To be or not to be: A Francophile in Paris

Everyone who learns that Gene and I went to Paris last month asks the same questions: “Where did you go?” and “What did you see?”

Did we scale the Eiffel Tower, spend days in the Louvre, stroll through the Jardin du Luxembourg and the Jardin des Tuileries, or seek out le cancan at the Moulin Rouge? Did we take the nighttime Illuminations Tour or cruise down on the moonlit Seine? Uh, no.

I feel as though I disappoint friends when I say our trip wasn’t like that. Gene and I didn’t go with the express purpose of seeing the sights, hopping off one tour bus and onto another, calculating how many monuments and museums we could cram into the fewest number of minutes. We employed no guides to show us around. Instead, we went simply to be in Paris.

Being in Paris did take us to several notable landmarks, but only as the spirit moved us. We had no fixed itinerary. The only schedules we had to meet were a 5:49 p.m. train from Rouen to Paris and a 11:46 a.m. TGV from Paris to Nice -- and we nearly missed those!

For four days we chose to dispense with deadlines and just let life happen, opening ourselves to adventure where and when it found us.


Desperate for a second cup of coffee one morning, we staked out a spot on the Boulevard Saint-Michel -- aka Boul’Mich -- at the edge of the Quartier Latin and watched pedestrians scurry by. Frantic to escape the hordes of tourists and school groups disrupting the calm of Notre Dame, we crossed Île de la Cité to Louis IX’s celestial Sainte-Chapelle. To view Claude Monet’s complete series of La cathédrale de Rouen (we’d seen one painting in the “Monet in Normandy” exhibit at the North Carolina Museum of Art in 2006), we spent a rainy afternoon at Musée d'Orsay. To check on train departures to Rouen, we visited the famed Gare Saint-Lazare.

We tried a new restaurant each night. By the fourth evening, we'd seen most of the sixth and seventh arrondissements and a good bit of the fifth -- but not by design. We repeatedly consulted our pop-up map but still got turned around and completely disoriented in the warren of criss-crossing alleys on the Left Bank. It didn’t matter. We got to relish Parisian nightlife and practice our French by asking for directions. And we eventually got to our chosen destinations: La Petite Chaise, Le Petit St-Benoit, Le Petit Zinc and Au Pied de Fouet.

For me some of the thrill was being able to read Le Figaro over a leisurely breakfast each morning. To speak French with the various desk clerks at Hotel Lindbergh, where we stayed. To shop the store windows stocked with antique faïence, avant-garde light fixtures and artfully arranged patisseries. To stumble upon the puppets of the Chat Noir Shadow Theatre that even the Musée d'Orsay claims is "an unlikely object to find in [its] collections."


No doubt Gene and I could've seen more, done more. But being in the moment as life is happening around us, being part of it, delighting in the spontaneity and feeling of discovery, that is the greatest adventure.

Perhaps Jean Paul Sartre said it best: This feeling of adventure definitely does not come from events: I have proved it. It's rather the way in which the moments are linked together.

© 2009 by Lorin D. Buck

Summertime ... and the livin' is easy?

Hi there! It's me again -- Lorin -- trying to figure out which end is up in this topsy-turvy summer.

I hope you all enjoyed Brittany’s inaugural blog. I love her writing, and her voice. The same goes for Anne. I believe Gen X is one of the best things that's happened to us baby boomers.

I’ve been lax about posting lately, as you may have noticed. Life picked up steam after I came back from France.

Like Brittany mentioned, I was filling in for a copy editor at USA WEEKEND Magazine. This last week I was gearing up to return to The Fairfax Times, a weekly suburban newspaper where I worked until last August.

Post-Newsweek Media Inc. bought The Fairfax Times and took ownership June 1, rescuing it from annihilation and announcing plans to expand. What could be better? I get to do the work I love -- journalism -- with people I already know and admire. Really, a paper that is growing and adding staff in this economy, while venerable newspapers are dropping like flies? Well, it’s a miracle.

Anne, Brittany and I are determined to keep Chatterlines going, though, despite our day jobs.

On a final note, as I mentioned in my first post, my youngest son has cancer. He's back in treatment, and over the last month concerns about his care have pushed more creative thoughts to the back corners of my mind.

But he's charging ahead, and now that I've regained my emotional equilibrium, I intend to do the same. As soon as I get my feet back on the ground ...

More to come. I promise.

© 2009 by Lorin D. Buck

Bling blog

Hi, it's Brittany. Lorin has been busy copy editing for USA WEEKEND (become a Facebook Fan) so I am helping fill in the gaps.

I just got back from a fun trip to Atlanta so I have more than enough to write about. Now, June probably is not the best time to visit "Hotlanta," but I went for a purpose: to visit an old friend and attend a baby shower. I've known Tiffany (aka Teety) since we used to skip Mr. Bowers' band class together in middle school. It was my first trip down to visit her and her family in Canton, about 40 miles north of the city.

The day I arrived, Teety picked me up from the airport and immediately took me to "The Underground" (someone later asked, "Why did you take her there?!"). Well, I can't answer that, but I sure am glad we went. It was a fascinating taste of local culture ... and by local culture I mean bling, crunk and bedonkadonks (Urban Dictionary at your own risk) all centered around an underground shopping mall of sorts. I've never seen anything like it. Inside the mall part, there was a long corridor lined with kiosks selling all sorts of shiny things like faux diamond (sorry, iced out) dollar symbol necklaces, iced out handgun belt buckles and gold chains (a guy told us they could melt gold into a personalized necklace that spelled our name). There must have been a pimp hat or cane in there somewhere and maybe even a grill (fo' yo' teef). There was some milder stuff like Bob Marley posters and incense, but this crazy hip-hop bling is what caught my eye. That and the women wearing the super-short booty shorts with matching stilettos. How do they walk in those things?!

This got me thinking about crunk, the style of southern rap that originated in Atlanta. After a quick Google search, I learned that Lil Jon is the current reigning "king of crunk" and that he grew up in the A-T-L. I also learned that I, surprisingly, am 92 percent crunk according to the "How crunk" test on howcrunk.com. A lot of people would probably find the questions highly offensive, but I think they are funny. Here's one of the cleaner examples: "So you're rollin down the street, smokin' indo, sippin on ... 1. Bud Light 2. Cognac 3. Gin and Juice 4. Cristal." You would have to be familiar with the Snoop Doggy Dog song to know what the hizzle I'm talking about.

There were plenty of other forms of local culture that I found equally intriguing -- the southern redneck (missing teeth, says "skeeters" instead of mosquitoes), the southern yuppie (plaid shorts, popped collar, golf cart), the southern housewife (implants, lots of makeup) -- but I digress.

One other cool thing we did during my visit was go to the top of the Westin Peachtree Plaza Hotel in downtown Atlanta. It's a 73-story cylindrical skyscraper with a revolving bar/restaurant at the top. The lounge part on the top floor where we hung out has panoramic views of the city and makes one complete revolution every 30 minutes. I remember going there as a kid with my family so it was cool to revisit some 20 years later. Only now I could order a real peach daiquiri instead of a virgin (to the tune of $15). It came in a giant souvenir glass with a mountain of fruit piled on top. It was worth every penny and I was happy to satisfy my craving for something peachy. The only problem was finding our way out of the revolving sky bar after consuming this rum-filled monstrosity. Teety and I must have looked confused because a staff member stopped and gave us directions to the elevator. "Just keep walking, you're about halfway there."

Atlanta is not necessarily somewhere I'd choose to live, but I certainly appreciate that we could go from the crunked-out Underground to the plush Peachtree Plaza all in a single afternoon.

Meet Brittany

I’m so lucky! Another of my talented writer friends, Brittany Boyd, has agreed to contribute to Chatterlines. Brittany will give blogging a whirl in the coming weeks.

I met Brittany, like Anne, when she was hired as a reporter for the Loudoun Times-Mirror. Brittany was brought on board to write features for the brand-new Friday Times, a standalone lifestyle and entertainment newspaper. I liked Brittany from the start because her copy required almost no editing. She’s a precise writer with a fluid, hip style, a sharp eye for art and design, and cool, eclectic tastes in music.

Eventually, Brittany transferred to our sister paper, The Fairfax Times, to take over as editor of the entertainment section. In frequent e-mails she’d tell me how much she liked the staff -- and more important, how much I’d like them. Roughly six months later, she lured me over to what LTM’s executive editor gloomily called “The Dark Side.” Brittany and I struggled together over content and deadlines for bridal guides, holiday gift guides, theater guides and more.

For the last year, Brittany’s been working as a Web producer for Universal Sports , an Olympic and lifestyle sports Web site and TV network partnered with NBC. A University of Colorado grad with a penchant for the outdoors, Brittany covered World Cup skiing over the winter.

I’ve missed the day-to-day contact with Brittany that allowed me to witness her refreshing take on life. I’m excited that she’s joining our writers group on Chatterlines so I can hear her point of view again. Reading Brittany’s stories is like sailing on clear, pleasantly lapping waters. The flow of her prose delivers you from one side of the lake to the other in a totally delightful ride.

Welcome aboard, Brittany!

From Paris to Paradise

We arrived at the 13th-century village of St-Jeannet shortly before midnight, culminating a half-hour drive -- accented with whiplash-inducing hairpin turns and empty roundabouts -- up the mountainside from Nice. As we approached, we could see the vast shadow of the village, a sleeping stone monument that after centuries seemed to have eroded into the Baou. Except for the music and laughter spilling from the café at the edge of the village, all was quiet and very, very dark.

Several times on the train ride down from Paris Gene had told me he wanted to arrive before nightfall, but I hadn’t listened. Now we needed to find the inn -- L’Auberge des Baous -- among this black maze of nondescript buildings. We parked our rental car near the café and set out on foot down the narrow street that split into a half-dozen directions leading who-knew-where.

I was mad at myself. Why had I let an impulsive run over to the film festival in Cannes distract me from getting safely to our inn? Star-struck, I’d chucked caution in favor of eye candy.

Hesitantly, I followed an alley up the hill, and Gene took a path down. I quickly realized I had no bearings and might wander all night through the silent streets. There was no sign of the inn.

Then I heard Gene call, “Lori! It’s here!” I hurried toward his voice and found him standing in front of a dimly lighted four-story building, just steps from the café plaza. Together we walked to the door. An envelope was taped to it. On the envelope was written, “Lorin & Eugene Welcome!”

We tore it open and unfolded this handwritten note:

Hello Lorin & Eugène :)

Sorry we had to go. Just in case we are not back on time when you arrive, here is the code for the door. [A small sketch showed how to work the security lock.] Press the handle down, the door will open. “Philomène” [our room] is at the top floor, so go all the way up to the top: the door on your left is Philomène.

All the restaurants will be opened in the village tonight: “Le Ste-Barbe” has a lovely terrace with a view. For the best pizza, go to “Le vieux four.” For a “homey-feeling” try “La bonne fiangette.” And for a more intimate atmosphere “Le chantegrill” could be the one … They are all 5 mins. max away from each other.

Have a great evening, see you tomorrow for breakfast if we don’t see you tonight (breakfast from 8:30 to 10 a.m.).

à bientôt,
Benoit & Corinne

Our hosts included their mobile phone numbers is case we had any problems.

Again I wished we’d arrived earlier. By now, the restaurants were closed and the view was less than spectacular. Gene and I unloaded our bags from the car, successfully worked the code and headed upstairs. Hauling our suitcases up the several flights, wheels clattering on the tile floor, seemed endless and left us breathless. We were reluctant to turn on a light as we didn’t want to disturb the other guests. We fell into our room, worn out from the long day.

We looked out the French doors to our small balcony at the lights below, orangey specks scattered far and wide. We had no idea where we were. I wondered if again I’d acted impulsively by choosing this place. I didn’t obsess for long as once I lay down on the comfortable bed, I was asleep.

Early the next morning, intense sunlight beckoned us to the doors. I pushed the sheer curtains aside and looked out. For a moment, I thought we’d landed in Oz. The view across the green, undulating hills and down to the blue Mediterranean could only be described in superlatives. All worries that we’d made a mistake coming here evaporated.

© 2009 by Lorin D. Buck

Plus ça change

The French have a saying: Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. The more things change, the more they remain the same.

After my visit to Paris three weeks ago, I’d propose a slight alteration: Plus ça change, plus ils deviennent de la même. The more things change, the more they become the same.

I was last in Paris for a few short days in spring 1975, at the end of a seven-month stay in Rouen. The previous fall, I’d spent a month in the City of Lights for orientation. Our group of 30-some undergrads lived and studied in the 14th arrondissement, not far from the artsy Latin Quarter on the Left Bank. Throughout the year, we routinely passed through Paris on our way to other destinations: Rome, Munich, Provence.

No matter how often I visited, Paris never failed to wow me. I was bowled over by how foreign the city felt. Everything was new to me: the food, the shops, the tiny cars, the narrow streets, the art, the book sellers, the museums, the way people dressed. I’d never experienced anything like it. It was all so French!

This time things were different. Somehow Paris didn’t seem so French. I’ve been asking myself: Who changed more, Paris or moi?

I fled my small hometown in Upstate New York and my even-smaller college town in 1976. I spent two years in Manhattan. I've lived in Washington, D.C., for three decades. I've eaten all kinds of unusual foods. I drive a small foreign car, as do my neighbors. I've hung out at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the National Gallery. I’ve traveled. I’ve seen more of the world.

Now Paris strikes me as just another big city. Has it always been that way for people accustomed to urban living? Or has globalization homogenized it?

I anticipated a promenade up the Champs-Elysées from Place de la Concorde to the Arc de Triomphe as guaranteed immersion in all things exquisitely and expensively French. I was disappointed. First, Tom Hanks glowered from every other corner in ads for “Anges et démons,” “The Da Vinci Code” sequel. On other corners were ads for “Là-haut” (“Up”), the Disney/Pixar film, and Ben Stiller’s “La nuit au musée 2.” (Meanwhile, wall-size posters for the upcoming release of the DVD, “Confessions d'une accro du shopping,” plastered Métro stations.)

Second, the busiest restaurateur on the Champs-Elysées? McDonald’s McCafe, just up the wide avenue from Starbucks. Third, as my husband and I sampled flan and tarte aux framboises at a real sidewalk café, two double-decker buses emblazoned with Mickey Mouse, Pluto and other Eurodisney characters cruised by. For this I left the States?

Yes, we saw chic, expensive retailers: Cartier. Louis Vitton. Guerlin. Sephora. But it felt no different from New York. (Or is it that New York feels no different from Paris?)

“Sadly, the Champs-Elysées — formerly the bastion of fashion and class — has degenerated into a neon strip of fast food chains, banks, airline offices, malls, and cinemas aimed squarely at the tourists,” confirms VirtualTourist.com.

Here's a word about fashion: That's changed, too. In the ’70s, French clothes were prohibitively expensive. French women owned only a couple of outfits and wore the same ensemble day after day. Now with Gap and Esprit -- fashion made in China -- all over the Left Bank, mademoiselles can stock their armoires with 19-euro T-shirts and 25-euro flouncy skirts.

Not that they’d need to. Everyone -- and I mean everyone -- in Paris was wearing jeans. And I don’t mean the tourists. It was incredible. I’d bought new clothes for our trip, hoping I might pass for Parisian. But I could’ve pulled everyday jeans, ballet flats and cardigans out of my closet and fit in just as well.

Another thing about jeans. The French couldn't get their hands on them in the '70s. Levi's was an American phenomenon for which the French were willing to spend hundreds of francs. Now jeans are ubiquitous and the franc is gone.

You know what else? Young people in Paris are nearly indistinguishable from their U.S. counterparts, uniformed in jeans, hoodies and backpacks with iPod wires running down their necks and cell phones at their ears. In some ways, maybe this is good -- I have the sense that, language barriers aside, twentysomethings on both sides of the pond might actually understand each other.

Thirty-five years ago, it was easy for me to tell who was French and who wasn’t. Not anymore -- I’d guess but was almost always wrong. Paris is an international city, just like Washington or New York, an amalgam of cultures, languages and ethnicities.

Am I sorry I went? Of course not. But next time I’ll need to dig a little deeper to find what’s truly French in Paris.

P.S. The mystery actress in my previous post? It's Amanda Plummer, daughter of Christopher Plummer (Captain von Trapp in "The Sound of Music"). I remembered seeing her on "Law & Order." She also was in "Pulp Fiction."

© 2009 by Lorin D. Buck

Voilà!

I’m back! Gene and I have been in France the last 10 days -- first in Paris, with a day trip to Rouen, and then in St-Jeannet, a tiny village in the foothills of the Alps, north of Nice. The trip was absolument superbe, incroyable, magnifique, formidable and every other French superlative you can think of.

Everywhere we went, I kept saying, “This will make a great blog!” I’ll be telling you stories about France for weeks -- probably to the point where you’ll wish the French had never outlawed the guillotine.

Not until we got to Paris did we discover our visit to Provence would coincide with the Cannes Film Festival. I had to check it out since we would be in the neighborhood and all. We arrived in Nice on May 16 and immediately drove the 27 kilometres or so over to Cannes (which is a blog in itself). And, ooh-la-la! What an event!

I’ll tell you more later, but for now maybe you can help me. I snapped the above photo of a woman I recognized, but I can’t remember who she is. Do you know? I can hear her voice and am sure I’ve seen her in movies, but I can’t place her. Cannes you?

Many thanks, Anne, for filling in while I was away. I loved your thoughtful posts and look forward to more.

A toute à l'heure, mes amis!

It's Anne again -- Lorin will be back soon! I thought I'd chime in on Lorin's earlier post about her early morning walks with a neighbor.

Reston, where Lorin and I live, is a suburb that is (for the most part) designed with the pedestrian in mind. This is extremely rare. Mostly, the automobile rules the road in the burbs.

It gives new meaning to the Shel Silverstein poem, "Where the Sidewalk Ends." You'll be walking along, and suddenly the nice granite sidewalk will disappear. You either have to walk on the shoulder of the road or turn around.

My mother experienced the plight of the pedestrian when she visited me when I lived in Leesburg, Va. She's lived her whole life in cities, and is used to the connectivity of the urban streets. One day, while I was at work (with the car), she decided to go for a walk.

When I got home, she was sitting on the couch with a harried look on her face. "I just thought I'd go to the Target across the street," she said. Even though the Target was 1/4 mile away, she had to cross a large road with six lanes of traffic, a narrow median, and a "no crossing" sign (which she ignored). She had looked so lost, standing there on the shoulder of the road with the cars whizzing by, that a woman had pulled over and offered her a ride.

I truly believe our society will grow stronger if we learn to use our legs again!

A few reasons to embrace a walking lifestyle:

• Notice the gas prices slowly going up? Yup -- those $4.50 per gallon prices are sure to return.
• Walking sheds the pounds. About 1/3 of Americans are clinically obese.
• Global warming: Fewer CO2 emissions from cars means a healthier planet.

There are small signs that the pedestrian is making gains. A lot of the newest developments are "town centers," with stores, homes and offices all within walking distance of each other. And I was happy to see a government website that has great tips for making your community more pedestrian friendly.

I'll conclude with a few words from a great man and a great walker (of cobblestone streets, of course):

"Providence has appointed few to roll in carriages while He has given to all a pair of legs, which are machines infinitely more commodious and serviceable. Be grateful then and make a proper use of yours."

-- Benjamin Franklin

The Great Playground Hunt

Thank you, Lorin, for this opportunity to guest blog!

This weekend, I spent some time swinging, see-sawing, and flying down slides. No, I don't have kids. And no, I am not a crazy person.

(This last point, I admit, is debatable.)

A little back-story: I work at the National Wildlife Federation, in the same department where they publish the nature magazine Ranger Rick.

It's great -- from my cubicle, I can see the photo editor's monitor, always brimming with close-up photos of flamingos or otters or wolves. Sometimes I hear things like, "Does anyone know what month we last did a story on the blue-footed booby?"

It's a fun job. Right now, I'm working on a project with another non-profit, Kaboom!, to map all of the playgrounds, parks and other places to play in the U.S. It's simple: find a playground, take a picture, and upload it to the online map.

I need to practice what I preach, so this weekend my husband and I went playground hunting.

Sadly, of the five playgrounds, only one had actual children playing on it. The rest were empty, despite the sunny weather. Actually, I was a little relieved. I worried that parents might look suspiciously at a strange woman taking pictures at a playground for no apparent reason.

At one playground, we did see two boys on a motor-scooter driving through mud-puddles, using the playground as an obstacle course. At least they were outside!

I tried the see-saw, with my husband on the other end -- and realized it had been a very, very, very long time since I'd been on a see-saw. I actually got a little motion-sick. And I was terrified of falling off. But I laughed harder than I had in a while.

This is, in fact, a perfect activity for me at the moment. You see, I've reached my crisis-limit. The most recent national emergency, the swine flu, pushed me over the edge. I was already anxious about the terrorist threat, the failing economy, and global warming. When a possible pandemic influenza strain came knocking, I just let it all go.

And reconnecting with playgrounds has made me realize that adults should play more often. I've always been a fan of the idea of an"adult" recess. Instead of boring coffee/watercooler breaks, we could all run outside and play tag, wall-ball and capture the flag.

Hard to imagine? I bet the national stress-levels would sink dramatically.

Let me know if you want to join me in this "adult play movement" -- I, for one, am ready for it!

Here's Anne!

Friends, you’re in for a treat!

I’m taking a short break from Chatterlines and giving you the chance to hear a new voice. My good friend Anne Keisman Cissel, an amazing writer, will step in for the next couple of weeks. I feel very lucky that she wants to do this.

Anne and I worked together at the Loudoun Times-Mirror in Leesburg, Va., where she became something of a local celebrity through her popular feature, “Where’s Anne?” Each week she and photographer Lisa Johnson found an obscure spot in Loudoun County, and Anne would pose for a shot. Readers then guessed where she was; the first one with the correct answer won a prize. Readers loved it!

Rumor had it that Anne’s picture was plastered on the side of a county bus à la Carrie Bradshaw in an ad for the paper (see above), but few of us actually can attest to that.

Anne also covered county government for LTM. She went on to become business editor and later, assistant managing editor. She left the paper after five years to become online media coordinator for “Green Hour,” a Web program of the National Wildlife Federation.

Over the years, Anne and I bonded at our newsroom desks and in cheap restaurants over lunch. At LTM she turned a deaf ear to my gum chewing, and I tolerated her deep sighing after particularly contentious phone interviews. Anne lived in Manhattan before moving to Leesburg; our mutual passion for The City has energized many a conversation!

Anne and her husband, Scott, moved to Reston a few years ago. Now that we’re practically neighbors, we’ve tried to recreate our NYC lifestyle. That mostly means wearing black all the time and complaining about how much it costs to live here. Contrary to popular belief, the world-class Lake Anne Center in Reston was not named after Anne.

I know you’ll enjoy Anne’s posts. Her singular prose is surpassed only by her sharp wit.

Have fun, Anne!

Ruminating about rummage

My son Andrew is in charge of our church’s annual rummage sale Saturday. The money raised goes to programs for our senior high youth.

I’ve known about the sale since September, when Andrew accepted the job as director of youth ministries. I vowed to clean out the unfinished part of our basement, piled to the ceiling with stuff, and deliver a carload of donations to this worthy cause. I’d kill two birds with one stone: make my storage area less hazardous, and support Andrew’s ministry. What could be better?

I have to deliver the goods today. Am I ready? No.

I did take a stab a couple months ago when I needed the box of Easter decorations. So much junk was shoved in front of the metal shelves holding the box that I couldn’t reach it. I did the easy cleanup -- discarding empty boxes that had accumulated. Gene took a load to the recycling center. The rest are still stacked neatly in the rec room. (Sigh.)

Friends remark on how organized I am. That’s because they see only the parts of the house that show. If they stepped into my basement, they’d start hyperventilating.

Why do I keep all this stuff? Cartons of my sons’ preschool artwork. Generations of suitcases dating from the 1950s. Shopping bags from stores that shuttered years ago. Original boxes for small appliances -- hair dryers, vacuum cleaners, food processors, mixers -- in case I ever need to send them back for warranted repairs. Halloween costumes from the 1980s on. My daring disco dress from 1978. Games no one’s played in eons and never liked in the first place. Gifts I’ve bought with loved ones in mind, then put away for the future and forgot. It’s ridiculous.

It’s got to be some kind of illness.

Years ago, a disgruntled water heater repairman shook his head as he wedged himself sideways to gain access to the unit. I’d tried to clear a path, but it was hard! He said if the unit ever failed and flooded the room, I’d have a real mess on my hands.

Like I didn’t have one already.

I save stuff because I have grand fantasies that someday I’ll organize it all and then it will have value. At least it will have sentimental value -- which has to be the most overrated concept ever.

The inability to part with things carries over to other areas of my life. My mother and my cousin both commented the other day that their e-mails bounced back with a notice that my inbox was full. That means I had 1,000 active e-mails sitting in my AOL account (not counting all the others in my 46 saved-mail folders). Who needs to hold onto 1,000 e-mails?? Do I think I’m going to read them all again? What my mother and cousin don’t know is I also have a gmail account with 601 messages. And lots of threads going in my Facebook inbox.

I used to save IMs. Do you know how hard those things are to read after the moment?

This IS a sickness.

It’s just too easy to close the basement door or turn off the computer and ignore it all, especially when there are so many other things I’d rather be doing. Sorting and tossing is boring! And it requires so many decisions, it makes my head hurt.

But today I will make the effort. I will fit as much as I can into the car and take it to church. (Darn! Gene left the van for me instead of the Prius.) I will get the ball rolling, accepting that this is a process I can continue next year.

I will do it -- as soon as I finish blogging …

Seeing the world from a new point of view

Every year about this time, I start pining for New York.

When spring warms the air, I yearn to get outside and walk. What better place to walk than the streets of Manhattan, jam-packed with tourists jostling shopping bags, taxis careering into crosswalks, diners spilling out of restaurants onto sidewalk tables, concert-goers heading to the parks, apartment dwellers hanging at their favorite Starbucks, and saxophonists and violinists crooning on the corner?

New York City is always alive, but never moreso than in the spring.

I lived in Manhattan such a short time, but my addiction to urban buzz remained. As a girl coming of age in Upstate New York, I dreamed of one day living in The City. When that day came, it was everything I’d imagined, and more.

It’s hard to justify my decision 30 years ago to move to Washington, D.C., a city I’d never liked. First of all, it was so clean. Second, where were the skyscrapers? Third, where could you shop? Hecht’s, Garfinkel’s and Woodward & Lothrop department stores just didn’t cut it. Fourth, in a city full of bureaucrats, the streets emptied at 5 p.m. Where was the nightlife? Fifth, Washington had no style, and worse, it didn‘t care.

Those were five of my top 10 reasons to hate D.C.

Don’t get me wrong. Life has gone well for me here. Northern Virginia is a wonderful place to raise children. We have terrific friends. But it isn't New York.

Many years ago, in the midst of a got-to-move-back-to-NYC fit, I was contacted by a psychic. Kathy -- who lived in Chelsea -- was the cousin of a close friend and felt prompted to interpret a dream I’d had. She asked my friend to deliver this message: “You won’t move back to New York, at least not right away. But New York will come to you.”

I took some comfort in Kathy’s prediction.

In the years since, New York has come to me in little ways. At first, it was the expansion of the subway (which for years I refused to call “Metro”). A few of my favorite NYC vendors discovered D.C.: Macy’s. Saks. Tiffany’s. Balducci’s. Barnes & Noble. Later I found my job at the Loudoun Times-Mirror with its editorial staff of transplanted New Yorkers. People who spoke the same language.

Meanwhile, 20-story buildings began erupting from a vast woods in the heart of Reston, within walking distance of my house. My view was changing.

Technically, mid-town Manhattan spawned Reston. In 1961, Robert E. Simon, a native New Yorker, took some money from his family’s sale of Carnegie Hall and bought 6,750 acres in western Fairfax County for a new kind of town. The planned pièce de résistance was Reston Town Center, a walkable urban core rising like Venus from a suburban sea.

Within that core today are towering office buildings on top of retail, sidewalk cafés and fine dining establishments, trendy boutiques, outdoor performance venues and high-rise condos with doormen. Traffic has accumulated so that inching along Reston Parkway in the early evening mimicks a bumper-to-bumper crawl down Park Avenue. While many residents decry the “Manhattanization” of Reston, I’m ecstatic. Bring it on!

Saul Steinberg’s 1976 poster, “The New Yorker: The USA as Viewed from 9th Avenue,“ above, hangs over my family room sofa. (Over the fireplace is a painting of One Gramercy Park, from my old neighborhood.) I was looking at that classic poster the other day. I realized it looks an awful lot like Reston.

A few quick changes and the deed is done. Ninth Avenue morphs into Presidents Street and 10th Avenue to Library Avenue. The Hudson becomes Herndon, and Jersey is replaced by Loudoun. The rest of the illustration stays exactly the same, even the westward orientation.

That photo up there, on the right? That's Reston.

It may not be New York, but it might be the next best thing.

Swine flu: Will this little piggy go to market?

My son David posted a status update on Facebook shortly after 9 last evening: “AHHH, SWINE FLU AT UD!!! WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!”

News crews were staked out in a van beside his dorm at the University of Delaware, he said. I quickly googled “swine flu” and “Delaware” and got a hit at the Philadelphia Inquirer. “U of Del: four students with ‘probable’ swine flu,” the headline read.

Did I panic? No. It was more like, “Here we go again.”

About a year ago, David was diagnosed with embryonal rhabdomyosarcoma, a type of malignant muscle tumor most often seen in young children. For several months, panic became the norm as our family dealt with this rare form of cancer.

Nearly as fearsome as the cancer was the prospect of David catching a cold, the flu or some other viral infection while his immune system was suppressed. Nine months of chemotherapy kept his white blood cell count dipping like the stock market, making him susceptible to invasive germs. The staff at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, where David received his treatment, gave us strict orders to head for an ER if his temperature ever reached 100.4 degrees. I’ll not soon forget his oncologist saying, “An infection that you or I would shake off could kill him.”

David had just completed his first round of chemo when his dad, and then I, got sick. Some sort of bug knocked us right off our feet. We each spent two days quarantined in bed, breathing heavily into blue paper surgical masks. For whatever reason -- maybe his counts were still good -- David didn’t catch the bug.

He took a semester off from his studies at UD, spending the summer and fall at home. The downside? He was incredibly bored away from his peers. The upside? Except for the cancer, he stayed well.

David returned to school in February to start the spring semester. Ten days later, his roommate became horribly ill -- high fever, vomiting, hacking cough, muscle aches. David contacted his Hopkins nurse, Susan. She told him to take precautions: wash his hands frequently; wear a mask; and at the first sign of fever, go to the ER for Tamiflu.

Gene and I sweated it out for a week, not knowing how long the incubation period might last. But once again, David did not get sick. The consensus was that his roommate had the flu and because David had gotten a flu shot, he was protected.

Now swine flu seems to have taken a direct flight from Mexico to Newark, Del.

On the one hand, the flu shot won't help against this virus. On the other hand, two months post-treatment, David's immune system has bounced back. Will that be enough to keep him from tangoing with swine flu? I contacted Susan. She recommended David take the same precautions as last time.

Now we wait again. At least this time the entire university is on alert. If David gets sick, he’s sure to receive prompt medical attention. Johns Hopkins also is braced for a potential pandemic, and we can rely on our friends there.

Maybe I've been through so much this past year that it'll take more than flu gone global to put me in a state of panic. I'm really not worried.

Actually, I'm more worried about what David might do with that full box of facemasks sitting in his dorm closet. Aware of how pragmatic and entrepreneurial he can be, I could see him profiting from the pandemic by peddling his masks for “a small fee.”

Now that I think of it, I have boxes of surgical masks and gloves stored in the linen closet upstairs. Hmmm …

The marrying kind, all in due time

An article that appeared in the Outlook section of Sunday’s Washington Post is generating online comments faster than I can reload the page to view them.

“Say Yes. What Are You Waiting For? The emotional, biological and economic case for marrying young,” was written by Mark Regnerus, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Texas at Austin. Regnerus is the author of "Forbidden Fruit: Sex and Religion in the Lives of American Teenagers." His premise is that we baby boomer parents should stop pressuring our offspring to wait till they're older to get married.

According to the Census Bureau, the average age of men marrying for the first time is now 28, the oldest since the agency started keeping track, Regnerus says. He doesn’t see that as progress. Citing women's enhanced fertility in their 20s, Regnerus promotes a flashback to the 1950s, when couples married young and often completed their families by the time they were 30. He tries to debunk the theory that the No. 1 reason for divorce is getting married at a young age. He further suggests that early marriage is good for the economy and the environment.

It’s not that young people don’t want to get married, he argues. The fault lies with parents who expect their sons and daughters to finish their advance degrees and achieve some early goals before settling down:

Now we advise our children to complete their education before even contemplating marriage, to launch their careers and become financially independent. We caution that depending on another person is weak and fragile. We don't want them to rush into a relationship. We won't help you with college tuition anymore, we threaten. Don't repeat our mistakes, we warn.

Could this advice be coming from parents who married young and wish they hadn’t? Who would’ve liked more time to indulge their interests and pursue their careers before settling down?

I faced opposite pressure when I went away to college in the early ’70s. My parents definitely expected me to graduate with an “MRS.” When I didn’t, they hoped my chances would improve when I moved to Manhattan to start my career. I had the time of my life -- one I wouldn’t trade away for anything -- during those two years in the Big Apple. I still believe I would’ve stayed longer and felt more secure in my career choice had I not been subjected to the relentless Greek Chorus: Time is running out. You’re not getting any younger. If you become too successful, no man will marry you.

Caving to pressure, I married for the first time at 25 and divorced at 26. It was a disaster; my heart wasn’t in it. I told myself I was going to swear off men until I was 30, just so I could get my writing career under way. Instead, I met my husband, Gene, a few months later; we got married the next year. That was 28 years ago.

Ours was also a second marriage for Gene. He married the first time before he’d finished college. He, too, bowed to the pressure of the times but also believes the hours he had to spend on the job, establishing himself, contributed to the demise of that relationship.

Regnerus, however, suggests that marriage and youth go best hand in hand:

Marriage actually works best as a formative institution, not an institution you enter once you think you're fully formed. We learn marriage, just as we learn language, and to the teachable, some lessons just come easier earlier in life.

Obviously, some couples are sufficiently formed to marry at 20 or 21. But many are not. And it makes me shudder to think of the possibility of returning to a time when early marriage was the norm. The ’50s-era artwork that accompanies Regnerus’ print article only heightens my worries about his retro-sounding advice. Somehow it feels like a backlash.

Many of us will remember the rhyme we sang as children: “First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes baby in the baby carriage.” If a woman is going to capitalize on her peak fertility in her 20s, that sequence has to play out fairly quickly. Which leaves scant time for building a career. Or anything else.

Don’t get me wrong. Marriage can be wonderful. Having a family can be awesome. Managing both well takes not only maturity, but also a lot of time and energy. For too many young women, that can mean putting personal goals and interests on a back burner for 20 or more years. For me, those early years in New York gave me something to hold onto during the intense years of childrearing. My early success gave me confidence that I could return to that career someday -- reassurance my mother, who married at 20 and gave birth to me at 22, never had.

Gene and I have been clear with our three sons from the outset: Don’t rush into marriage. The older two, now in their mid-20s, have significant others. All four young adults are building their careers; the SOs are pursuing advance degrees. My sons are saving money, learning how to deal with less-than-ideal co-workers and managers, and figuring out what they need to do to achieve long-range goals. They’re flexible and mobile because they’re unencumbered. Delaying marriage seems to be working for them.

I know I can’t speak for everyone. Some people get lucky and find their mates when they're very young. They're able to raise bright, healthy, well-adjusted children. But I don’t think Regnerus can speak for everyone, or even most, either. Letting ourselves, or our children, believe he does -- therein lies the danger.

Deadened woman walking

Cold. Dark. Morning. Those are three of my least favorite words.

So it strikes me as odd that I gave my neighbor’s e-mail a second look. Someone I hadn’t met, she’d e-mailed all the families in our pocket of cul-de-sacs:

Neighbors,
Is anyone interested in a neighborhood walking group? A few of us are planning to walk for about 45 minutes on weekdays at 6 a.m., before the craziness of the day begins. Would you like to join us? It's a great way to catch up with neighbors and friends and also get your exercise first thing in the morning. If you would like to join us, please email me, or just plan to meet in front of my house at 6 a.m. this Monday, the 13th. Looking forward to seeing you ...
Megan

Did I mention “exercise” is also on my least-favorite-words list?

But I do like to walk -- which is one reason I loved living in Manhattan in the ’70s. I could walk everywhere. Lately, I’d been thinking I ought to start walking again. I’d grown sedentary after a year of sitting in hospital and physician waiting rooms and at the pediatric oncology clinic. Too much time thinking about test results, possible outcomes and the improbable demise of our little family translated into an anxious outlook.

A little voice nudged: “This would be good for you.” But at 6 in the morning??

I answered the e-mail, telling Megan I'd join the group … and then started to stress. The night of the 12th I lay awake, at once wanting to bag the idea and worried I’d oversleep my 5:40 alarm. (Uh, one other thing: My ideal day starts at 10 a.m.) When I got up, it was really, really dark. I bundled up and stepped outside. It was really, really cold. I thought, “I must be insane.”

Alas, I was too chicken to chicken out. I figured all these motivated moms would be gathering at Megan’s house and I’d look like a wuss if I didn’t show up.

I arrived a couple minutes before 6 a.m. No one was there. Not a soul. I stood in Megan’s quiet driveway and listened to the birds tuning up for the day. With a spritz and a whoosh, the sprinklers embedded in the lawn across the street turned on in white plumes of spray. The predawn world was peaceful and fresh. I liked it.

Megan emerged from her garage; I introduced myself. We waited a few minutes, but no one else came. We started to walk. We found we had so much to talk about, we walked until 7:15.

By the time I got home, though, I had a searing pain in my right groin. I collapsed on the living sofa and stayed there all day.

It hurt to move, but my husband, Gene -- who walks during his lunch hour -- encouraged me to stick with it. "You'll walk out the pain," he said. He kept saying how proud he was of me, for doing something so beneficial -- and so utterly out of character.

Two days later, when Megan and I were scheduled to walk again, my leg was fine. I haven’t had a problem since. We’re walking 3 ½ to 4 miles, three days a week, trying to perfect our 15-minute mile. It’s still just the two of us. I’m kind of proud that I’m keeping up with someone nearly 20 years my junior. By the third morning, I’d traded my ratty jeans and bulky jacket for a pair of sleek exercise pants and a cute hoodie. I’d also traded any dread of the new regime for a happy anticipation.

Megan talked me into participating in a 5K that she organized for her son’s preschool this past Saturday morning. Gene and I both walked; it was our first 5K. We trailed the runners but were ahead of almost all the parents with strollers. We finished the walk in a respectable 43 minutes.

I’m sure people assumed we were one of the preschoolers’ grandparents. It didn’t matter. The day was bright, the air was warm, and it felt so good. Even better, illness and despair were the furthest things from my mind.

A blog about something

Is there a baby boomer alive who doesn’t remember Jerry Seinfeld’s and George Costanza’s oddball pitch for a television sitcom, “a show about nothing”?



Well, I'm aiming to write “a blog about something.”

My friend Anne and I -- both of us displaced print journalists -- have been brainstorming blogs over lunch since February. She recently helped her mother, Robin Hathaway, a mystery writer in New York, launch a blog called “Robdoneit.” Before that, Anne and I wrote blogs at the Loudoun Times-Mirror. Anne is convinced that if writers want to stay in the game, they have to blog. They have to be “out there.”

I've been curious but reluctant. How would I set up a blog that wasn't affiliated with an existing newspaper or Web site? Anne deftly directed me to resources. How would I, someone without an art background, design a layout? She suggested I look for blogs I liked and emulate their features.

One of my favorites is David Loeb’s blog, "Musings of a Pediatric Oncologist," at doctordavidsblog.blogspot.com. Dr. Loeb, my son David’s doctor, generously shared with me some of the unexpected pleasures and benefits of blogging. He patiently answered questions about such things as “search engine optimization.”

But content proved to be the bugaboo. I had to write about something! During March I stewed over topics. Should the theme be broad so I’d have lots to say? Should it be narrowly focused to distinguish it from the zillions of blogs out there? I tried several ideas on for size, but none fit.

My friend Megan suggested I look at dooce.com, an enormously popular blog by Heather B. Armstrong, a Web designer and “recovering Mormon.” She blogs about, well, mom stuff. I thought, “I can do that.”

Meanwhile, I resisted launching a public blog because I was quite happy with my private blog on the CarePages Web site. There I could keep writing about our ongoing, but diminishing, cancer challenges as my family tentatively moved forward after a year of upheaval. I could tell my stories from a recovering cancer mom's point of view.

But suddenly David took editorial control of our CarePage, and my role was curtailed. I could almost feel myself gasping for air, my lifeline cut off. The time had come to launch a new blog, whether or not I was ready. It was do or die.

So I’m “out there,” a little duck in an immense puddle. This is a fledgling effort; I don't know how it will evolve. I suspect it will undergo several iterations before I hit on something that works. Or not. It could be a big flop.

For now I'll keep writing the sorts of essays I was writing on the CarePage. I'll write about those things -- the everyday and the monumental -- that happen to most of us as we get older, but I'll try to bring a new perspective. As I try to make sense of the changes in my life, maybe I can help you make sense of yours.

Perhaps this blog will amount to nothing. But for now it's something.

I am Susan Boyle

OK, we all know I’m not really Susan Boyle, the frowsy chanteuse who blew away millions of viewers this past week, first on “Britain’s Got Talent,” and then via YouTube’s instant replays.

First of all, I’m 55, not 47. I live in the United States, not Scotland, in a collection of sprawling suburbs ringing Washington, D.C. I have been kissed, and I’m married. As for my singing, let’s just say it’s not one of my stronger attributes.

But strip away the superficialities and I am Susan Boyle, the tentative, would-be artist trying to hone a talent in the safety of her living room, far from potential critics and disapproving voices.

In the broader scheme of things, Boyle represents all of us who toil in the arts and dream of being discovered, doesn’t she? Don’t we all long for that mystical moment when stunned audiences leap joyfully to their feet as we finally dare to open our mouths, put brush to canvas or pen to paper, click on the camera or jeté onto the stage? How many of us imagine ourselves as emerging swans after a lifetime as ugly ducklings, indistinguishable from the masses?

Simon Cowell asked Boyle about her dream. “Why hasn’t it worked out so far, Susan?”

“I haven’t been getting the chance before,” she replied. “But here’s hoping it will change.”

Getting the chance, hoping for change. It’s what every novice artist seeks. My chances kept eluding me as I raised three sons, all now in their 20s. Life has a way of slipping by, especially for women, when the care and feeding of others is allowed to block the creative process.

The time has come for me to take a chance on blogging. After three decades of modest writing success -- favorable comments from editors, an award here and there -- I’m striving for something bigger, even as my favorite print venues crash and burn. This blog is a new chance, where I can play with my ideas and see what happens.

“I dreamed a dream of time gone by,” Boyle sang, echoing Fantine's frustrations in “Les Misérables.” Electricity surged through that auditorium and ignited a response no one could foresee (sorry, Simon, not even you). Nothing could extinguish it, least of all the disconnect between that radiant voice and the awkward singer. Now Susan Boyle can dream a dream of times to come.

I’d venture to say artists around the globe are telling themselves, “That could be me.” I know I am.

Why "Chatterlines"? Why now?

As the creator of "Chatterlines," I come to you as a longtime journalist -- just one in the thundering herd of dinosaurs fleeing newspaper burial grounds, trying to avoid extinction. My younger colleagues tell me that to survive "The End of Life as We Know It" in the print world, we all need to blog.

The concept isn’t entirely new to me. I’ve actually had three moderately successful blogs over the last two years. Each ran its natural course. The first, “Empty Nesting,” was posted to the Loudoun Times-Mirror Web site in Leesburg, Va., from June to October 2007, after my youngest son graduated from high school and left for college.

When my husband and I discovered that we, too, wanted to escape our empty nest, we sought out theater productions to fill our many free (read: lonely) evenings. In a natural progression, “Empty Nesting” morphed into “Backstage,” as I wrote about community theater for The Fairfax Times in Fairfax County, Va. I had a great time reviewing musicals and plays -- and meeting directors, actors and stage crews -- after scooping up my complimentary tickets at the box offices.

“Backstage” came to an abrupt end a year ago when that same youngest son was diagnosed with cancer. Biopsies and endless consults with doctors at Georgetown University Hospital in Washington, D.C., and later at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Md., left no time to languish at the theater. May 2008 brought a diagnosis of embryonal rhabdomyosarcoma and more than nine months of chemotherapy and radiation treatment.

During that time I kept a private blog via the CarePages Web site. I wrote about everything -- from the mind-blowing to the seemingly insignificant -- related to our cancer journey. As David’s treatment wound down, and particularly after he returned to college in February, I started filling the CarePage with family news instead of cancer updates.

The other day David revolted. Threatening to hold the CarePage hostage by changing the password and denying me access, he asked that I no longer fill the page with “chatter” but confine myself to news about his care and treatment. Having no choice, really, I agreed. I posted an update announcing the new parameters, noting that this censoring might force me to set up a blog elsewhere.

Several readers wrote to say they actually liked the chatter:

“These CarePages, I think, have served many purposes for different people. I do understand David's position, and it sounds like the time is right for a change. Just let me know where you're ‘chattering’ …”

“I understand David's ‘takeover,’ but it makes me a bit sad as well. I've followed every CarePage since I first learned about it. The family news and ‘chatter’ have been an important part of it for me. It lets me know how and what everyone is doing as well. That's a significant piece of the whole process. ... Please find your new outlet and let me know where you land. I'm interested in all of it!”

Of course, others, like my oldest son, applauded the change. “Vive la revolution,” he wrote.

So, what exactly is “all of it”?

“All of it” is what goes on around a cancer story -- the context into which the illness fits. Cancer lands in families merely going about their business, paying bills, chasing dreams, building friendships. No one sits around waiting for cancer to strike. When it does, it comes flying out of left field and knocks you flat. As you lie there, you wonder if you’ll ever get up again.

You do because your doctors make sure you do. You have to keep getting up to report for surgeries, scans, treatment and frequent checkups. The primal need to fight the invading beast takes over and sets you on a new course. Friends hold your hand as you put one foot in front of the other.

And when it’s over, you face what many call "a new normal." Much is still the same, but a lot has changed. That’s where we are now. The future is uncertain, but David is moving on, which forces me to move on as well. As he strives for wellness, there’s a lot of chatter in the background as the rest of our family recovers and puts life back together.

"Chatterlines" is not a cancer blog. It will enfold as the story of an everyday family pursuing life even as cancer has reworked its reality and expectations.

Welcome, friends! Thanks for stopping by.

Lorin