This Upper Eastside Life (aka WWG-G-MaD)

What would Great-Grandma do, or think, of my recent ventures out and about the neighborhood?

On this Where We Were Wednesday (yes, just made that up so I could publish a catch up post), we have the photos from our companion Instagram posts "Blume, Blooms, and Botaniste" and "WWG-G-MaD" to provide a lookback at a fun evening Tuesday last week and a weekend in "the life" (this past weekend, to be exact).

Cụ Bà loved oranges. Ông Nội loved watermelon. Papa Rooster loves cookies and snacks.

Let's go in reverse chronological order and start with this past weekend, with a vase full of flowers from the Mother Garden for my great grandmother's giổ (death anniversary). She died over 75 years ago, in a very different time and world. What would she make of...

...Her great granddaughters graduating from Ivy League colleges? Her daughter-in-law's younger sisters (all but the baby, who was a mere 4 years senior to Papa Rooster) stopped their education at 8th grade, which was quite common in the first half of the 20th century in Vietnam, and their father was highly educated for the time.

The ivy in this planter off Park Avenue or thereabouts, as I walked home before driving out to the Mothership, is exactly like the kind I used to draw back in high school; it was a motif I was pulled toward, even before heading to college, and that college led to jobs, and law school, and a life I was able to build mostly myself.

Earlier that day, on Madison Avenue, it was the Saturday of gallery walks, of abstract art...

Plume Chaser happens to love doughnuts. This work had a price tag of $45,000. I texted him the photo and teased it was just a bit above my budget; he said he would have chastised me if I ever spent so much on such a thing.

... I must have been hungry.

In addition to snacks, Papa Rooster very much likes lobster. This isn't the depiction of one, but the piece was uncannily like a cooked crab, with the same coloration as our meals whenever Papa Rooster gets to call the shots.

And I respond to vivid colors.

This one reminded me of Sissy, who has gone full into her jigsaw puzzle hobby in recent years since the ease of getting new ones from Buy Nothing.

The gallery visits were broken up by bits of nature.

Mama Hen would have appreciated this sweet topiaried shrub in a planter on Madison Avenue.

And some of the art subjects themselves were natural. 

Asked Plume Chaser if he would have preferred this instead; he finds blue jays annoying, with which any gardener would agree.

Including by a Viet artist. How far - literally, figuratively - we've come from where, and when, GGMa died.

Back in the Jardin this same past weekend, a flower with a name that reminds me of travel by sea came into bloom - armeria maritima...

Though far we've come, still, we are not completely severed from the motherland - the rains left lush chickweed, and dandelion greens, also tía tô (perilla - so begins the battle for control of the planters) and kinh giới (Vietnamese balm - less ubiquitous than the tía tô), which I had dressed and tossed with chili lime cashews for lunch. And that was all I had for that meal; perhaps why I was drawn to food art at the gallery walk.

And from Madison Avenue gallery walks to talks at a Fifth Avenue synagogue... Could Cụ (Great Grandmother) ever have imagined her great granddaughters there! But how could we pass up...

JUDY BLUME!! Sissy and I were in the same (very large) room with THE Judy Blume! Who didn't read a Judy Blume book in their youth? Well, any Gen X'er, anyway. Got us tickets to see her right in our neighborhood (the chi-chi-er part, the southwesternmost edges of our neighborhood, far from where we plebes dwell in Yorkville). And Judy Blume (as she tells it, all the kids have always called her by both names) was delightful, and energetic, and still so sharp for age 87! (Far sharper than Papa Rooster, who is her age.)

And afterward we walked to find dinner, past St. Vincent Ferrer Roman Catholic Church on Lexington Avenue, with its most lovely rose garden out front. Just like a children's photographic picture book version of "Sleeping Beauty" we had growing up, of dolls as the princess and prince and witch, posed in settings with lots of vivid roses in the background castle garden.

We ended the night with a wonderful vegan meal at Le Botaniste - clean, delicious, ethical, reasonably priced - a nice bow-tied ending to an outing in the nabe.

I chose a half portion of African stew and zucchini soup, with a vegan brownie.

Sissy had a pasta with vegan Bolognese, the same zucchini soup, and a chia pudding with berry topping.

Mid-April Convergence

National Gardening Day, followed by Tax Day.

Yesterday was apparently National Gardening Day. Today is Tax Day. What does it say that these two dates connected to how I spend so many of my hours follow each other so closely on the calendar? It's like my own little life slice of the month/year.

I did spend Gardening Day in the garden, assessing, daydreaming, easing into the gardening season. The tulips survived and are finally coming into their own - very yellow - matching the warmth of the day (don't mind the shiso seed heads and skeletons that I haven't yet managed to remove). The balmy weather prompted me to bring the jasmine and the Thai lime outside - after I defoliated them of their dry, crispy leaves; the jasmine leaves I crushed by hand so the plant could mulch itself, ...

...while the Thai lime leaves got collected for future use (the dried are not as fragrant as the fresh leaves, but I have seasoned rice with it, seen recipes calling for the fresh in soups and stews - which should rehydrate the dried, maybe?). Let's see how much the lime tree bounces back; it seems the new growth happens where the wood is still green, which isn't very much of the little tree.

I never did start the tomato seedlings over Winter (even as everyone else out in Instagram gardening world were starting from back in January or February, I sat with the guilt and the cloud of non-accomplishment and inertia), so we're going to try some direct sowing this year. I have more seeds that I collected and may attempt some very late eggshell seedlings, too, as insurance - a hedge against the direct sows not germinating. In the meantime, there are rainy days ahead, so I wanted to capitalize and get some lazy growing going by sprinkling seeds from these shriveled fruit (insect eaten, or split, or starting to mold post-last harvest, so they weren't consumed), then burying the dried fruit. We'll see if anything emerges.

On that note, the two survivors of the one-time Maple Triplets are leafing at very different rates; oddly, the bigger one is more stunted in leaf than the medium one, while the smallest just seems dead.

Also emergent, in one of the large nursery pots where a seed tomato was sown, a sugar snap pea - finally! I was afraid none would germinate. It's surrounded by chickweed, though, so I'll need to give it some breathing and growing room.

All that gardening (mostly garden contemplation) was really just procrastination on filing my tax returns (and tending to other dreaded household tasks). Even those of us in tax-centered fields can dread the actual exercise of preparing an income tax return.... All I did was buy myself some time, hopefully to be picked up and done once and for all sooner rather than later.

So my metaphysical small sliver of the calendar: Gardening Day (passion, fun, love), then Tax Day (work, drudgery, responsibility) represents the struggle between distraction versus duty that has always been present in my life, from my earliest childhood schooldays. It's like my chronological analog to the Greek drama masks depicting comedy and tragedy.

Quaking (in Her Roots)

Mother Nature shaking it all up - earthquake edition.

Mother Earth is just shaking it up all over the place today. The breaking news of the morning was a 4.8 magnitude earthquake centered in western New Jersey, felt up to 300 miles away, and definitely 45 miles from Tewksbury here in Yorkville. Working from home, the entire apartment vibrated and lightly rattled, visibly moving. It was evident pretty quickly that it was an earthquake (and I got confirmations back on Facebook right away). Then at 6pm, a 4.0 aftershock - felt that one distinctly, too.

Not my first rodeo. First one was a legit California one when I was in my teens, circa 1991, on a family trip, in a sleeping bag on my uncle's living room floor, the dining room chandelier swaying before us, as my cousin came from his room and stood under the door frame. My second was around 2011, the last big east coast one - I was on a recruiting trip and not far from the epicenter.

So this one, all told, was not so bad. Back in 2011, another California cousin shook her head at the New Yorkers streaming into the streets - exposing themselves to the risk of falling glass. I told her that, tremors being rare here, when our buildings shake, we worry a plane has flown into it. Today, safe in my apartment, I knew it wasn't a plane, at least - some psychological comfort courtesy of post-COVID work changes.

In the domestic plant world, Mother Nature shook up some of my expectations - life and renewal, where I thought there was failure and death. 

Out in the Jardin, three young upstarts are leafing out from the roots of what I thought were a dead tricolor peach tree. In the small rosemary pot, where the original rosemary finally succumbed, I stuck a twig - that looks like it has hope of leaf buds? It looks a bit like a miniature rose twig; but maybe it's a rosemary twig? Must try to label better. Anyway, will wait and see.

Indoors, the petulant Thai lime. I really was quite good about watering this Winter. But midway through, the leaves just started to shrivel. I kept with regular watering, and it seems to be growing new, fresh chartreuse. Thank goodness.

In the bathroom was the morning's first surprise - before the earthquake rolled in. The jasmine that came in for Winter, and originally up atop the medicine cabinet where it lacked light and was hard to water, had, I thought, dried up and died, the soil hydrophobic. I gave up watering regularly, but threw a few drops here and there. But that shoot! That is definitely life trying to assert itself - hooray!

Happy for roots to dig deep and Mother Nature to shake me up with happy surprises🌱.

One of These Things Doesn't Belong Here

...One of these things just isn't the same...

Snaps from this past weekend at the Mothership, with most from the lush Mother Garden.

1 - Loofah (apparently, it appeared out of nowhere, or, at least, surreptitiously; it had caught no one's eye until right before this photo was taken).

2 - Very happy basil (in contrast to my several failed attempts at the Jardin; although the latest cuttings seem to be establishing now, quite late into the season - so even the cuttings' good growth is nowhere near the size of these leaves, only two of which were more than enough for a full dish of leftover pasta).

3 - Spent dwarf sunflower, hopefully bearing some viable seeds, so that we can try for some next year without relying on the supermarket that sold us this one. [This could be the "one" that doesn't belong, being neither edible, nor vividly colored - though once it was.]

4,5,6,7 - Red amaranth, in all its various forms  (taking a cue from my pleasing past practice), including inside an omelette. Mama Hen was somewhat skeptical about the omelette; she seems to have missed out on spinach omelettes in her life. The little yellow grape tomatoes came from seeds that Mama Hen just casually tossed into a planter in Spring, and, of course, they thrived in her care. I saved seeds, since I don't know that mine will yield very much fruit.

8 - The reason for the visit - Lil' Bro's. [This is the other candidate for not belonging, being not of the Mother Garden, though the flan still sprang from the hands of Mama Hen.]

And also "not the same"? The weekend's activities. No watercraft; Lil' Bro was reluctantly willing, but the reluctance was clear. And it was HIS birthday, so it was only right that we should follow his lead and preferences - and for him, mini golf won. A fun outing overall, though surprisingly not much less mosquito-plagued than boating would have been.

Sissy expressed some pressure to boat regularly, too, to make the annual dues that I paid worthwhile. Sure, there are the fees - but it should still be fun, for everyone involved. I think part of the reason the fun has waned is the complex assembly routine. The kayak option that Papa Rooster, Mama Hen, and I went to explore last week alas doesn't quite work as is - the seat was lower than Papa Rooster's comfort level. There might be other options, but that would be more of an outlay. We'll see....

It's always the time versus the money. Feels like life shouldn't come down to that, but surprisingly often, decisions can be plotted out on those two axes. I am fortunate in that, for these things, I feel like I can disregard the cost element - nothing we do is oh so extravagant; I just want it to be fun and easy. But the expense part tends to weigh more on others - it's generally that the ones more lacking in a resource value it more. And so it is with me and time.

Highest and Best Use

Food and decor from the August garden.

Greens living their best lives, according to what passes for a meal plan in these parts:

Should eat the 6 day old leftover thin crust pizza (boxed from a work team after hours pizza party). The basil (finally seeming to establish a foothold) needs pinching; can add some on top. Oh, there's amaranth from the monster plant-tree out there - can use that in place of spinach. Let's go for the big leaves. Really need to snip off the flowers so it doesn't self seed as much next year; will clip the ends and harvest the little leaves around the flowers, then cut up the stems to self compost. Well, aren't the droopy flower clusters charming! People DO harvest them for boho bouquets... maybe we'll hold onto the de-leaved stems. Oh... the shiso next to the amaranth; a little won't overpower the mix. [Glancing at adjacent planter.] Lamb's quarters ... I HAVE been meaning to try it. [Walk toward door, pass by another planter.] Red amaranth! That might be pretty, to break up the greens - on the pizza AND the bouquet. [Close to the door.] The Vietnamese balm is awfully tall and getting leggy; would it be weird to add it to the mix?

Inside. Warm pizza, strip leaves into a bowl. Grab a third and sprinkle atop slice #1 of 3, eat. Not bad, a little dry. Maybe it would be better with dressing. 

Pour over small part of remnants of bottled roasted garlic dressing, rather thick and gloopy, add splash of apple cider vinegar to thin it all out. Toss leaves, top slice #2 after sprinkling it with red pepper flakes. Eat. So much better!! The acidity cut the richness of the cheese and mellows the saltiness of the pizza beautifully, the bit spice - really, higher order leftover pizza, here. The Vietnamese balm coming through is just right, and the rest of the greens taste unified. 

Top slice #3, fold and eat - MUCH easier to consume and bite through the leaves. THIS would make a good regular dish - whoever was smart enough to top pizza with salad?!!

Oh... Would this work as a modified grilled cheese? Hmmm...

How cute is the little amaranth bouquet that led off this post?! Food AND decor!