Cherry Blossoms

When Nora was a baby, the cherry blossoms bloomed in DC during a visit from my mom.  It was fun to be able to share our first trip to see the trees with Mom, and I was surprised by how well Nora managed the commotion.  We went on a weekday to avoid the biggest crowds, though, so Billy was unable to join us.

Friends have been posting pictures of the trees all week, so I knew they were in full bloom.  When we realized how nice it was going to be yesterday, we decided to get ourselves out of the house as early as possible in hopes of avoiding the biggest crowds.  We were down by the Tidal Basin from about 10am until noon, and since this was also when the parade was going on, it wasn't too crowded to be enjoyable.  The metro stations were pretty busy, but there were definitely more people arriving when we were getting out of there, so our trip was well timed.

I learned my lesson last time that shooting pictures with a smart phone is insufficient.  It's shady underneath the trees, but there is so much light reflecting off the water that it's hard to get a picture where the faces are not obscured in a shadow.  I still don't know much about how to work my DSLR, but we managed to get some decent pictures that I wanted to share.  It was really the most beautiful day.  I wish the weather could be like this always.

Apparently you are not supposed to climb on the trees.  In my defense, she really liked it up there but we kept her off after Billy told me that.

Trying to get Nora to pose for a photo when there are ducks and dogs in sight is generally futile.

When I took the photo above, a man asked if we wanted one of all three of us.  How did he get the best picture of the day with a stranger's DSLR and only two clicks?

We have not been to the MLK Jr memorial since it opened in 2011, so we were glad it was easy to access from the tidal basin.  Nora liked having room to run around, and she really wanted to touch the waterfalls, but she was too nervous to step into the spray to feel the wall by herself.

Let's try it again, Mommy!

We walked back around on the White House side of the Washington Monument, so we got to see the Lincoln Memorial, Reflecting Pond, World War II Memorial, White House, and a few of the parade balloons from afar.  One of them was shaped like a panda, and there was a rainbow float behind it, so Nora liked seeing those too.  It was nice to see all of the mall on such a beautiful day.  There has been scaffolding on the Washington Monument for years, and it always seems like the Reflecting Pool is empty when I go.

Not surprisingly, when offered a frozen lemonade and a hot dog for lunch, she chose the former.  "It's so tasty in my tummy, Mommy!"

Nora liked the "trees with flowers," and she had fun seeing all the sights, especially when she was allowed out of the stroller to wander.  But mostly she liked riding the subway in and out.  We got her to order the doors shut and tell the train to start moving right before it did, so she was full of giggles about that.  She was tired and it was past naptime by the time we got back, but as we walked out of the station, she said, without any prompting, "Thank you for taking me on the choo choo train!  I liked that."

This is going to be a fun summer.

Nora's Narratives

As she gets older, Nora's attention span is getting much longer and she is starting to love stories.  She follows the plot of in kid shows and movies, and she's happy to sit through longer books, often announcing what is going to happen next.  Since she often chooses to repeat the same books, she is even beginning to memorize exact sentences from them.  I recently recorded her participation in reading one of her current favorites, "All By Myself," to show that she likes to "read" the book while pointing out other things she notices one each page.  In this case, there is a mouse on every page, and she seeks him out each time even though he is only mentioned in the text once.  As a mom who knows that paying attention to detail can make a life more full, and who is currently writing a dissertation about marginalized writers and characters on the margins, this makes me feel amazed and proud.  : )

We discover new proof of her ability to follow a narrative every day.  Yesterday she twice she recounted memorable plot moments from her current favorite story, Frozen, which we have in book and DVD form.  One time, she said "I have to go kiss Hans" as she walked down the sidewalk away from me and Billy, and the second time she said "Let's go bring back summer!"  I think everyone who reads this blog probably knows I am much more on board with the second suggestion than the first!

She loves listening to us tell made up stories, but insists that each one feature her in some capacity.  She's also learning to tell her own stories, many of which begin with "once upon a time" and include someone "walking down the street" at some point in the 3-4 sentence narrative.

NYC

As I mentioned in my previous post, I was scheduled to go to New York City during spring break to present a paper at the American Comparative Literature Association conference.  I appreciated the opportunity to participate in a two day panel on "transnational motherhood."  My paper was about Mary Austin's No. 26 Jayne Street, which was sort of a nutshell version of my current plan for that dissertation chapter.  I was hoping to get a bit more feedback than I did, but a few of my co-panelists had helpful suggestions, and I enjoyed hearing how they addressed similar and different issues in their papers.  All of the other panels I attended were interesting, as well, and I got to spend some time catching up with a former classmate who is now studying at Rutgers and living in NYC.  So the conference was worthwhile, and good practice for moving forward!

Billy decided to join me for the weekend, so we were able to make the most of our first trip away together since Nora was born.  We rode the Megabus, which was new to us, and we found it to be convenient, affordable, and fairly comfortable.  We stayed at the New Yorker Hotel on 34th Street, and since this is right on the blue line of the subway, it turned out to be super convenient for everything we wanted to do.

We arrived on Thursday, checked into the hotel, and then headed to the World Trade Center site to see the 9/11 memorial.  The museum isn't open yet, but we were able to walk around the grounds, look at the fountains that they put in the footprints of the old buildings, and look up at the new One World Trade Center building.  I didn't expect to get choked up about this experience, but I did.  I realize 9/11 means a lot of different things to different people, but it happened when I was a 19 year old college sophomore.  So for me, it has always felt like 9/11 closed the door on the world I lived in as a child and ushered in the world I've always inhabited as an adult.  When we were at the memorial, the weather was sunny and cold, but the metal plates with the names carved into them were warm to the touch.  Somehow that felt fitting to me, like a representation of the way we retain warm memories of those who've died despite the cold, difficult expanse of their absence.

That night, we went to dinner at Oceana, where we ate delicious food and accidentally drank a half bottle of champagne that cost three times as much as the one we meant to order.  After dinner, we walked through Times Square and over to the Richard Rodgers Theatre to see Idina Menzel's new musical, If/Then.  It officially opened about a week after we were there, but even though it was still in previews, I didn't want to miss the chance to see Idina live.  Her voice is as good in person as you would hope.  I didn't love any of the songs as much as I love "Take Me or Leave Me," "Defying Gravity" or "Let it Go," but those would be pretty hard to top.  Near the end, she sings a song in which she says "Here I Go" several times in a row.  Billy and I both agreed that no one there would have minded if she'd said "Let it go" instead, just one time.  The musical has two parallel storylines, but basically she plays a woman named Elizabeth who is trying to juggle family and professional commitments, and who wears a lot of jackets, so the plot resonated with me in some ways.

I was glad that it was a very short subway ride back to our hotel, because I had to be up early Friday morning so I could travel to NYU.  I wanted to attend a panel at 8:30, and I had to check in beforehand.  NYU is right around Washington Square, so I got to see the sun come up through the arch.  Being near Washington Square made me think of my dad because it figures prominently in Searching for Bobby Fischer and August Rush, both of which were movies he loved.

After I attended the morning session and had coffee with my friend, Billy and I met up to get lunch.  Then we walked along the High Line, which is an old elevated train line that has been repurposed into a park/walkway, and then we wandered around in the East Village.  I even made him stop on Jane Street to take a picture of No. 26, because this is exactly the nerdy type of thing I would insist on doing hours before giving a paper on the novel that takes place there.  It's still an apartment building.

After I gave my talk, we walked a few blocks for dinner at a restaurant recommended by a friend, La Laterna.  It was delicious and affordable, and it also happened to be a block from our plans for the night: the Comedy Cellar, which we knew about from watching Louis CK's tv show.  He walks into this comedy club during the credits, and the show often opens with him doing stand-up there.  The club runs several shows a night, each with about 5 comics in the lineup, but the rumor is that A list comics drop in to do sets whenever they feel like it.  We finished dinner early, so we were at the start of the line and sat directly in front of the microphone stand.  I was worried that I'd have to fake laughter at that close range, but everyone was funny.  And then Louie showed up unexpectedly and I almost died-- of shock, and then of laughter.  It still does not seem like something that really happened.  But it was awesome, and it was exactly the sort of lucky thing that always seems to happen to someone else.  He did the same jokes in his SNL monologue last week, so I guess he did a few shows to try out these jokes before he took them on live TV.  You're not supposed to take pictures in there, and my phone would have been right in Louie's face if I'd gotten it out, so I followed the rule.

On Saturday morning, we slept in a bit before riding the subway over to Brooklyn, where we walked around for a while before getting brunch.  I know Brooklyn is trendy right now, but this was the first time I found myself in a place where I could imagine living with Nora.  Everywhere else we went, I could not believe how many people were pushing babies in strollers, and I just could not imagine what it would be like to parent in a city that big.  Parenting in Brooklyn, though, I could have imagined.  Nora would have loved the parks and the people and the streets that were full of dogs on leashes.

We ate brunch at Atrium DUMBO which was delicious and had a cool atmosphere.  I was glad I did not have on flannel shirt because obviously that was the required attire for servers. Then we walked over the Brooklyn Bridge, which felt historic and had cool views of the city.  A lot of people were walking in the opposite direction, and I definitely felt like they were going the wrong way.

We had some time to kill before my afternoon panels, but we weren't really hungry, so we hung out near city hall for a while before we walked all the way up Broadway to NYU.  We were really fortunate with weather the whole time we were there!  It was cold and sunny most of the time, although it did start to feel a little warm at times when we were able to get out of the wind.  After I attended my afternoon panels, we actually got dinner at La Laterna again because it was convenient and we had been envious of the pizzas that the people sitting next to us had ordered the night before.  They did not disappoint.  Then we headed back to the hotel to pick up our bags and walked a few blocks to wait for the Megabus to bring us home.  We both slept on the bus, so getting home around 1am didn't feel too bad, and I was definitely glad to sleep in my own bed.

Our Saturday night return also meant we got to pick Nora up on Sunday morning!  I really missed her, but she stayed with Patti, Chuck, and Brian, so I didn't have to worry about her while we were gone.  They kept us updated with a few pictures and videos, and I even got to Facetime with her once.  That seemed to upset her, though, so we made it a quick chat.  She got an excellent report from her Gram and Pop, who said she had no trouble adjusting to being at their house.  It was nice to feel like she was able to enjoy her weekend away from us while Billy and I were enjoying some time alone together, and it was an added bonus to get to relax with her at home on Sunday before we had to get back to work the following day!

Now that I know the Megabus is so convenient, I think I will give more consideration to short trips up to the city.  I also want to check out The Jane, a (relatively) inexpensive hotel I discovered before Billy decided to join me.  US Open, anyone??