Mersydotes

Summertime.  Locusts, fireflies, corn fields.  It has a certain magic.  A season with clear edges, challenging you to take advantage of every last moment.  We'll miss the sunshine, and the warmth, the birdsong, and the  foliage, but they're here now for the taking.   And for me, summer also means choosing a theme.  I'm not sure how it started, but for a long time, I've chosen an overarching theme for my summer reading- once, it was happiness, once the grand classics of Russian literature (yes- that was a reallllllly depressing summer!), and this year it's Japan.  I've never gone into it with a theme already picked out, but once summer hits, I start "chain-reading", starting with one book, then reading another that was somehow mentioned or alluded to in the first or stumbled upon in the same section.  It's taken me on some pretty fun and rambling trips.  And then, when summer is drawing to a close, I can ...

Has spring sprung?  One day it seems like it has, with sunshine and mild temperatures and strolls around town, and the next we're back in the snow and wind and freezing rain with warnings of a Nor'Easter heading for the East Coast.  But there are signs that warm days are on the way, and on one fortuitous walk to the park we stumbled upon snowdrops- snowdrops!  Little bells tolling the arrival of springtime- we just have to wait a little longer. And while snowdrops are sprouting outside, yarn flowers have been sprouting in our living room.  This gorgeous batch of new cotton holds a million possibilities (and was only a buck a skein!).  It is actually a cotton synthetic blend, giving it a really soft feel without any pilling.  These little flowers are my first project with the new batch of yarn- I've been wanting to make a springtime flower garland for my grandmother, and these were the perfect colors- half brights,...

All we've had in May so far is cold, drizzly rain.  Looking out the windows, all I see is people wearing stocking caps and scarves scuttling along the grey sidewalks- in May!  How will my tomatoes survive this drought of sunlight? Shouldn't we have gotten this out of the way with all that "April showers" jazz?  There's been a lot of indoors time recently for me and Penny, but at least it's been warm and colorful.  It helps when you're a pint-sized furry mammal who can luxuriate anywhere and everywhere : ) I shouldn't complain too much, though, because we did have one gorgeous day last Saturday.  Walking after brunch with friends through Central Park, everything felt right in the world.  Too warm for a jacket, the sun on our faces, families out in droves to enjoy the newly opened public lawns- it was lovely! In March I was out of town for a few weeks, and when I came back to NYC, the city had taken its revenge: all of the copies of The New ...

We had an adventure yesterday in Hell's Kitchen (a neighborhood on the West side of Manhattan):  I'd heard the creative director of the New York Shakespeare Exchange interviewed on a podcast, and she was so happy about her troupe that her enthusiasm was contagious.  She said that Shakespeare wasn't meant to be read, but rather heard and experienced, and that's why the Shakespeare Exchange brought the Bard to the masses. So we went on our very first pub crawl yesterday afternoon, making four stops with a group of about 50 other Shakespeare fans.  At each stop there was time to kick back and relax and then suddenly a bell would chime and actors would hop up on the bar and bring to life a bit of a play.  They had chosen stand-alone comedic scenes from Much Ado About Nothing, Henry IV, As You Like It, and the Merry Wives of Windsor.  Here are the Merry Wives perched atop a bar, making us laugh. It was perfect and joyful, and every scene ended in a reso...

It's been nearly a month, and now I'm back.  You might say that time flies, but I say that from a non-linear, non-subjective view-point, it's really just a ball of wibbly, wobbly, time-whimey stuff.  Either way, it's good to be back in the blogosphere.   It's been hot, hotter than ever, with no rain and no reprieve.  We've been making iced coffee (even Mr. Mersy likes it when I use the hazelnut instant coffee) and escaping to Brighton beach whenever we can. Three weekends ago we fled from the nitty gritty of the city with friends and made our way into the Hudson Valley to Stormking Art Park.  It was breath-taking.   To be yanked from our neighborhood where the population density is 90,000 per square mile to acres and acres of mountain meadows and valley overlooks was glorious.   Just to remember that the rest of the world exists even if your stuck in NYC working two jobs in neighborhoods that stink of trash and garlic day in and day o...