fun – Page 6 – Nourish-n-Cherish

Earth’s Eyes

Canadian summers are generous.

The week we were there, we were blessed with ample sunshine, full rivers gushing waterfalls, millions of evergreen trees, tiny pinecones, open skies, harsh rock faces, long days and every hue of blue in the waters of the land.

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When we told anyone that we were planning to visit Banff, Canada, we heard about the Blues. In gushing tones, awed expressions, faraway looks as if transplanting themselves momentarily to a place with blue waters, and peace. I liked that. It must have been something if everyone had the same things to say, shouldn’t it? I have been to several lakes, and am always in awe of them. I remember somebody saying something to the effect of a lake being a planet’s eye, or something like that. Awfully poetic I thought then. Must find the quote.

Ah – here it is. It is our reliable ol’ Henry David Thoreau on Walden Pond.

“A lake is a landscape’s most beautiful and expressive feature. It is Earth’s eye; looking into which the beholder measures the depth of his own nature.”

― Henry David Thoreau, Walden

Anyway, so off we went expecting to see blue lakes. Emerald green waters, turquoise waters, and all the hues in between. Pictures do not prepare you for the surreality of it all, we knew that. We were hiking around the famous Lake Louise when the daughter piped up with her usual candor. “It looks pretty and all, but I don’t want to swim in it. It doesn’t feel right. Do you think it has some kind of algae, in it?”

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I looked at her and then nodded. I understood that feeling. I had not been able to express quite that way yet, but there it was. It didn’t help that I was reading The Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu, Translated by Ken Liu, and somewhat agitated by the other worlds mentioned in the book.

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But when we stopped to take breath a few meters on, I sucked in a deep breath. It was beautiful especially from our current vantage point. We were at least a thousand feet above and hiking around it in an elaborate trail that allowed us glimpses of the turquoise blue waters in between. So, what did make these waters this unnatural shade of blue? Why didn’t lakes in Iceland, Switzerland, Philippines, New Zealand, or the United States have the same color?

Professor Google says it is because of the particular kinds of glacial silt that is deposited in the waters with glacial melt, and not algae. Up close, the waters looks transparent near the shores, and the canoes seem to enjoy the peace and quiet of it all.

We canoed in ‘a lake that looks like more like an earthly lake’ as we delicately put it. But this lake too had spots of emerald green waters turquoise spots and the transparent blues. I took photos that I thought would wow the world. Of course, they looked like I shook my hands and poured tea into the lens instead.

I was nervous about the canoeing. I was nervous about the hues of the waters. But as the daughter and I shared a canoe, I was somewhat heartened. She is calm, reliable and more capable than Yours Truly at steering canoes towards shores as she demonstrated to me that day. We stopped mid lake, peering into the depths below. The calm beautiful waters holding the promise of the winter snow in its depths.

Earth’s eye that day assured me that to imagine yourself in a different world, if only a moment, is fascinating and necessary. We couldn’t really see the Loch Ness monster, or the myriad fishes in the beautiful waters even as sunlight pierced through to the bottom maybe a hundred feet deep. But I am sure these lakes were home to plenty of lifeforms – how could they not be?

Sometimes, humans are so caught up in our own trivialities in this universe, I wonder whether our fellow habitants are the same. Maybe. Maybe not. We would never know.

Yes, Aunt Alberta

Alberta sounds like a fussy old aunt who sews quilts, and asks you if you’d like some warm milk before turning in for the night. Yet, Wild Rose County, Alberta, is anything but. There is nothing domestic or warm about its mountain peaks, or its glacial rivers, or its expansive valleys, plains and lakes.

Every peak has a distinct…

Actually, it feels droll to use words like ‘distinct’ to describe the peaks of the Canadian Rockies. Majestic, unconventional, foreboding maybe? But it still does not capture the raw power these mountains exude. The peaks truly do appeal to the fanciful too. As we drove towards Banff in Canada, the car was filled with tales of the kind that must’ve inspired the folklore of American Indians for centuries. I resolved to go and look for some of these legends later.

“See those mountains? Don’t they all look like old men?”

“Yes! They are all wizards who went against nature, and then the rivers and lakes learnt of their treachery, cursed them to watch over them as penitence.”

“Ooh! Nice one!”

“Those must be the mountains where the goats learnt their footing.”

And so it went. Through the traffic and amidst the trees with the towering cliffs of mountains on all sides.

“Look at these little bridges? With trees and plants growing on them. Like little bridges for wildlife to cross the highway.”

“Yes! That is exactly what it is!”

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“Like the stuff mentioned in the West Wing episode?” asked the son wide-eyed. His interest in all things constitutional seems to be on the rise these past few months, and so we have started watching West Wing again. It makes for wonderful entertainment. If Aaron Sorkin was able to make a series like that based on a Presidency like Bill Clinton’s, I wonder what he would be able to do with a Donald Trump one. (But that saga wrote itself.)

Anyway, this is the clip in which the wildlife crossing is mentioned: Wolf’s only highway featuring Pluie the Wolf

Driving along the Canadian highways with nothing (miles of no human habitation) and everything (bounteous, gorgeous, fabulous nature) on all sides is surreal, and a change that we were grateful for.

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In the oceans of wonder

T’was the time to plan one of our trips to another dimension, and we were excited. For this time, we also had the company of our family friends who came in from India, which meant that we had planned both a trip to the Monterey Bay Aquarium and the beach nearby afterward for a sumptuous picnic.

At Monterey Bay Aquarium, we can be assured of being grateful to our marvel-filled planet for all its resplendent forms of life: the staggering variety of it, and the true meaning of diversity. For all our time in our daily lives, we seem to devote little of it to ponder the wonders of the world. So, taking a day in which we see nothing but life other than our own, so often so different than our own – with exactly the same conditions to develop is not just wondrous, but necessary.

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There were a few moments in that day that stood out:

🐟 Standing in an entryway where thousands of sardines swam overhead, the son and I noticed that there were a few – very few maybe 5 in all, who were determined to swim in the opposite direction. It seemed to be by choice, since they were edged multiple times in the opposite direction by the other fish. They were packed like sardines after all.

Maybe, every society does need those few who swim against the tide and make their own way – hard as it seems, I thought philosophically. Though, I am the first to admit that I have never studied sardine behavior to corroborate this. It simply seemed like a comforting anthropomorphizing thought at the time. I was feeling contrarian at the moment and these little fishes making their way against the rest of their crowd made it seem like those feelings were valid.

🐟 I have almost identical pictures of the jellyfish exhibit from my multiple visits to the aquarium, but this one was different. The picture of a baby silhouetted against the glass and longingly touching the glass housing the jellyfish caught my attention. Had my more photographically inclined friends been there, I am sure they would have captured an award worthy photograph. What I got was this. I love this picture because it seems to capture that essence of wonder innate in all of us, that we forget to cultivate and nurture.

🐟 Later that day at the picnic at the beach and on a walk by the waters looking at the profusion of wildflowers I could not help staring into the ocean waters. The home to all these grand creatures we had just seen. Their habitats and life in the waters had been beautiful, but so was ours. The tiny wildflowers on either side of the trail were reminders of that. Even if a tiny part of me resented the fact that my attempts at growing these wildflowers had come to naught for so many years and yet here there, able to thrive with no help from mankind.

There is something marvelous about being in the beach on a warm day at the end of May. It isn’t as crowded with the summer sunbathers yet, and the waters are neither warm nor cold: perfect for a game of guess-the-wave -lines (this game is a complicated game where we point to a wave and try to stand as close to the wave on the shore without it actually touching your feet. So the person closest to the wave before it starts receding wins)

I have with me a book on the oceans titled: Sea Change: A Message of the Oceans by Sylvia Earle and plan to wrap myself in the wonders of that world over the week-end.

🪷Happy 18th Birthday 🍀

May is the beautiful month of beauty, warmth , work, and birthdays (including the blog’s birthday)

The nourish-n-cherish saga is now officially an adult in the muggle world (18 years of age)

Over 1080 posts in, the blog seems to have had its own growth.

In the beginning , it was a place for short anecdotes on family and children.

Over time, as it neared school going age, I suppose the blog grew too

It started showing interests in varied subjects: gravitating towards science and nature based subjects for sure, but also retaining that shy curiosity about life and a sense of humor as we navigated the vicissitudes of life.

It isn’t as personal as a diary, so I doubt it will serve as a pensieve, but it serves as a cup of joy from which to sip when in a reminiscing mood.

🧘🏼‍♀️There were times when I could philosophize, contemplate, marvel in safety.

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Whatever it’s purpose was while starting out, I think I can safely say that it has helped along several dimensions (like a snowflake)

When first I started moving out of only personal anecdotes to writing a thing or two on a book I read etc, it seemed to have opened a door to innate curiosity.

Suddenly, I was more interested in varied topics, trying to understand different perspectives, open my mind to areas that I otherwise might not have had the opportunity to, etc. Inevitably, with all this fodder came the benefits of cross pollination, the joys of thinking through things, or the rewards of quiet contemplation.

In short, what started as a hobby soon became a source of such gratification, learning and joy that I could not help sharing with my friends (who, for their part have been nothing short of spectacular with reading, inspiring and encouraging me)

It Takes a Village

There have been times I’ve wondered what it all amounts to.But then I realize that it already has amounted to magnitudes more than I thought possible (sometimes human imaginations are limited.)

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⚡️Those moments when I am spinning ideas in my head, and have to stop mid-stride when a thought strikes.

⛈The magic of writing, re-writing and re-rewriting to get a piece right.

👻The frustration of unfinished pieces from a decade ago because of lack of time.

∫ The joy of tucking a good memory away so it can replenish us in written form later.

🪷The thrill of creativity as new ideas come in – the long list of children’s books ideas waiting to be written (also novellas & short stories) I have wisely given up on the idea of a novel given the constraints of time – but one never knows!

To all of you who have joined me on this journey, whether gamely taking it in your stride when featured, or given me things to think about as part of our stimulating conversations, or inspired me to try new things, or just being there in my life: Thank You!

A Redwood Run

It has been a few years since we attempted a destination run. The type where we run for the scenery, the physical gravitas of one’s surroundings, and the joy of camaraderie among one’s fellow runners. As we ran through the redwood forests, I thought to myself how marvelous it was to run and run like a true child of the Earth without urban buildings, construction noise, and piles of concrete. Even the gray road through the forest felt poetic and somehow attuned to its surroundings. (Well, maybe the double yellow lines were a bit jarring, but the gray road didn’t feel quite so intrusive)

After a chaotic start to the half-marathon, it took some time for us to settle into the run. The traffic jams were horrendous – the husband’s implacable optimism about making it to the start line on time was a bit misplaced, especially when we could see other runners leap out of their cars and run to the start line (adding a good mile to their already long runs). Our group of runners were split between two cars and by the time the bibs were collected and we started the race, it was a good 20 minutes past the race start. To make matters worse, the officials were adding to the confusion yelling to all in the vicinity that they would be removing the starter mats that record time. We were thoroughly frazzled as we ran across – not at all sure it had recorded our run, but we ran anyway.

The son ran a 10K, while the husband and I ran the half-marathon. The son having age and weight on his side flew on, while we huffed and puffed behind him trying to keep up. This resulted in a shin injury for the husband (which, he told me later, almost had him wondering whether he should do a 10K instead. Coming from the sun-is-shining husband, this must’ve been a serious enough injury) However, some stretches and slow miles later, he seemed to be in a better shape.

As we ran on and on, deeper into the forest, there was tranquillity there. A meditative pulse to running through trees that started life when humanity was still contemplating the merits of civilized living. Physical gravitas takes on a new meaning in the redwood forests. Young shoots and ferns, the young greens against the textured markers hues of the older trees, the sunlight poring through the branches high above. I thought of the books on redwood trees – Richard Power’s Overstory – the best one I could think off: powerful in its imagery and cathartic to think about just then.

“This is not our world with trees in it. It’s a world of trees, where humans have just arrived.”

– Richard Powers, The Overstory

Between the 7th and 8th mile, I thought I’d missed the mile marker somehow. It seemed interminably long. My leg seemed to have just given up, and I found myself looking up into the tall redwoods begging for strength. To drink from the infinity that seemed to stretch among those majestic trunks. It helped. The depths of the forest tends to speak to the depths of the soul, and I prodded on, careful not to tell the husband about the injury like saying it out loud would somehow make the injury worse. I stretched, grimaced, and plodded on. Each mile excruciatingly long.

I thought of the gray road cutting the mycelium web underground that sustained these trees for millennia and felt a strange stab of remorse : would the web have found a way to continue underneath the gravel to sustain the trees on either side? I’d have to check.

Cosmos episode for: The Search for Intelligent Life on Earth : narrated by Neil DeGrasse Tyson, written by Ann Druyan & Carl Sagan

But yet again, the forest helped.

Whenever the body felt drained and the pain in the right leg flared up, it felt grounding to remind myself that running this course was one of the best things to happen. For the redwoods were calm, the mists rolling in mystical, and the pattering of fellow runner’s feet grounding. There was a strange other worldliness to running through the redwood forests. Pain (possibly ITB) the only reminder that this was not a dream.

I cannot tell you how marvelous it felt to run the last mile and arrive at the finish line – famished yes, but we had managed to finish! Between our injuries, and a clatter of a start, a horse-wallop of a run, we had finally finished. The son was there cheering us on and all was well.

Having a wonderful set of friends on the journey is always helpful, and though we were scattered throughout the race, and didn’t see much of each other – the glimpses and cheers we did get was hugely inspiring.

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⚡️💨⛈ Oh! To be a cloud! ⚡️💨⛈

Time spent in a beautiful meditation of clouds, is time well invested in one’s soul. I am convinced of it.

The past week had me sighing and exclaiming at nature’s shows. The multi-layered clouds rolled in, and treated the populace to extraordinary shows of the skies.

At times, it would be the shades of gray against the white fluffy clouds as a backdrop.

At others, it would be the inevitable beauty of the setting sun’s rays as it used the clouds as a canvass for their light based shows.

Sometimes, I would find myself after a late night meeting simply looking at the moon flit in and out of the marvelous multi-layered curtains in the sky, to the orchestra of the winds through the trees outside.

One such time, I found myself picking up two beautiful children’s books and flipping through them with contented sighs. If only one could bottle up these little moments, there wouldn’t be angst or turmoil in the world.

Owl Moon : By Jane Yolen

Owl Moon

The Boy and the Blue Moon: By Sara O’Leary, Illustrated by Ashley Crowley

Both books managed to capture the beauty of the moon’s rays so perfectly.

I wonder whether the animals we share the planet with enjoy the cloudy days. They seem to be. One morning on a beautiful morning when thoughts of gratitude flitted in and out, much as light seem to be flitting through the scudding clouds overhead, I stopped in awe at the birds. This season, I noticed many more birds – maybe a bounteous winter made for a marvelous nesting season for the birds as well, who knows?

But the blackbirds, geese, herons, storks, pelicans, wood-ducks, grebes, hawks, turkey vultures, bald eagles, harriers, thrush, sparrows, robins, woodpeckers, avocets, yellowlegs, hummingbirds, and so many species that I can’t identify, have been flitting and filling the air with beautiful characteristic sounds.

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Life seems busy as the conscientious parents take care of their newly hatched young.

As I write this, a mild rain is falling outside – so gentle there is no discernible sound of the rain. The only sounds are those of chirping birds like a soothing backdrop to the drama in the skies: The grays against the greens and the multicolored flowers a unique kind of meditation.

#Nephophilia : a lover of clouds

“How sweet to be a cloud. Floating in the blue!”

– A. A. Milne

Write an ode to my wife, my life

“So, will I be getting my romantic poem then?!” I teased the husband who was looking sheepish. I giggled at his obvious discomfort. He is the sort of fellow who relishes the sentiment behind P G Wodehouse’s statement:

I once stayed at the residence of a newly-married pal of mine, and his bride had had carved in large letters over the fireplace in the drawing-room the legend: ‘Two Lovers Built This Nest’, and I can still recall the look of dumb anguish in the other half of the sketch’s eyes, every time he came in and saw it.

P G Wodehouse

We had been gurgling on about some rom-com movie, a rather touching spot of sentimentality that clinched the deal between the love-birds and all the rest of it. Which led to me to ask for my romantic poem. It is an old joke between us: we both know he is no poet, I am no queen, and so it goes.

I needn’t have worried though. If ever the man is discomfited, it is but a fleeting sensation. For he leaps into problem solving mode almost instantly. A few minutes later, the cocky fellow strode into the room looking pleased with himself.

“Check your WhatsApp messages!”, he said.

I did, and burst out laughing. He had done it. He had sent me a horrendous poem full of lines from 1980’s Hallmark cards, all culled together.

“Oh my goodness! Did you search up the first “romantic poem for my wife” and send it? I asked. I was laughing now, and he disappeared again looking even more pleased, and a sentence thrown to the winds, “The poem doesn’t speak of your particular gifts you are right. One minute.”

Then. A few minutes of deep thinking could be heard – the brain whirring probably and he said: “Check now!”

I must say it was much more than I expected. After seeing the previous attempt, I braced for a cheesy omelet.

My love, my life, my wife,

You are a woman of many talents

You are funny and witty.

And your writing is wonderful

The “poem “ went on in this vein for 3 more paragraphs.“Really?! You wrote this? I didn’t quite slot you as a loquacious poet, but good job! “ I said. The husband puffed out his chest and looked proud of himself. Too proud in fact, and that gave me pause. I narrowed my eyes x-raying the man’s soul and saw all. The twitching of the smile that gave it away, the hearty thanks, and I said incredulous, “Oh my goodness! Did you use ChatGPT for these?”

He nodded looking so proud of himself that I clutched my sides laughing barely able to breathe.

“Pretty good right? I asked it to write a poem for a loving wife who is also a funny writer.”, he said.

I beamed at the problem solver. I suppose all poetically challenged lovers can now relax. They can get help.

We had been talking about the ways in which this new technology can change things for us. Just as with every new piece of technology, there are pros and cons. I had been reading two books simultaneously :

Excerpt from Impromptu:

“Mintz immediately integrated the new tool into his decades-old teaching methods. Within months of ChatGPT becoming public, Mintz started requiring his seminar students to write their essays collaboratively with the new tool. As homework, they bring the ChatGPT prompts they tried and the responses they received for class discussion. They must turn in their final papers with a log of changes to the machine’s output.

As a great teacher, Mintz chose to use ChatGPT not as a source of answers and authority, nor as a replacement of his or his students’ work, but as a tool to help his students learn individually and together.”

ChatGPT: Threat or Menace?: By Prof Steven Mintz

Steven Mintz is professor of history at the University of Texas at Austin.

The book goes on to compare the use of calculators in Mathematics teaching a few decades ago:

“In 1970, the typical calculator was too pricey for wide- spread use in schools, but they hit a tipping point in the mid- 1970s. Many parents and teachers were alarmed at the influx of new tools; they worried that math skills would atrophy and students would simply cheat.

By 1980, however, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics recommended that “mathematics programs [should] take full advantage of calculators . . . at all grade levels.” Today, most math instructors consider calculators to be a critical part of math instruction, and many states mandate calculator use with certain tests. “

It is curious to see how human intellect is ever ready to thrive and adapt and hopefully stay abreast of these. There are now jobs being created for Prompters for those who can get the ChatGPT/ OpenAI platforms to coax the AI platform into answering particular queries.

There are cautionary stances to be taken and our laws may not always evolve fast enough to keep abreast of technology. The buzz of AI is the most fascinating challenge thus far, and I am rooting for our species to master its use as humanely as is possible. Use it for the good of the world – climate, healthcare (physical and mental), food production, education and so much more.

But now, I am going to savor the husband’s poem. After all, it did say:

Thank you for being you.
You make the world a better place.

Professor Mintz would’ve been proud of the poem 🙄

Photo by Matheus Bertelli on Pexels.com

Photo by Andrew Neel on Pexels.com

🪷An Anthophile’s Angst🪷

The Earth in spring is filled with ephemeral beauty. If only there was a way for us to shore up these stores of promise and beauty to dip into on long, drab days when hope isn’t shining out of every pore, life would be set.

Last week-end, one of my best friends whisked us from our homes to a place where Earth, as Ralph Emerson Waldo, so clairvoyantly says, laughs in flowers. I had seen pictures of tulips from Netherlands, and from Oregon and Washington states as well. It is hard to miss these photographs on social media. But it has helped build the yearning to visit these flower fields in the peak of spring. Who says dreams do not come true? They do, and often, in ways you do not expect, adding a delicious twist of serendipity to the experience. For this time, it came in the form of a girls’ trip to one of my best friends’ home. The exemplary hostess that she is, we came back feeling like queens, glowing in the warmth of laughter and love she enveloped us in, and smiling secret smiles filled with tulips, daffodils, fields, lakes, clouds and the sound of the twinkling camaraderie between friends.

Walking in and out of these flower fields, I stopped to see the different ways in which we sought to preserve these memories for ourselves. The photographs were fast and furious. Some folks, like ourselves, tried silly photographs, and some others were trying their best to obscure the pictures and their angles so as remove the other people around them. I quite understood the yearning, but also felt a bit cheated (though I was guilty of the same thing). You see? I had expected to see endless fields of tulips stretching far into the horizon as far as the eye could see. What I saw instead was a finite field of flowers. They were brilliant, but not endless. The angle of photography can be misleading indeed.

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The ones most appreciative among us were a couple of dogs that stopped to sniff the blossoms reminding me of the dog in Mary Oliver’s poem that loved to sniff flowers.

“I had a dog
who loved flowers.…

she adored
every blossom

not in the serious
careful way
that we choose
this blossom or that blossom

the way we praise or don’t praise –
the way we love
or don’t love –
but the way

we long to be –
that happy
in the heaven of earth –
that wild, that loving.”

― Mary Oliver

Maybe the dog caught a whiff for their sense of smell is far sharper than ours, but we shall never know what the dog smelled. I shall however remember the satisfied contented look in its eyes. There was another child who sniffed at the tulips and looked up questioningly. I understood the confusion in the child’s face for it mirrored mine from a few moments ago: the tulips weren’t fragrant exactly – they simply had no smell.

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As I stood there surrounded by tulips first and then daffodils in another farm, I thought longingly of the patch in my front garden. For two years now, I have been trying to get it to bloom. But like a trichologist (Trichology is the scientific study of hair) battling a particularly persistent bald man’s patch, it has so far resisted. A shining bald patch in the middle of the yard, simply refusing to burst forth and shine in the spring time. How these horticulturists managed to get this many plants to bloom altogether, and not one of them a dud, is beyond me. #EarthMagicians.

In any case, I thought to myself as I sniffed a flower, I take inspiration from the dogs in spring time bounding about with energy and a bubbling happiness trying to capture infinity in flowers. An anthophile’s (lover of flowers) angst is easily remedied in the ephemeral beauty of every blossom. No rose stops to think of its purpose in life does it?

“Wild roses,” I said to them one morning.

“Do you have the answers? And if you do,

would you tell me?”

The roses laughed softly. “Forgive us,”

they said. “But as you can see, we are

just now entirely busy being roses.”

– Mary Oliver , Roses

The Nature of Sleep and Time

The evening started off morosely. At least from my side. I felt the weight of time pressing in between the shoulder blades. The vague sense of limited time against the unlimited expanse of it: both aspects ebbing and flowing like tides in the narrow confines of one soul.

“Maybe I’ll cheer you up with a Tamil movie story.”, said the husband. Have I mentioned this aspect of the man before? I must’ve. The movies themselves do not interest me. The husband as narrator, however, takes it upon himself to remove this misconception of movies I have in my mind and with his usual charm and enthusiasm tries to work his magic. I am more entertained by the narrator’s enthusiasm than by the movies themselves.

“No please! I have limited time, and do not want to waste it on some stupid movie you watched late into the night!” I said. He gave me a “summary” anyway. 👀

“This is a summary? Please! You’ve gone on and on for 10 minutes – and you’re still meandering about with laying the ground!” I said exasperated for the n-th time. “This is why I don’t listen to your stories – you take double the time the movie itself takes!”

“Okay…okay. Almost done. Getting to the climax soon.” He said and went on for another 10 minutes.

I realized it was time for my meetings to start and made off.

“That’s twenty long minutes I’ll never get back!”, I swished mock-irritated, though his “summary” had me laughing.

Later that night, I crawled into bed ready to let my eyelids close and drift into the pleasant land of sleep when I saw the husband looking enthusiastic and energetic.

“What now?” I moaned. “If you’re going to tell me one more Tamil movie story, I cannot be responsible for my actions. “ I said.

He grinned, and I flopped back onto the pillow. “What the bloom? Tell me – maybe it’ll help me sleep. Two minutes.”, I said. “120, 119…”

“Okay – okay!”

After a few minutes, I moaned “Why do these movies go on-and-on?”

“Almost done. Almost done!” Said the husband and launched into a description of a fight between two knuckle heads who should’ve been home reading about the finer points of living instead.

15 minutes later, I flopped onto the pillow, and realized that the night-time story was far from relaxing. Adrenaline based fighting – humph!

So, I settled in to read instead. I picked up Flights of Fancy by Richard Dawkins and read about our dreams of flying.

I was reading about indigo buntings and their sense of direction. The little indigo buntings enthrall me. Tiny little creatures with a wing span of 7 inches flitting fast between their nest building and early morning swooping. Electric blue swift against their backgrounds. Their tiny wingspans made me think of the beautiful pelicans I had seen just a few days ago while out on a walk. Large birds with 7 ft wing spans – taking to the skies with a majestic power, and gliding through the waters with elegance and grace. Both states natural and both states equally alluring.

Both the pelicans and the buntings had my admiration, and I am often refreshed after spotting them somewhere on my walks.

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“Shall I tell you about this book?” I said.

I knew I had him trapped. If I listened to two movie summaries in as many hours, he could listen to what one book said. He gave me a look that conceded he was trapped, and I laughed. I started and within 3 seconds, I heard the man snoring. Snoring!

How long must those 3 seconds have felt for him? I shelved the book and let the man drift into his dreams amused. Maybe I should learn to fall asleep like that: Right when he is telling me a movie summary.

Omafeit – Amsterdam Fietsen (Bikes)

After that hectic trip to Europe, we came back happy and content with all the marvelous experiences we had the opportunity to take in, and also intensely happy to be back to our suburban heaven in California. It was a beautiful rainy day when we landed and the day after, an even more beautiful sunny day. So, off the son & I went on a bike ride through the beautiful trails by the swollen creek that we can now call a river. It was as we were happily talking to each other and biking that we took to discussing the bikes of Amsterdam. The beautiful, haphazard bikes by the canal.

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There are images, and there are special ones. The ones that you have no time to take, but remain imprinted on your brain. The whizzing fleeting ones that sear themselves in some cozy part of the brain, associating with some feeling or aroma or words. The mystical ones.

“Remember that man with his kid on his shoulders riding the bike?”

“Oh- and that lady who had a cabin baggage sized suitcase hanging from her handlebar as she biked off to catch her train or plane!”

“Oh – that grandpa with his suit and lovely grand-daughter sitting in a basket seat in the front dressed like a princess tootling off for a Christmas service or lunch somewhere!”

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While walking by the canal in Amsterdam on Christmas Eve can be an experience in itself, it doesn’t quite prepare you for the chaotic beauty that is Amsterdam. I’ve heard folks talk about Amsterdam not being like other European cities. I’ve seen pictures of bikes by the canal on social media. But I was truly taken aback by the sheer joy and the haphazard manner in which the bikes were strewn against the canal as folks went about their business. There was a hustle and bustle, a gaiety, a chaotic joy to the whole atmosphere that was wholly unique to Amsterdam. It seemed like everything was possible with a bike. What an empowering sensation that must be!

We were besotted by the warmth and quirks of the locals, and fellow gawkers such as ourselves alike.

The markets! The open air market near LinderGracht was a charm. Nowhere had I seen such a jolly throng of folks.About the only orderly thing is the statue of Dutch writer and educator Theo Thijssen, teaching one of his pupils. The son & I chuckled as we made our way on a cold morning walk the next day and saw a bike propped against the statue as if the student was in a rush to get to his master, and had to get there on bike and dash it by the statue.

bike_market

This was Christmas morning, and many folks seemed to be making their way to church or for a meal with friends and family on their bikes, and we wished them all a merry Christmas as they biked past. The fact that they all waved back, returned the greeting or said something clever and witty tickled us to no end.

“You know I understand now what my colleagues meant when they said they missed the biking of Amsterdam when they moved to the US!”, said the husband as he watched a father and son whiz past us to somewhere. The baby sat safe and content in the front basket, while the father biked him to where he needed to be, while the wind whipped their faces with holiday cheer. “This is a whole different level of mobility and swift action.”

A dozen geese squawking overhead flicked me back from Christmas time in Amsterdam to a cold January day in California in a jiffy. Who said we haven’t invented time travel and wormholes?

“Isn’t it so much easier to bike here on the trail though?” said the son as another biker courteously informed us that he was approaching us on the left, and sped past us with a wave of his hand as moved out of his way.

I agreed.

ca_bike

While it was enchanting to watch all these bikers wiggle their way through the crowds, it takes a certain debonair attitude I think to be able to bike suavely in Amsterdam, and for that they had our admiration. We amateurs were safer on a biking trail for now.

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