adventure was being written for the books.
After the game, we paused to consider dinner options, and I recalled the nearby Time Out Market, explaining the dining hall aspect to Skip, who jumped at the notion. When it had first opened a couple of years ago, I made an early morning visit on a day I was supposed to meet Kira later in the afternoon. I’d felt a rare moment of loneliness, as Kira wasn’t with me, and I think I even texted Skip a photo I took of Fenway – empty and forlorn on the cold fall morning. In a way, it felt like a happy denouement as we walked through the sunny early evening, the warm light still washing over us even as we approached the 8 PM hour.
A DJ was spinning Dua Lipa and Journey and Olivia Rodriguez and somehow it all worked. People were laughing and talking, and while the tables were filling up, it didn’t feel crowded. We ordered some food and waited for our buzzer to light up. It was the perfect wind-up to the weekend, one of those moments that comes together with unplanned ease, like the world was aligning for us even if Mercury in retrograde was doing its best to mess with everything else.
We walked back to the condo as was our usual tradition, vainly struggling to shirk off all the hot dogs and bibimbap we’d just ingested, and the night turned a brilliant shade of blue. Even in the encroaching dark, summer was on the horizon. We spoke of the vacations to come, and summers that had already gone. We spoke of family and friends and the people we held most dear. For a few brief stretches we didn’t speak at all. While I had never doubted that our friendship would survive Covid, it still felt incredibly good to be in Skip’s company again.
We reached the condo and went out for one more round of stoop gazing. The next day dawned in warm and sunny fashion, and I realized I had left my glasses and an extra pair of contacts at the Mandarin, so we trudged over there as the sun grew in warmth and brightness. I was glad to not have to take the quick journey alone, and happy to prolong our return home just a few moments longer. Our BroSox Adventure was back in glorious effect, and as momentarily sad as I was to see it come to such a quick end, I was grateful we were both still intact, still able to make the trip and expand our friendship.
A true friend is someone who puts on Barney’s cologne simply because you asked. He doesn’t question why, he just starts spritzing.
A true friend is someone who proudly dons a gay pride rainbow Red Sox shirt even though you only bought it for him as a joke. He’s not embarrassed, he’s not self-conscious, he’s just instantly and intrinsically supportive.
A true friend is someone who can crack you up when all you see is his eyes above a mask in the back seat of an Uber. He doesn’t have to speak or tell a joke, he just makes you laugh – and he makes your life richer, more expansive, and always a little bit better.
“Don’t be dismayed by good-byes. A farewell is necessary before you can meet again. And meeting again, after moments or lifetimes, is certain for those who are friends.” ~ Richard Bach
“A good friend is a connection to life – a tie to the past, a road to the future, the key to sanity in a totally insane world.” ~ Lois Wyse
The mark of any great weekend can usually be found in the first stirrings of Sunday morning. If something exceptional and soul-warming happened, that initial crush of the Sunday scaries is a telling indication. Such were the dismaying notes of dread and disappointment that were starting to appear as Skip and I made our way to retrieve the bag of contact lens items and glasses I had inadvertently left at the Mandarin Oriental.As we walked in the brilliant sunlit warmth, and I munched on a mobile breakfast of croissants from Cafe Madeleine
Alas, I felt the keen pang of heartsickness upon leaving Boston. There was never enough time… but the results and aftermath of a wild weekend won’t mean much without the lead-up and adventures that ended on this bittersweet note of Sunday clean-up, so let’s return to the highly-anticipated start of everything on a sunny Friday, late in the morning, and the first stop at Price Chopper before hitting the road…
Excitement and electricity were in the air, and Mercury was in retrograde motion. The opening salvo of ‘Shipping Up to Boston’ fueled the very first turns we made, a driving song suggested by Skip, and one that marked the dramatic collection of music I’d selected for this trip, to mirror the dramatic year and half we’d all had. Checking out of our quick Price Chopper stop, I noticed that the total for the water and gum for the ride to Boston read out an ominous $6.66. Skip mentioned the infamous bad sign of the goocher before the boys in ‘Stand By Me’ began their coming-of-age journeys. I hoped we didn’t share a similar fate, not being in any mood for dead bodies near train tracks. Skip and I were far from boys, and had long since come of age, so I wondered if this trip would be a turning of the page in our own BroSox Adventures, if not an entirely new chapter. After 2020, it might be a completely new book. As such, I had been tamping down my own expectations and tendency to hype things up in breathless anticipation of our first trip back to Boston since 2019. It would be enough just to make this journey again after a year off.
This year, the drive itself into Boston would prove to be an integral part of things, worth mentioning for the quick pot-pick-up now that it’s entirely legal in Massachusetts to use cannabis – and we all know that I’m a mellow kind of girl. The process was fascinating, as the young woman who was taking Skip’s order stopped by and asked us to turn on the hazards (which I’d never done before). She was extremely affable, telling us about her recent effort in saving a baby bird from being run over by a car. Even indirectly, cannabis seemed to be making people much happier – or maybe this woman was an isolated moment. Across the street, we paused for a piss-stop (ten glasses of water a day will do that to a forty-five-year-old bladder). In the bathroom of McDonald’s a gentleman was just coming out of the stall, making guttural sounds and noises and carrying a crumpled paper bag, acting all kinds of crazy while I stood at the urinal and did my best to ignore his noises, and the responsive noises of Skip in the stall mimicking his nonsense. Everything was as if we never said good-bye. These were the moments I’d missed over the last year and a half – silly, foolish stuff that only good friends find funny.
The day ripened into afternoon as we arrived at the condo, dropping off our stuff and taking only what we would need for a night at the Mandarin Oriental. Since Skip’s dog Cooper had won us a gift certificate, it seemed only fitting to use it with Skip in tow. I’d been wanting to stay there properly ever since experiencing their spa, a visit to heaven on earth. We paused at the condo for drinks and snacks, then walked to the hotel, where I hoped to partake of some spa time while Skip napped.
The scent of the ocean was on the wind – an invigorating and intoxicating fragrance that would rival the sprays of Barney’s cologne I asked Skip to don for our check-in. Rain always seemed to bring out the sea – water calling to water – and in the air hung the first hint of the wet night to come. It wasn’t here yet – only the hints of it.
Mercury in retrograde reared its tricky head shortly after we checked in and I headed down to the spa. The vitality pool – their luxurious hot tub – was closed for service, leaving only the steam room, which cut my time there quite short. A disappointing moment, but after 2020 it was a minor incident not even worth inquiring about a rain check for. Returning to the room, Skip was back up, and we headed out for a beer and a seltzer, and a power meeting on dinner options, ultimately settling on Boston Chops. As we approach the breaking mid-point of our forties, and another summer of potentially shirtless moments (our pool is open and Skip has the wedding of Sherri’s sister to attend in the Caribbean next month) we had both been doing some intermittent fasting to shed our extra Covid weight. That discipline was suspended for the weekend, as we headed to a favorite steakhouse and tasted the first few frites, and a béarnaise sauce that was to-die-for. Breaking bread with a good friend you haven’t seen in a long time has got to be one of the most soul-enriching experiences our time here on earth still affords. As enjoyable and satiating as dinner was, it was merely a preamble for the fun we were about to have.
In previous years we had walked past and toyed with the idea of stopping at Cathedral Station, a gay sports bar of sorts. It’s been literally years since I’ve been to a gay bar, and this seemed the perfect moment to fix that, while watching the Red Sox game on television with Skip and his expertise in tow. We got a table and asked the host to put on the Red Sox game. Shortly after our beer and cranberry-club arrived, a figure decked out in head-to-toe Ariel garb from ‘The Little Mermaid’ began slinking around the room.
Put those two things together and I was utterly enchanted for the first five minutes of our interaction. Upon learning that Skip was straight, she quickly turned her back on him and spoke only to me – which she would do sporadically for the remainder of the evening. It’s practically impossible to ignore Skip, even with years of practice, but Layla did it flawlessly. While entertaining as hell at first, it quickly grew slightly rude and tiresome, to the point where I tried to avert eye contact so she wouldn’t seek out our table again.
The game was a doozy – and Skip seemed to be the only one in the whole place actually paying attention and watching, excitedly cheering the Red Sox on and screaming his usual nonsense; our initial plan to watch the game this year from afar didn’t seem all that bad, even if it rang a little hollow. Near the end of their comeback, I was blessedly in the bathroom when they made their winning play – and even though the bathroom was on another floor, I could hear Skip’s shouts and the pounding of his feet on the floor. I may have stayed there a little longer than necessary to allow the hysteria to die down, and to let Skip talk up his Tatum O’Neal game show encounter at a nearby table (for which he’ll have to write his own blog post because I’m not repeating that kind of desperation). Whatever he said left them supremely unimpressed as they all departed before I got back.
In his own advancing age, Skip has been making some hilarious mistakes when it comes to names and trivia, so when I mentioned Pedro Guerrero as a possible father to Vlad Guerrero Jr. he laughed and didn’t believe such a player existed. A quick Google search proved my answer not entirely foolish (well, except for the Jr. aspect – but I knew of a baseball player that Skip had never heard of, so it was a draw). He also confused the years that the Red Sox won the World Series – maybe it was his beer – and when I have to correct him on baseball trivia you know we are in a brave new world.
A few inside-side-notes to Skip directly:
It’s ‘Weber’ grill, not ‘Wagener’.
It’s ‘Holyoke’, not ‘Housatonic’ (or vice-versa).
It’s ‘Blue Jays’ not ‘Blue Rays’.
And, my personal favorite, it’s ‘Room service’, not ‘Room rental food’.
We departed with a vow to return here again next year – it was a happy mix of people, maybe a little more giddy than usual to be out and about once again – and now a new memory of joy in Boston exists where only possibility lived before. Exiting and not really thinking through our next steps, we walked right into a first for our BroSox Adventures: steady rain. While we had skirted one quick thunderstorm during dinner and drinks at Hojoku before a game, on that night the skies had rather miraculously cleared right before the game, as if on cue from a very kind God. On this night, with Mercury in retrograde, the rain did not let up for a minute, and we found ourselves trudging through the wet night, and somehow laughing our way through every step. Finding a way to laugh while walking through rain without an umbrella is a testament to the magic of being with a longtime friend.
A final bite at Solas ended our first day back in Boston on a filling, and happily fulfilling, note. We crashed quickly, and soon were out. Maybe we should have made more of a room at the Mandarin, but Boston had beckoned and we were at her wish and whim. Or maybe we did grow up a little, and such things as ritzy hotel rooms weren’t as important as time with good friends.
Widely-known as the ‘Grandmother of Juneteenth’, Opal Lee is honored as the Dazzler of the Day for her 94 years of wonderful work on this planet. She was present when President Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act into law, making Juneteenth a federal holiday, saying, “I am so delighted to know that suddenly we’ve got a Juneteenth. It’s not a Texas thing or a Black thing. It’s an American thing.” Read more about her activism and how it all began here.
Occasionally called the ideal mailbox post plant, this common clematis is often trained onto posts for mailboxes and lamps alike. We’ve opted for the latter, and I actually can’t remember if I planted this one, or if it came with the house. On certain years I’ve neglected to trim it up, allowing it to flop about at the base of this ugly lamp, reminding of its presence only when it strikes up its royal purple show.
This year I fed it a bit, tied it up a bit, and am now enjoying the fruits of such minimal labors. It takes so little to make a difference sometimes, and so often we just don’t bother. Still, some flowers will bloom no matter how badly you treat them, or how often you forget them. It’s just in their nature. There’s a nobility in that which I can only hope to one day approach.
A week ago as of this writing, Skip and I were just embarking upon our BroSox Adventure 2021. I’ve been stalling and putting off writing about it because I didn’t want to break the spell. Once I’ve written about it, it’s well and truly over. In some ways I’ve been extending and enjoying the fun of it all, living off the excitement and laughter we were so starved for over the past two years. Of course I’ll get to summing up this year’s adventures, and misadventures, I just want to hold onto the memory of it before putting it all down for posterity.
The tricks we play on ourselves, the way we emotionally convince our minds to play along with whatever gets us through the damn day – I don’t begrudge anyone for what they have to do to make it all work.
As for the eventual repository of the BroSox Adventure 2021 that I will write up here at some point, get ready for an epic return to form. Part of me anticipated a muted and more mature evolution of our Red Sox trip to start off the summer season. That part of me was woefully and wonderfully wrong. Stay tuned… and to give you a hint of things to come, let’s just say I may not legally be allowed to ride in an Uber for the immediate future.
Most true plant enthusiasts, if we are being brutally honest with ourselves, have turned to a life of crime at one time or another. Whether it’s the quick clipping of a plant cutting from a greenhouse stuffed surreptitiously into a pocket, or the midnight cut of a lilac branch from a public park, most people who are passionate about plants and flowers have succumbed to the mostly harmless temptation of taking something that wouldn’t really be missed, or might otherwise shrivel away. I always think of my criminal actions when I see the bright blooms of the evening primrose.
We had a nasty neighbor – well, she seemed nasty to a sensitive child because she had absolutely no tolerance for the foolishness of wicked boys (I’d probably get on quite well with her today) – who cultivated a couple of refined and simple gardens – all of which were right off the sidewalk in front of her house – no gate, no hedges, no impediment of any kind for an ill-intending garden thief who only wanted a small bit of her evening primrose that needed to be divided and cut back anyway.
The evening primrose (Oenothera) is a reliable signifier of summer – its blooms appear right around the solstice, opening in the bright light of day and closing at dusk. They appear in great quantity, but they don’t last that long, so it’s a trade-off. They will occasionally throw out some sporadic blooms throughout the summer, but this is their main time to show off. The plant spreads quite quickly in a sunny spot it likes, and so I didn’t think our neighbor would miss them, or even know, if I took a small bit from the back of one of her extensive patches.
Late at night, I snuck into her garden, quickly dug out the smallest of pieces of primrose, and hurried home, depositing it into our backyard garden (not the front because that would be too telling when it bloomed the following year). I’m not proud of this, and don’t recommend stealing of any kind, even if you think it won’t matter or make a difference. Clearly it still weighs on my heart and conscience all these many years later, and the neighbor had long ago moved so there’s no way to achieve any sort of reparation for what I did. Maybe I’m a better person for operating in a more honorable way since then, who knows. I didn’t tumble into a life of crime, and every time these sunny blooms open up and remind us of summer, I’m reminded to be a little better, a little more aware of my actions, a little less, well, criminal.
As for these Oenothera blooms, they are descendants of that initial brush with thievery, as these plants took off in our garden and have spread reliably and almost invasively ever since. I don’t think our neighbor even noticed. And that still doesn’t make it right.
A hilariously brilliant writer, comedian, actress and producer, Quinta Brunson first came to my delighted attention during her Instagram series ‘Girl Who Has Never Been On A Nice Date’. The thought of her happy shock at the movie refreshment stand will always make me laugh. She’s got a new book out that goes a little deeper, ‘She Memes Well’, and it’s a breath of fresh air from a new generation. Anyone who can make me laugh and think a little deeper about things deserves to be a Dazzler of the Day.
The mock orange, aptly named of its convincing approximation of the sweetness of an orange blossom’s perfume, is one of those unassuming and almost weed-like shrubs that only shines at this time of the year, but it shines so sweetly and so memorably that we will put up with its otherwise drab appearance. There are often such trade-offs in the garden. Some of the most spectacular visions and colors – such as coreopsis or evening primrose – are entirely devoid of any notable fragrance. Meanwhile, such plants as the mock orange and Korean viburnum offer potent perfume without any other visual excitement.
Being that I have a few fond memories of the mock orange perfume from childhood, it is worth it to have a couple plants on hand, even if this magic is doomed to last but a week at the most. Two of them came with the house, and the other one is a nursery specimen. All could stand to have a little extra care, something I’m guilty of neglecting as they are such stalwart souls.
Only Andy and I, and a few select Audi associates, will ever truly understand the epic failure and subsequent journey that was undertaken and endured to reach this smiling point of happiness with a vehicle. As any regular reader will tell you, Andy is all about his car. He has a photo album of every car he’s ever owned or leased, like a proud parent or grandparent, and he religiously researches and keeps up to date on all the latest news about whichever model currently occupies the garage. It’s his passion and his hobby, and one of the three things I looked for in a mate all those years ago. (When we were young and foolish enough to demand such things in a partner, one of the things I wanted was someone who was passionate about something – it didn’t need to be anything that I liked or enjoyed, it just had to be something about which they were excited and knowledgable about – and in Andy’s case that was cars. I still get a kick out of watching him peruse his car magazines and figuring out which car package would work best in any given situation.)
His last Audi was a lemon of the most sour variety – you couldn’t eve make lemonade with how dangerous it was getting. (The automatic correction thingie almost smacked us into a truck on the Mass Turnpike.) Luckily, he reached an agreement on a new car with the local Audi dealership, so for now things are looking up after a year-long nightmare. His smile says it all, and I have a sleek new ride to work.
