january 11, 2012

wednesday morning

boot & shoe service

oakland.

(birthday week gifting 

of a few free hours to 

be still, write, think, pray, draw, drink coffee, 

and 

soak up a january morning)

i took a peek at what i wrote one year ago today and i posted this and this.

kind of funny- some things never change.

Outside my window...january is warm and sunny

I am thinking...of how i used to sit at cafes like this for hours, ruminating on life and art and scribbling in a journal

I am thankful for...birthday week!

From the kitchen...blueberries, plain yogurt & a handful of granola

I am wearing...a pale aqua long cardigan layered over a thin, long-sleeved grey shirt layered over a tank top, a black & white striped scarf my mom got me for christmas, grey skinny jeans and my favorite boots that matt bought me last year for christmas, and the bone earrings my parents bought me in south africa a few years ago

I am creating...space for myself

I am going...to spend the rest of the morning writing & thinking, instead of working or cleaning (which i what i feel like i should be doing, as a responsible person; i am rejecting that feeling in favor for what is actually good for me -and as a result - good for the people around me)

I am reading...mindy kaling's book. she is really funny.

I am hoping...to get my studio up and working by the end of the month

I am hearing...the espresso machine in the background, jazz over the speakers, the clink of spoons and plates, conversation from the guys working at the cafe

Around the house...groceries to put away (from yesterday- classy), laundry to fold, dishes to wash and dry, and a whole lotta playtime with the girls

One of my favorite things (actually a few of my favorite things)...getting mail, reading the newspaper in my bed on sunday afternoon before falling asleep for a nap, a clean house, lipgloss, being warm, a hug from my mom, the succulents i potted on our front steps, snuggling, opening presents, iced coffee

A few plans for the rest of the week: to savor the joys of this last year & to anticipate and hope for a new year, go a date with my husband, knock out some freelance, put away 46 loads of folded laundry, celebrate side-christmas with my roommates, and figure my crap out (that one might take a while, seeing as its taken 36 years so far)

a picture of one of these moments: 

(succulents on our front steps)

treats + friends

i took a couple of days blog free, so i have a few entries up my sleeve from the end of last week still! that way even though it is monday, you can pretend it is thursday or friday! 

we started thursday off well with a fun visit from our friends bearing delicious treats: coffee and la farine. (i've evolved in my relationship at la farine- first i was obsessed with morning buns, then moved on to the chocolatine, and recently i am all about their savory morning bun. yum.) little m woke up from her first morning nap while we were hanging out, so she came out for her own snack of milk and her hit of social interaction. she snuggled for a while with nancy's mom and then spent the rest of the time eyeing baby micah, who is only 4 months behind her in personhood. at this point little m grabs everything of interest and stuffs it directly in her mouth, so once micah got close enough she lunged for him (i saw either a baby make out session or disastrous eye poking on the horizon). i think it's pretty safe to say that little m already has her prom date. (although there are a few other worthy and very cute contenders out there...if you want your child to get bumped up in the queue, you can bring us coffee and snacks too.)

there is little better than just sitting with good friends (of course, enjoying good edible treats with them does knock it up a bit, and good coffee makes it even a little better, but i digress). i have been hibernating somewhat this year, which is so unlike who i normally am. i've been realizing this week that i feel like this year has changed me at a fundamental level. it is as if a part of me, or maybe i should say parts of me, has been taken, stolen, removed without my permission. very important parts of my identity have been reshaped or erased and i am trying to process that:  who am i as a maker, wife, mom, friend, daughter, sister, and so on? right now, i don't really know, but i feel quite unfamiliar to myself. in the midst of that lack of knowing, it was peaceful to sit with good friends and share the beginning of the day. 

speaking of cafe au lait...

ah, to be sitting at cafe fanny in berkeley right now. so amazing the cafe au lait there is. yum. throw in one of next door neighbor acme bakery's turnovers - either ham and cheese or apple, and you are pretty much in culinary heaven. people, i am not exaggerating; do you live within 50 miles of berkeley? in that case, you really have no excuses & you need to experience the goodness. i should mention that cafe fanny's beignets (pictured) are not so bad either, but really, they are a distant second to turnover fabulousness. 

yay for my bro

props to my little brother aaron for making partner of the month at starbucks! (here he is in action pimping coffee a la little m)

i tried to convince him to jump ship and relocate at a local peets so that i can stop by for free drinks, but he informed me that peets is for hard core coffee drinkers. he is a self declared not-so-much-coffee-but-sugary-sweet-drink-liker, so he said he wants to stay at starbucks. every day when he's finished with his shift he gets a drink. yesterday's was a flop i guess: i think it was raspberry iced tea lemonade with a shot of melon syrup added. um, i think i could have preemptively said that bizarre flavor combo would be nasty. 

as a side note, there used to be a starbucks very close to an art store that i frequented when i was in grad school, so sometimes my next door studio mate, taylor, and i would stop in to get a hit of caffeine mid-day. once i discovered that their iced coffee costs more than their regular plain coffee, i had to boycott for good. i mean, seriously? i kind of went off on the barista one day, because it makes absolutely no sense to me. he informed me that it is due to the cost of ice. ice? really? as if starbucks isn't making money hand over fist with raspberry iced tea melon drinks? besides, you get less coffee when you get iced coffee, because the ice takes up at least 1/3 of the coffee's space. sigh. 

and side note number two: who does not know that coffee plus steamed milk = cafe au lait? ok, maybe not everyone, bt if you work at a coffee shop, one would think this goes with the territory, no? at starbucks it's a misto though, not a cafe au lait, and so until i realized that a. cafe au lait=misto and b. that i needed to translate my drink desires into starbucksian, it involved a confusing and complicated explanation process at the register. sigh #2.

but aaron, i digress. i am super proud of you and don't worry, you can always give me a free drink and i won't object.

little m's favorite nap location

there is a peet's coffee 2 miles from our house, and little m and i walk there a few times a week to get out of the house. i discovered early on - in little m's crazy fussy weeks, when she would cry for hours on end with no respite- that somehow, and to my GREAT delight, she loved peet's. maybe it' s the dark brown walls, or the lights dotting the ceiling, or the smell of coffee. or maybe i am content sitting there so she catches the vibe herself. who knows.

i do know that one of my favorite things since her birth has been to walk there with her and then sit for as long as she remains mellow (it usually entails a small small nap and a feeding before she goes stir crazy) until it is time to head home. we often run into someone there we know who is stopping in for coffee, working at one of the tables, or walking by outside to go to the grocery store. it is a reminder to me that even though we live in a city, that we also have community in this place. 

one morning, when m was still quite small, and therefore consistently fussy, she began crying inconsolably while i was sitting at a table inside. being a new mother, i was super sensitive about her crying noises, and didn't want to bother the other patrons, so we headed out to the corner. as i stood there, bouncing m to calm her down, i was struck that in that very moment, on fruitvale avenue, it seemed as if i was somewhere far more cosmopolitan than the dimond neighborhood in oakland. an african american couple sat chatting next to me on a bench; four middle eastern men- a grandfather, father, and his teenaged sons were crossing the street from my side; a trip of co-workers, two of them asian and one latino, were coming from the other side of the cross-walk. and there i was, so thankful that i live, and will raise little m, in a place of many generations, cultures, ethnicities, and languages. there may be a lot of crap in oakland, but there are also some wonderful gifts that come with living in such a diverse and vibrant city. 

i know my months (yikes, maybe weeks) are limited doing this particular ritual with her; soon she will be crawling around, trying to pick up all of the little doodads that are for sale throughout the cafe, climbing all over me, losing interest with sitting in any one spot after moments. but for now, it is one of my favorite ways to spend the morning with her, and one of my favorite ways to remember that despite some of the drawbacks, i love living in oakland of all places.