Local adventures: art in conversation.

Last month, my guy and I headed to the MFA on a Saturday (thank goodness for library passes). Both the permanent collection and the rotating exhibits there are stunning, and we love an occasional afternoon spent strolling among the art.

We spent most of our time in the New Light exhibit, which brings together new pieces and older artworks, placing them side by side and in conversation with one another. I saw more pieces than I can possibly tell you about here, but I was fascinated by the juxtaposition of art in different media, from different eras, telling different sides of a story or simply highlighting the various angles of a subject or topic.

There were paintings, of course, and sculptures, and mixed-media pieces made of textiles and paper and wood. There were pieces clearly inspired by other artists’ work, and a tiny scale model of a gallery that an artist had used to virtually showcase others’ pieces during the height of the pandemic. There was a sculpture of Fred Hampton’s door, a powerful piece calling attention to the brutality so often faced by Black Americans. There were detailed botanical drawings next to a piece by Lui Shtini that combined a recognizable flower with some fantastical elements. And there were a number of pieces that simply identified the artist as “Artist once known.”

That, perhaps, caught me more than anything else: a way to acknowledge the fact that artists unknown to us (many of them female, Indigenous or marginalized) were once known, and important, to their loved ones and communities. Someone knew this quilter, this painter, this sculptor, this folk artist who took such care to carve or draw or assemble a piece. Their identities, while maybe lost to us, are still important, and still vital to acknowledge. It brought those “unknown” artists a little closer to me, and reminded me that art is always saying something: it highlights beauty, records and analyzes events, calls out injustice, names and honors complicated emotions.

The neon sign above, which hangs in a different gallery of the MFA, reminds me of that, too: the museum encourages visitors to look, feel, talk, communicate, interact with the art. You don’t have to be an artist or an art historian to do any of those things, to engage with art on a human level. I’m grateful to the MFA for reminding me of that, in different and thought-provoking ways.

What local adventures are you having, this summer? How do you like to engage with visual art?

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Local adventures: the Watertown-Cambridge Greenway.

My guy and I love a good bike ride, and he, in particular, can rarely resist a new trail. So when a friend of his told G about a recently completed project that links Cambridge with Watertown – and takes you from a busy retail area to the quiet of Fresh Pond – we had to check it out.

We started in Watertown on a humid Sunday, picking up the trail behind the Arsenal Mall and riding it through neighborhoods neither of us had ever seen. The area is a mix of residential and old industrial buildings, and it’s all suddenly lush with early-summer green. We crossed a few streets G knew, but so much of it was unexplored territory to him, and it was all fresh to me.

We took a snack break near Fresh Pond, eyeing the sky because a storm was rumored to be blowing in. The wind did kick up, but we decided to take our chances, and it was a beautiful ride (my first) around the pond.

I’ve been riding in Boston for several years, but there’s still so much I don’t know about the bike paths in the area. It was a particular treat, though, to explore a trail that neither of us knew – G’s delight in discovery was evident at every turn.

We’ll be riding more this summer, of course, and having other local adventures. I’m looking forward to every single one.

What local adventures are you having, these days?

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Summer adventures: 24 hours in NYC.

It’s no secret I love a solo trip to NYC. Some of my favorite memories of the Big Apple are from weekends spent wandering the streets by myself. My last trip there, though, was kind of a failure: it was January 2020, just days after my divorce court date. I thought I wanted an adventure to look forward to, but once I was there, all I wanted was to be back home. I came back early and didn’t regret it, but I’ve been wanting to revisit NYC alone (and basically unable to do so) ever since.

I hopped down to NYC a few weekends ago for my shortest trip to date: I was there for just over 24 hours, and it was a hot, humid whirlwind. But I loved wandering my favorite tangle of streets in the West Village, browsing bookstores and drinking my weight in iced tea. Here, a few highlights:

My beloved Three Lives & Co. is in a temporary space due to renovation, but I made sure to walk down West 10th to visit their new digs. I had a long browse and a lovely conversation with Nora, one of the booksellers, and bought a fabulous compendium of essays about Manhattan.

I headed straight for Bryant Park (see above) when I arrived, for lunch and a lemonade. But once I made my way to the Jane, where I stayed, I stuck to Chelsea and the Village all weekend.

I walked and walked – to Pink Olive, to Chelsea Market (above), to various shops that looked intriguing. I popped into cafes for iced tea and took photos of flowers and street art. And I had dinner at Roey’s (the most fantastic burrata pizza), and sat outside on one of my favorite corners in the city, sipping a gin cocktail and scribbling in my journal until nearly closing time.

Sunday morning meant a long run through the Hudson River Park (the High Line wasn’t open yet, but I loved discovering a new-to-me running route). Then I had a fantastic sandwich (with iced chai) at Three Owls Market, and wandered up to 192 Books, where I’d never been.

I grabbed some snacks for the train, walked around some more, and headed back to Penn Station to catch my train home. I was exhausted and delighted, and so glad I went. The city is waking back up, and it felt like mine again.

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Summer adventures: a day out in Salem.

My guy and I love Salem, that famously witchy town a bit north of Boston. We spent a few weekends there in 2019, but hadn’t been back since March 2020, for the obvious pandemic and life reasons. But a couple of weeks ago, we decided to just go for the day – hopping on the commuter rail in the morning and coming back in time for dinner. It was, in a word, fabulous.

We started the day with iced chai and treats from Caffe Ducali (see above) and then hopped on the train. When we arrived, we did some browsing of favorites old and new: the bike shop, the comic-book shop, the fabulous consignment shop Re-find (where I always find the best stuff). We ran into an old friend of G’s and chatted a minute, then headed down the street for hot dogs. I almost never eat hot dogs unless I’m at a ballpark, but I made an exception for these:

Thus fortified, we wandered some more (stopping at Front Street Coffee for iced tea – it was hot!), then headed out on a bike ride. I love exploring new parts of familiar places with G, and we adore a good long bike ride. We ended up at Winter Island, which has campgrounds, a beach and ocean views.

We rode back to town and headed to Far From the Tree, Salem’s wonderful local cider house, for some sampling (G) and an old favorite (me). We have a cider-focused Instagram account these days, and it’s so fun to taste different ciders and compare notes.

After a ride back on the commuter rail, we ended the day where we began it: at Ducali for a delicious dinner. It was so lovely to revisit one of our favorite towns together. I want to go back (again).

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Afternoon on the Cape

One of the things I’ve missed the most in these pandemic times is travel.

I love my little nest in Eastie, but I also love hitting the road or jumping on a plane or train, to see somewhere new or revisit familiar, favorite places. Like so many folks I know, I have mourned multiple canceled trips this spring and summer. My guy and I have ridden our bikes all over Boston, and it’s been fun, but I’ve barely been out of the city for months.

Last week, though, I decided to get out of town – at least for the afternoon – and head down to Falmouth, near the base of Cape Cod. My friend Hannah had invited me for lunch and a walk, so I rented a Zipcar and drove down in the late morning. By some miracle I escaped the weekend traffic (in both directions), and the afternoon was just what my soul needed.

Hannah and I met at a writing workshop years ago, and we love talking about books and faith and catching up on our lives. I sat on her sun porch and sipped tea while she made lunch for us, and we ate at a square blue table in her front yard, trading stories while the skies gradually cleared.

After lunch, we slipped on our sneakers and went for a long, rambling walk, past a local farm where someone had nailed a small box to a fence post and written “Enjoy!” on the side. It held a few cherry tomatoes, so I helped myself. And the dahlias nearby were stunning.

We walked down the bike path, through a sedate neighborhood filled with late-summer trees and flowers, over to Little Island and the beach there, which you reach by walking through the woods. There was a rotting pilot whale carcass on the beach (so smelly!) but there was also sweet autumn clematis, blooming away, and the first red leaves. We perched on the rocks and talked for a while, and then we walked back and I hopped in my rental car to make the drive home.

It was only a few hours, but I’d forgotten how refreshing it could be to see different views, explore a new path, breathe (slightly) different air. Not to mention the nourishing company of a dear friend. In these strange, anxious months, making the effort to get away often feels overwhelming. But I’m here to tell you: it is entirely worth it.

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#dailylilacs and celebrating my guy.

In the midst of the profound strangeness we are all living in, it has been a gorgeous spring in Boston. The lilacs, in particular, are simply stunning this year. I’ve been stopping to sniff them on my daily walks and runs around Eastie, and on Sunday, my guy and I soaked them up at one of our favorite places.

The Longfellow House, just west of Harvard Square, has an entire hedge of lilacs out front and another grove of them all the way around its western side, ending in a stand of them by the back garden entrance. We love that garden, but it is not quite in its full summer glory yet; we were there for the lilacs, and oh my, did they deliver.

We walked and sniffed and snapped photos and sniffed some more, and actually crawled through a tunnel made by overhanging lilac branches. We saw a few other people who were as ecstatic as we were: a woman whose purple shirt matched the flowers, a mother with her redheaded toddler daughter, an older woman wearing blue eyeliner who told us she had grown up among lilacs in Lexington. Sunday was G’s birthday, and all he wanted was to wander among these lilacs, which he’d seen in bloom here and there before, but never at their peak.

Before the lilacs, we got sandwiches at Darwin’s (with chai for me) and ran into several people we know – both staff and regulars. Afterward, we rode bikes back across the city to the Blue Line, which brought us back to Eastie for a birthday dinner and presents. And all day long, we soaked up the beauty, and enjoyed being together.

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Weekend in Connecticut

Earlier this month, the hubs and I took off for a much-needed weekend getaway. His birthday is in early May, and it seemed like forever since our quick trip to Florida in mid-March.

We’ve been through southern Connecticut many times on our train rides to NYC, but had never spent any time there – so we decided to hop down to Mystic (as in pizza) for a long weekend.

In spite of some truly crazy spring rainstorms, it was delightful. (As were these tulips, spotted outside a shop in downtown Mystic.)

We arrived on a windy, rainy Friday afternoon, checked into our Airbnb apartment and ate lunch at the S&P Oyster Company, down by the water. The views were a bit obscured by the weather, but the clam chowder was delicious.

After lunch, we drove over to nearby Westerly, R.I., where we spent most of our time at the Savoy Bookshop & Cafe. (If you know me, you are not shocked by this one bit.)

I browsed the stacks while J curled up and read for a while, and later (after wandering around in the rain) we came back for an afternoon snack.

The rain had (mostly) stopped by dinnertime, and we ate at the other pizza place in Mystic – not the one from the movie, but Pizzetta, down on Water Street. Both the spinach-artichoke dip and the pizza were fresh and delicious. (The after-dinner excitement: several of the server girls shrieking because a frog had found its way onto the back stairs!)

Saturday began with pastries from Sift (yum) and brought more wandering, including a long browse at Bank Square Books, which is owned by the same folks who run the Savoy. I could have stayed for hours: it is well-stocked, pleasantly arranged and full of unexpected corners.

Our Airbnb hostess, Melissa, had told us about M Bar, a hip little restaurant in a converted gas station, a short walk from downtown Mystic. We had dinner there on Saturday night and I loved every bite: avocado mash with pita chips, veggie lasagna with white sauce, and the best fries I’ve had in quite some time – with house-made ketchup. (Plus lovely wine, a great ambiance and a handsome date.)

The sun finally came out on Sunday, so we drove over to Gillette Castle, though we were disappointed to learn it was still closed for the season. (J really wanted to climb it, and I was curious to go inside.) We had to content ourselves with wandering around the site, and marveling at the exterior.

After that, we headed to yet another bookstore: the rambling, overstuffed Book Barn in Niantic. It boasts a fairy garden, a “haunted” mystery shed, several annexes of various kinds, and – I kid you not – a hobbit hole.

More to the point, it is positively overflowing with used books, and we ended up with a bulging bag of them: fiction and mysteries for me, history and other nonfiction for J. My favorite kind of vacation shopping.

In between our wanderings, we spent a lot of time at the apartment: sleeping late, going to bed early, curling up with good books. I spent hours on the wicker sofa by the window, under a white afghan, sipping tea and reading a couple of YA novels I loved. It was restorative in the best way: walking and resting, exploring and eating, just being together.

We capped off our trip with brunch at Rise (which J kept mistakenly calling “Shine”) on Monday morning, and headed home, refreshed.

Mystic, you are enchanting. (And restful.) We’ll be back.

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Hibernation weekend.

This past weekend, I had an unusual amount of solitude. My husband was in Texas, celebrating his niece’s second birthday. He left Thursday morning and came back Sunday night. I had to work Thursday and Friday, but I toyed with various possibilities for the weekend. Should I spend Saturday wandering around Boston, dropping in and out of museums and cafes? Drive out to western MA and explore a few cute little towns? Hop a train to NYC for 36 hours?

As you might have guessed from the post title, I didn’t do any of those things.

I hibernated.

I slept – 11 hours on Friday night alone. I read, finishing three books and starting another one.

I did laundry, washed dishes, baked two batches of muffins on Saturday afternoon.

I watered my balcony garden and picked some fresh basil to sprinkle on top of my fried eggs. I knitted and wound yarn and binge-watched half of Veronica Mars, season 1. (I am officially hooked.) I began watching (and giggling at) the Lizzie Bennet Diaries on YouTube after flying through the book version.

July has been an unusually social month: we had two sets of houseguests in a row, first a pair of friends and then my parents. Work has been alternately deep-summer-slow and totally crazy: my team is relocating soon, temporarily, to a building across the street while construction work happens in our office. I love having guests to stay, but it requires a lot of planning and energy and disruption of the usual routine. And after two weeks of that, I was exhausted.

For an overtaxed introvert, a hibernation weekend was the perfect cure.

I felt a wee bit guilty about “not taking advantage” of a free weekend and sunny summer weather, until I realized that even thinking about making plans was making me tired. I barely talked to anyone (except the ladies at the library and the checkout girl at the grocery store), and it was glorious. (Though I was ready for some social time by Sunday, and so happy to see the hubs when he flew back in at 11:30 Sunday night.)

Lesson learned (again): a weekend at home may not sound glamorous, but sometimes it’s exactly what I need.

Any fellow introverts/hibernators out there? When was the last time you indulged in some serious solitude?

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