A List of The Best Things in Life

• Listening to National Public Radio - Fresh Air and On Being especially
• Having a laugh out loud phone conversation with your oldest niece
• Finding the perfect gift for someone
• Reading a book that both disturbs and makes you think - Incendiary by Chris Cleave
• Giving another niece a book you absolutely loved and she texts that she simply can’t put it down - Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonsen
• Traveling by train
• Fresh flowers in the house
• Giving a children’s book to kids in and out of your family - A Sick Day for Amos McGee by Philip Stead
• Watching a documentary about Sting and his musician friends making the haunting CD A Winters Tale
• A bunch of kids sitting around playing board games
• Having a cheeseburger and Guiness with my best friend in a neighborhood bar  
• A cup of Earl Gray tea in the afternoon - Barnes & Noble has the best EG - in the blue tin for about $10
• Discovering that your Great-grandfather x 11 was a Quaker and served time in an English jail before coming to America with William Penn - yes, that Willliam Penn. 
• Discovering that a stone house your Great-grandfather x 11 built in Philadelphia still stands today - and the house has a name "Wynnestay" Try www.familysearch.org   - it’s free
• Watching my grandparents dance to Ella or Benny or Glen
• Growing paperwhites in the middle of winter - just to remind myself of Spring
• Watching a BBC series: Single-handed; The Vicar of Dibley; Ballykissangel (1^st season); The House of Elliot; Downton Abbey (of course); Foyle’s War; and Vera
• Wrapping a present in plain brown paper with simple cotton ribbon 
• Taking photos
• Going to the library
• Eating  a piece of warm homemade bread with salted butter
• Imagining my grandmother sitting in a chair beside me, wearing peddle-pusher slacks with her standard white tennis socks and rebooks, her super slim, crazy beautiful legs crossed - leaning forward with a cup of coffee (or if evening a glass of beer) with a cig in hand, saying “ Now Sis” getting ready to impart something……..
• Reading about intelligent thoughtful discussions and approaches to complicated problems in these crazy not so reasonable political times- Kennedy by Ted Sorenson
• Crunching through the snow on a super sparkly crisp clear winter day
• Catching a whiff of something that smells like the grilled cheese sandwiches they served at your Catholic school every Friday back in the day - yummy
• Listening to and watching Lowell George on YouTube

Hawks

There is not day that goes by that I do not see a hawk somewhere in this urban landscape. Yes, it is winter and the bare bones of the leafless trees expose anything that moves between them more easily but it’s not that I think, I just see them no matter when, no matter where, no matter the season. 

Yesterday I saw a red-tailed hawk fly across the Interstate highway, landing on a light post flaring out her beautiful signature red tail to balance her abrupt change from soaring to full-on stop.This morning on my way to the library to do a bit of writing I saw a smaller hawk (sharp-shinned I think) chasing a frantic sparrow back and forth across another busy thoroughfare - the sparrow got away. Last Fall, during my ritual morning walk on my childhood street I saw two hawks fighting/chasing one another just above my head in a maple tree, some sort of territorial dispute I suppose. 

Where I currently live is a sort of charming New Englandy looking street  (truth be told it is the only charming thing about the whole neighborhood). The condos connect above the driveways to mimic  an old fashioned carriage house entrance. While standing with my dog who was snuffling about in the shrubbery, our resident hawk came gliding through the covered entryway at eye level only to smoothly sail through the other carriage-house drive directly across the street - WWII planes flying under bridges just for the kick of it comes to mind. 

I don’t recall seeing hawks in residential neighborhoods when I was a kid, I suppose they were there but for the life of me I don’t recall it. They clearly have adapted, a few weeks back  I even saw a juvenile red-tailed hawk that was coming down to feed off a not so recent roadkill, just tufts of fur remained. Key word here may be juvenile i.e. inexperienced, in explaining this odd behavior.  

After writing this blog and doing some other writing I took a break  to go get a bite to eat, yep, you guessed it - another hawk flew right in front of my car on the way to lunch………go figure.

Historical Novels - Medieval Times

It seems as if I have always been interested in medieval history, not sure why but ever since reading the classic Katherine by Anya Seton at age 14, I became hooked on books about the England, France, Wales and  Scotland. The court intrigue, the personalities, the role of the Roman Catholic church and the power they wielded, the building of cathedrals. I like history in general but these times for some reason speak to me. So here is a list of books that I find you can dive into and lose yourself.

Wales:

Here be Dragons by Sharon Kay Penman - about Llwellyn, the Prince of Wales and his marriage to Joanna - illegitimate daughter of John, King of England

England:

The Autobiography of Henry the VIII by Margaret George

Sunne in Splendor by Sharon Kay Penman - Richard III of England

Scotland:

Mary Queen of Scotland and the Isles by Margaret George

Cathedrals:

Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett - building a cathedral in 12^th century England

Coincidental Gifts

Delight - joy, enchantment, amusement, to revel in, to relish

I was sitting in a neighborhood coffee shop the other day doing some writing when an older woman walked in - and I immediately knew her. Clear across town months before I had taken a photograph of she and her grandson sitting at a red café table by a window, their faces washed in sunshine - looking at each other with absolute joy. I had come to this bakery in Bexley - owned by the daughter of the grandmother and mother to the boy in the photo - to take photographs of the weekly gathering of musicians. Those photos turned out fine, nothing special really but it was that photograph of a grandmother and grandson that gave me that wonderful feeling of “ahhh” when I pulled it up on my computer screen. One word came to mind "delight" - they were clearly delighted with one another.. As with most of my photos, it’s usually the ones that I have not noticed, that seem to take themselves, that turn out to be affirmations. I had the photo enlarged. framed and gave to the bakery owner.

Now today, almost a year later, speaking with the grandmother, she tells me that the photo is on her dining room wall, that she receives numerous compliments on it.  I tell her that that photograph is one of my all-time favorites, that it reminds me of the way I felt about my grandmother and how she felt not just about me but about my brothers as well.  What were the chances that I would have run into this lovely kind woman, clear across town, in a Starbucks that I hadn’t been to in weeks? That photograph was a gift, running into that grandmother was another one.

* Recent favorite photos on right

Music

Every Sunday after Mass my Dad and I would sit on the dining room floor listening to records. Always Simon and Garfunkel’s Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme album which included the lyrical Scarborough Fair and my favorite Homeward Bound.

In the 1960’s seeing the weirdly disembodied faces of Frank Sinatra and Count Basie on the album cover of It Might As Well Be Swing lying on our red carpeted floor. I have an image of my parents dancing to Fly Me to The Moon across that same red carpet - real or imagined, I’m not sure.

Regretting forever the time I did not turn my car around and go back to visit longer with my father who was in a short-term rehab facility after surgery for cancer. Getting into the car, cranking up Little Feat’s live version of All That You Dream (probably the best lead-in build-up to any song anywhere, anytime).  The slightly lost look on my father’s face up against the self-imposed work deadline. My gut told me to turn around but the deadline won out. I would do it differently if given another chance. Songs do that, remind you of the regrets, the wished for do-over’s.

Recently I went to the Dublin Ohio Irish Festival specifically to see the incredible Eileen Ivers. But an unexpected surprise happened, the discovery of a band called Slide. Their singer Dave Curley’s version of The Maid of Culmore was a gift.  If you are not Irish or part-Irish, that band, his singing, that song will make you long to be.

Download The Maid of Culmore at:www.slide-ireland.com  
Album: Slide BEO-Live

When my father was going through cancer treatments, I would drive him to his doctor appointments. Every time we got to the end of his street he would say, “Hey instead of going left (towards his Doc) let’s go right to Jersey to see your Aunt Jill" (his much loved sister). The other day I was on my way to my own doc appointment, one that always makes me nervous - when I turned on the radio and Homeward Bound was playing.

Sampling from Beth’s IPad:

Chasing Strange - Lizz Wright

The Needle and the Damage Done - Neil Young

Soul Cake - by Sting

The Maid of Culmore - Slide, sung by Dave Curley

These Days - Jackson Brown

The Way you Look Tonight - Frank Sinatra

Classical Gas - Mason Williams

County Line - Pousette Dart Band

Moondance - Van Morrison

Don’t you Worry ‘Bout A Thing - Stevie Wonder

A Taste of Honey - Lizz Wright

Blackbird - Sarah McLachlan version

Ohh Ooh Child - Valerie Carter