The Volunteer

In so many ways, the name doesn't fit. When I hear "volunteer," I think of a smiling face with a hospital tray, or a badge-wearing angel at an airport information desk. There is a lot of goodness in the word, to be sure. But the word also a martial implication, young men marching off to war. How odd, then, that trees that spring up where they aren't planted are also called volunteers.

But they are, and I can now stand amidst the branches of one — a weeping cherry that was spared at birth by our neighbors the Morrisons, the same neighbors who are more than halfway through their around-the-world cruise. Decades ago, they left the cherry alone while it spread its roots, enlarged its trunk and sent its branches down in a cascade of blossoms, larger and more fulsome every year.

The tree sits far too close to the street, is off-center, is too big for its footprint. But it has thrived, just the same. And watching it bloom this year makes me wonder at the wisdom of natural selection.

According to the itinerary they left behind, the Morrisons recently left Sri Lanka for Indian ports. These will be followed by a long string of sea days, then Jordan and the Suez Canal. The Morrisons aren't in Virginia to see the small pink flowers bud from the hanging stems. For this, they will need a stand-in — and  I volunteer. 

Remembering the Light

Traveling with a photographer for 10 days as I did last month in Cambodia has made me more attuned to light, to the waxing and waning of it, the quality of it. I'd heard of the golden hours, the ones early and late in the day, when light slants low over the landscape and casts a glow. But I was unsure of how far you could push it, how little light you could have to still capture a shot.

Our last full day in the field had us racing to reach a family before dusk. Even I, non-photographer that I am, was biting my nails. Would we get there in time? Would there be enough light left?

I've seen the photographs ... and there was. The couple we wanted to capture stand arm and arm in the setting sun, the brickyard slag heap reflecting its final rays.

The young woman wears a red checked dress. She's changed into it for this photograph, though her husband still wears his work clothes, which are streaked with grime and brick dust. This touches me greatly, the efforts she took, her simple gold necklace and flip flops, the way she cupped her stomach, cradling the baby she carries, due next month.

Life goes on; light goes on, too.

Lenten Thoughts

Two nights ago after a leisurely dinner, I found myself reading a fine essay about Lent. I rounded off the dinner with a few squares of white chocolate as I pondered Michael Gerson's words.

The chocolate is significant because I didn't give it up this year, and in Gerson's thoughts I found some justification for my decision. "Some of us give up sweets," he writes, "with the dual purpose of self-sacrifice and dieting. It is fully consistent with American ideals to kill two birds with one ancient spiritual practice — examining our inner selves while losing those 10 pesky pounds." The focus instead ought to be on the inner life, he says.

What I was striving for this Lent was to pray more, snipe less — to be more grateful for that which has been given to me. In that I've been only partially successful. But I'm encouraged when I learn of others who struggle too.

Gerson describes an earlier "enforced Lent" he experienced recently, a week in the hospital with poor food and no electronics. "What did I miss? Lots of things. What could I do without? Pretty much everything."

Such denial, he writes, reveals that the "richness of life is found elsewhere — in ... the experience of gratitude — not for this thing or that thing — but for God's radiating presence in all things."

I don't typically seek spiritual uplift from the newspaper. But that's what I found the other day.

Meandering More

Lately I've been living the life of a dog-walker. Not a professional dog-walker, mind you, the kind that gets paid, but an amateur — a true amateur, according to the French root of that word, one who loves, who does what she does for love.

And love this little guy I do. We all do.

A couple weeks ago he started limping. Did he hurt his paw? Would it resolve itself? The vet rendered a verdict: Copper had torn his ACL! Who knew canines had anterior cruciate ligaments?

While some dogs have surgery for this, I doubt this dog will. Instead, we're keeping him quiet and giving him medicine for pain and healing.

Keeping Copper still is not an easy feat. It means barring him from running across the backyard, something he wouldn't have attempted two weeks ago but now, as he improves, he would love nothing better than to do. I've barricaded the deck stairs (his only way out of the house without a leash) and he's walked a few houses up and down the street when he needs to do his business.

It's been an interesting interlude, this routine dog walking, quite a departure from the typical Copper experience, which involves holding on for dear life. Instead, the two of us have been meandering more, Copper sniffing, me musing — both of us slowing down and taking life a little easier.

Interior Decorating

I don't take naturally to interior decorating. I have no flair for it, no natural aptitude. I know what I like, which for lack of a better term I'll call Old World Cozy, but this is not an easy vision to articulate.

A recent burst of decorating energy has propelled me online and into furniture stores, where I wander bewildered among the couches, tables and chairs. The problem with making one decision is the many others that follow. 

If we buy this couch, must we buy the chair? And the ottoman? And what about end tables and lamps?  Ah, yes, the list is endless. 

Which is why ... sometimes ... I do nothing at all.

(Photo shot in a furniture store showroom which shall remain nameless.)

Brave Buds

Before the leaf and flower, trees take on a vague pink sheen. On closer inspection the sheen turns out to be clusters of budding branches. But from afar, when caught in a spurt of sunshine on a breezy day, they seem to gleam with a light pink halo.

It's the maples, the brave ones, showing us the way. It's not that hard, they say. It's a matter of faith, of reaching to your highest branches, letting the life-force flow.

On a walk this weekend I snapped photos of trees and shrubs in various states of bloom. I thought about anticipation, potential, that which is worth waiting for. Surely there are spring shots lovelier than these.

But to me these speak to the heart of the season, that from the gray trunks of winter come a riot of bloom. That summer greens would never happen without these brave buds.

2,700

Sometimes I only see the milestones after they happen. Yesterday's was this: I've written 2,700 posts since I started this blog in February 2010.

It makes sense, I guess, numerically speaking. I'm in my tenth year, and I write almost 300 posts a year.

Still, the round numbers always make me reflect on how much this blog has become part of my life, an (almost) daily habit.

What this boils down to is that I make sense of the world by writing about it. I'm a born scribbler, that's all.

Naming Names

One of the more light-hearted aspects of my work is the opportunity I occasionally have to make up names for people. The reason I do this is anything but lighthearted, though. It's because I interview and write about people who have been trafficked and can't reveal their true identities.

Still, this gives me a creative license typically lacking in most of my daily to-dos. This morning I've been reading about Cambodian names, about how family names appear first and given names second (which I knew) and how name meanings are especially prized.

So I've been having some fun with it. Should the lovely young woman who met her husband at a survivor's forum be called Bopha (flowers) or Arunny (morning sun)? Should her young husband be called Narith (masculine) or Leap (luck)?

The mother's name was easy. The smiling woman who greeted us as we pulled into the brickyard, who wiped her hand on her skirt and reached out to shake ours, she will be called Sophea (wise).

(School children in Cambodia, who shall remain nameless.)

Our Towns

I've just finished reading Our Towns: A 100,000 Mile Journey into the Heart of America by James Fallows and Deborah Fallows. The authors, who write for the Atlantic and charted their multi-year progress on that publication's Our Towns notebook, have a few things to say about what makes places prosperous and what makes them whole.

Their observations were based on their visits (often multiple visits, some years apart) to towns and cities all across America, from Eastport, Maine, to Redlands, California; from Holland, Michigan, to Greenville, South Carolina.

Here's some of what they learned about what makes towns tick: Thriving places consider themselves separate entities, not suburban satellites, and people work together on practical local possibilities rather than letting national politics keep them apart. Many of these towns have flourished because of public-private partnerships, research universities and community colleges. Elementary and secondary education also makes a difference. Downtowns are one of the most important features. They enliven towns, they give them heart.

The part of the book that spoke to me most involved the intersection of people and place. When asked why they live where they do, citizens of these towns say it's about belonging. "This is my place," they exclaim. To which the Fallows add: "From Sioux Falls to Eastport to Columbus to San Bernardino. Hometown [is] home."

(The photo is from my hometown, Lexington, Kentucky, which was not featured in the book but which holds a special place in my heart.)

Five Years

A few weeks before Dad died, his friend Jerry bought him a new watch battery. Five years later, the watch is still ticking.

Apart from wondering where Jerry purchased the battery, I have often reflected on Dad's watch and its longevity, how it has kept going so long after his passing. It's a vivid reminder of his enthusiasm for life. Even when Dad was dying, he wanted to know what time it was.

A watch is an intimate thing. It's worn on the pulse, a shortcut to the heart. It becomes a part of its owner in a way few other items do. I've come to count on Dad's watch being close to mine every evening, as if through our timepieces Dad and I are somehow still communicating.

The battery won't last forever, I know, nor will the watch. But sometimes I like to pretend that they will.

Saint Joseph's Day

When I was just out of college and teaching high school English for a few years, I was lucky enough to work with a man named George Herman. He seemed old to me at the time, though was probably just in his 50s. Puckish and fastidious, Herman led the 20-plus-person New Trier English department, New Trier being a suburban Chicago high school with a campus as big as some colleges.

Herman comes to mind regularly this time of year because when I wore green on St. Patty's Day, he told me he was holding out for March 19, when he would wear red for St. Joseph's Day. And he did. I can still remember his red vest.

Today is St. Joseph's Day, and I've been thinking about this saint, what was asked of him. Yes, your betrothed is with child, said the angel, but don't be afraid. The child was conceived through the Holy Spirit. You will name him Jesus and he will save his people, your people, from their sins.

Who knows how this all came down. Who knows if it really did come down. (My faith is a rather elastic one.) But even in metaphor, St. Joseph's example speaks volumes. To follow your beliefs no matter where they lead you, to endure ridicule and scandal for them. Not a bad example to follow — depending on your beliefs, of course.

(A photograph that has nothing to do with St. Jospeh. I just happened to take it while walking to work this morning.)  

St. Patty's Redux

One advantage of having a tame St. Patty's Day celebration is waking up and wanting to do the day all over again. It's something that younger people (and my younger self) would have problems with.

But because my office is having a little happy hour this afternoon, and because I never get my fill of Irish music, I'm treating today as St. Patty's #2.

I'm wearing green and humming tunes and yes, I'll try to do a little work today, too.  But the spirit will be with me. The Irish spirit, that is.

Green Weekend

The Irish music has been blaring yesterday and today, pipes and jigs and ballads, from my laptop, iPod and CD player. I listen and am back in the little pub in Inishmore in the Aran Islands, or in Dingle Town, where the great Steve Cooney showed up to play at the Courthouse Pub.

I'm remembering the stones, the cliffs, the bare hills all green with lambs grazing, the ancient, ruined forts with rainbows all around them.

I'm tasting the brown bread at breakfast, the scones and the fish and chips and the Cadbury's chocolate, which somehow tastes better over there.

I'm remembering how I felt in Ireland, which was ... like I'd come home.

Jeepers, Peepers!

In the woods and wetlands of Fairfax County, the spring peepers are singing. I hadn't expected them yet, but the minute I heard their music I felt like I'd been listening for them all along.

"It's spring, it's spring," I imagine they're saying, though it's probably more like, "I'm hungry, I'm hungry. What do you have to do around here to get some flies!"

One year I first heard them on St. Patty's Day, so they are at least a few days earlier than that year. But what matters most is that they're here, and being hearty fellows they will weather the cooler weather that's blowing in here tomorrow.

If the color of spring is yellow and the scent of spring is hyacinth, the soundtrack of spring is what I heard last night: the music of tiny frogs welcoming the season.

(Look closely; there must be some peepers in there somewhere!) 

Walking Outside

An elliptical machine is a wondrous thing. It allows me to walk in all weathers and at a time that suits my schedule, from 5 a.m. till 8 p.m. What it can't do, nor would I want it to, is mimic the sights and sounds of the walking world.

I often write of the psychic benefits of walking, which to my mind rival the health effects. I can get a buzz from the elliptical, but it's not the same as the lift I get from walking outside. Take the random interactions, for example.

First, there was a short walk with Copper, where we ran into neighbor Nancy, who I'd just seen last week at a neighborhood gathering. We exchanged pleasantries as the little guy pulled at his leash.

Later, on my own solo stroll, I saw Nancy again, as well as the couple who are adding a gigantic garage onto their house, and another woman with curly gray hair who've I've seen walking but had never before linked with her house. This time I saw her checking her mailbox.

I don't know all these people well; some I just nod to. But they're the human heart of the walk. Some of them have lived here as long as we have; they give the place character and depth.

So I'm thankful for the elliptical because it's kept me sane this winter. But I'm thankful for the outside walk, too. It's what life's all about.

Restorative

I had One of Those Days. Suspicious activity detected on a work computer so I spent hours reconfiguring passwords. A long, frustrating task with nothing to show for it at the end but (I hope) greater security, which I too often assume is mine anyway (though not as much as I used to).

Once home, though, there was a restorative: seeing the world from a dog's perspective. Time to smell the roses, or rather, sniff them. And not roses, not yet, but buttercups and snowdrops, which I spied on our brief stroll.

I took some deep breaths, looked up at the sky, caught the flash of a sun-lit contrail.

It was 7 p.m. and still light enough to take a walk outside. All's right with the world.

Standing Water

After the record-breaking rain totals of 2018, the D.C. area seems poised to break more records for 2019. Lately there's been some form of precipitation every weekend and most weekdays. It rains and mists, snows and sleets.

And so, there's a lot of water in the yard. It pools in the hollows, saturates the grass, clings to the leaves and sticks and other flotsam jiggled from the aging oaks by storms and downpours.

It makes the yard most unsightly. But if you look hard enough and long enough, you can see a blue sky reflected in the standing water.

I hope it is the harbinger of good things to come.

DST vs EST

There are movements afoot to banish Standard Time, to make Daylight Savings Time the law of the land all year long. Given how little Standard Time we have now (just a little over four months of it), we may as well.

Since I often deal with jet lag these days, to say nothing of early awakenings, it doesn't make much difference to me either way. I love the long light of summer, but that's because there really is more daylight to go around that time of year. In the spare season, a time change is the horological equivalent of a comb-over. There aren't many hours, period. Pretending there are is just sad.

So let's just pick one time and stick with it. Give up springing ahead and falling back. And given the eight/four discrepancy, it looks like Daylight Savings Time should get the nod.

Conversational Snow

It's March 9 and the daffodils have pushed themselves at least two inches through ground. But the ground is now covered ... not in mulch but in snow.

Welcome to what the Capital Weather Gang calls "conversational snow." This is white stuff that we talk about but do not fear. Snow that clings to trees and grass but not roads.

This snow fell yesterday but lingers today. Conversational? Yes. But not hardly whispered. Just ask the witch hazel tree (foreground), with its yellow blossoms all coated and frozen. It would like to change the conversation, I think. And it will have its chance. Tomorrow, we could hit 70!

Of Memoirs and Tree Ferns

I began this International Woman's Day reading (and finishing) a memoir by a most amazing woman, Diana Athill. Retiring at 75 from a successful editing career where she worked with such writers as John Updike and Jean Rhys, Athill began her second act — as a memoirist.

She penned several volumes in her 80s and 90s, including Stet, full of literary gossip and wise observations, and Somewhere Towards the End, which she wrote more than 12 years before the end, as it turns out. She died less than two months ago at the age of 101. She is my new role model.

Not that I think I'll live as long as she, but it would be wonderful to write another book someday, and reading her gives me hope that there may be some juice left after I finally leave my day job.

Let me quote from her postscript, with a bit of explanation. Athill begins her book describing a tree fern that she would like to plant but hesitates to — because she thinks she won't be around long enough to enjoy it. By the time the book ends, she has a more optimistic view:

The tree fern: it now has nine fronds each measuring about twelve inches long, and within a few days of each frond unfurling to its full length, a little nub of green appears in the fuzzy top of the 'trunk' (out of which all fronds sprout and into which you have to pour water). This little nub is the start of a new frond, which grows very slowly to begin with but faster towards the end — so much faster than you can almost see it moving. I was right in thinking that I will never see it being a tree, but I underestimated the pleasure of watching it being a fern. It was worth buying. 

Under Construction

It didn't take long. Just weeks after Amazon's announcement that my work neighborhood, Crystal City (aka National Landing), would be its new HQ2, the demolition — and the detours — began.

First, my cut-through was cordoned off, which made my walk from Metro to office less diagonal and hence longer. Then one whole stretch of sidewalk was blocked, a pedestrian walk constructed in the bike lanes, and the whole lot of it painted white.

Now I wait at the light and cross to the other side of Crystal Drive so that I'm strolling on a pavement-stone sidewalk that runs alongside apartment buildings where a few brave pansies still show their yellows and purples.

This is not just a construction zone; it is the construction zone. A transformation that will continue for years, and will, I imagine, outlast my presence in these environs.

There's a tinge of excitement in it, I'll admit. It's not unlike the neighborhood I grew up in, full of two- and three-bedroom bungalows being built as quickly as the hammers and saws could make them. The sound of construction, the sound of new life.

Ashes

I began Lent by returning my overdue library book (see below ... additional venial sin averted!) and receiving ashes. To accomplish the latter, I reached my parish church by 6:33 a.m. (the service having already begun, of course) and found the parking lot almost full. Wind chills today are in the teens but that doesn't stop Catholics from their appointed rounds.

Back on the road to Metro before 7:00 a.m., I noticed that my church wasn't the only one offering predawn distribution. Cars were leaving the Methodist church, too.

But the greatest surprise came at the Crystal City Metro. I usually avoid that station these days, having found a bus that leaves from another Metro stop that gets me to the office more quickly. But today I opted for Metro all the way because it was warmer.

As I was scrambling up the escalator into the usual crowd of buskers and hawkers, I spotted a man in purple off to my left. He was bearded, smiling and ... wearing vestments. It was a priest giving out ashes!

Guess I would have gotten them today one way or the other.

Overdue!

Though I sometimes drive over the posted speed (less often than I used to) and have been known to jaywalk, I'm not what you would call a scofflaw. There's something else afoot in my attitude toward library books.

Here I am, a few days behind returning one and I feel like I've just stolen the crown jewels. It must be because books are important to me, and having been on one end of the "holds" queue I don't want to keep people on the other end waiting longer than necessary.

Still, this morning I did something faintly rebellious. I kept my overdue copy of Hempl's The Art of the Wasted Day one more (not wasted) day just so I could finish taking notes on it. I can't renew it because the book has one of those aforementioned holds. But I can't return it either — because it still has a hold on me.

The book is rich in observations, too many to record in one sitting. So I'm boldly ignoring the date stamp (2/28/19) and bearing the additional fee (+10¢) and returning the book tomorrow — instead of today. Hold off on the paddy wagon just a few more days, please!

Tethered

Last night I watched a movie called "Free Solo," a documentary that chronicled Alex Honnold's untethered ascent of El Capitan in Yosemite.  Using only his hands and feet — and most of all his brain (which apparently has a less-responsive amygdala than most), Honnold was able to climb up the sheer face of the 3,000-foot cliff. No ropes, no belts, buckles or belays. Just the man and the mountain.

By contrast, I recently ascended 400 feet in a balloon to see the temples of Angkor Wat. It couldn't have been safer. The balloon was tethered to the ground and the passengers were encased in wire mesh. I was still weak in the knees.

And last night, I was weak-kneed again. It didn't even help that I knew the guy survived. There's something primitive about it, something hard-wired in us to recoil when we see another human being clinging precariously to a sheer rock face. 

No doubt about it, the untethered experience makes for great cinema — but when it comes to my own ascents, I'll take them tethered every time. 

Coconuts!

I've yet to write about the food in Cambodia, a topic worthy of several posts. But let me say a quick word about coconuts.

They were everywhere, at roadside stands, alongside Angkor Wat, in the city and in the country. Families served them to quench our thirst after a hot, dusty drive. And as long as the straws weren't used (and I don't think they were), they were the most hygienic drink of all.

The ones pictured above were served at the Vietnam border, where we sat for a few minutes to look nonchalant in our pursuit of photos. Maybe that was why their milk tasted all the sweeter.