decisions

i was feeling undecided in a cafe the other night, and finally ordered hot apple cider with a glass of ice on the side. which to me made sense, because i wanted that soothing warm drink but also a refreshing icy one. to the friend i was with, however, it represented my difficulty, not exactly with making choices, but with having strong desires for more than one thing that people usually just have one of. i am writing about this because my friend suggested i should, but also because i think this is the issue i have with where should we live. it is impossible for me to feel confident about the decision to raise my kids in the city for several reasons, one of which is that there never really was a decision, just the circumstance of our rental apartment going on the market, but also because where you live is so definite, so unable to accommodate the desire to have more than one thing at once. if we live in the city we have x but not y, if we live in the country we have y but not x. it sure would be sweet to have some land up in point arena we could retreat to every summer, but we don't. it sure would be sweet to have a city home that backed up to glen park canyon but we don't. it sure would be sweet to have multiple lives, but unless reincarnation is real, we don't.

i am rambling on neurotically as usual. i have just volunteered to be in charge of the "environmental education liason" committee at my son's school, so, quick, i better figure out what that is and how to get people to join me. how to feel more peaceful and good about raising our kids in a land of cars and concrete.

yesterday the kids and i went to chrissy field. it was cool and windy and sunny. miles stripped down to his suit and wiggled down the shallow river of water leading into the bay. we built a big castle with a moat full of this water, and watched the amazing kite-surfers rush off into the gusty bay. many shapes and sizes of dogs went by. on our way out we spotted a strange-looking cat on a leash in the parking lot. it was a three month old house cat and serval tiger mix the owner had bought in texas. he had the cat out to socialize it, and i suppose he thought if he socialized it enough this wild creature would never turn on him. good luck.

i have two hours with no kids and no work right now. time to go clean, water, cook, and listen to NPR. i just heard a screaming hawk in the backyard.

is anyone out there? please let me know. if i am writing to myself i might as well get a little more personal...

love,jamie

staff picks, mission branch library

there is just enough time in my life now to get to the adult section of the library (no, not that adult section)

i like the staff picks at the mission branch. last two week's reads:

the corrections, jonathan franzen

james sturm's america: god, gold, and golems

fun home, alison bechdel

persepolis, marjane satrapi

alias grace, margaret atwood

i also read dave eggers, zeitoun

my kids are turning into voracious readers. i guess seeing miles reading comic book after comic book has influenced me.

reading about dysfunction and chaos is an addictive escape i have sought out for my entire remembered life. all this reading reminds me that reading is the enemy of writing, though.

two festivals, sore foot

well, school has started, with anxious resistant children at home and anxious resistant and pretty much nonverbal children (one three-year-old wailed the single word "mommy" for two hours while staring out the window, threw up from crying, and finally passed out in my arms on tuesday) at work. so it will al be uphill from here, right?

went to sunday streets at ocean beach, another beautiful day with bikes everywhere, little dogs up for adoption maya could hold in her lap, soccer balls to kick, hula hoops, blue sky, booths explaining climate change, old friends and students, kids from my kid's school, free clif bars, bubbles, lion dancers, and raver music blasting from the back of burning man bikes. maya wobbled up and down the freedom from training wheels runway (she doesn't even have training wheels yet) many many times and gave the surprised bike volunteer lady a hug when we left.

later i walked to the rock make festival with miles, where we saw all the cool things people around here make: bowls out of records, knitted pac man ghosts, 3-D rock posters, t shirts, hula hoops, jewelry from old keys and coins, a 3 headed fire dog stuffed animal, bags, comic books, and mostly music. we saw and heard some darn good rock bands.

on the way home we envied all the wide sidewalks and miles observed that when they made our sidewalk narrower it was like saying that people aren't as important as cars. he also noted that people made cars but cars can't make people, so that proves people are more important.

my foot hurts, i have some sore foot condition i self-diagnosed. i know that every time i walk a lot, as i did today, my foot will kill me later, and in the morning. i am icing it right now. i love to walk, can't give it up. walking home we passed the house on 23rd with the mysterious new stained glass sun windows and a man was opening the gate. i asked if the building was now some kind of artist community and he said no and invited us in. the landlords built these cool japanese walls to park bikes and strollers behind, and built a big shared courtyard with a stage for the three building they own to share. miles jumped on the stage and said if he had this in our yard he would meditate on it. or put in a basketball court.

pretty soon i will write some social commentary again, for those of you readers getting bored with all this imagery. i feel the social commentary coming through the images, hope you feel it too.

on that note, i just heard something that sounded like gunshots. and an ambulance. and remembered our evening yesterday on potrero hill, where Bridge Housing sponsored an event at the potrero rec center to celebrate?educate? bring people together for Rebuild Potrero. there were brochures of what it will look like when the current housing projects on potrero hill are torn down, and it all looks very wonderful, if things go as planned. a neighbor from the projects gave us tiles to paint which would be fired and someday put up in the office or community center of the new community. there was an awesome dj, rich playing football with neighborhood kids, miles playing soccer, our friendly school crossing guard, a jumpy house, a spread of great catered food, and a huge screen set up for the later screening of princess and the frog. the rebuild potrero people seemed friendly and down to earth and had been building a planter box all day with some kids, and threw the football with mine. i wondered though if the people who live here now would be able to come back to their guaranteed spots after living somewhere else during the huge construction project. a friend remarked that change can makes things better. i overheard a woman in the food line say "there is going to be a war if they try to tear this place down."

our neighbor

we have a neighbor who lives a few houses down from us who must be in her late 80s. i may be wrong but i think she has lived on this block her entire life. she lives alone and still drives and loves talking to the kids. today she told us that miles' school used to be at 25th and utah. she told us when she went there she and the other boys and girls would walk home every day for lunch. she also told us that there was an ice cream parlor on bryant street and that she and her sister would walk over with empty milk bottles and would get them filled up with milkshakes for 10 cents. miles was impressed. maya is always especially polite with our neighbor and today told her that it was movie night and we were going to watch go diego go.

imagine living on this block for 80 years. maybe we should invite her over for tea sometime. i'll think about it.

i really need to start taking more photos-- Rancho Cicada

wish i had visual documentation of our weekend at rancho cicada, east of sacramento. a windy road through grapevines and then down down into a dusty canyon. at the bottom is the most beautiful perfect green river--crystal clear water, smooth slate rocks perfect for climbing on, one small rapids for kids to go down, minnows, rafts, a huge swimming area. along the river there is a lush long green lawn with plenty of chairs, croquet, a hot tub, and there are little wooden and tent cabins along the river. at night from ours you hear the burbling of the river, peeping frogs. a friend's friend does a demonstration showing us how to start a fire rubbing sticks together. we meet a librarian, an e.r. doctor from sf general next door, a little girl who wants to be an entomologist, a dog who gives swimming rides, and a woman whose brother is the president of the NAACP. the two older guys who run this place lead a hike up river to a deep and dark swimming hole with a rope swing even i try. they keep two tortoises and 14 vintage cars in a barn on the property and seem very happy.

for not too much money we ate amazing catered food, and met so many new friends and reunited with so many old that the weekend flew by with the kids pretty much in heaven. two images--one is miles sitting alone for a long time, peaceful and still in his bathing suit on what he named "sun rock", a curvy huge slate poking out of the water above the rapids. another is more of a short film, at night in the dark under three long strings of lights about ten kids entertain their parents and friends with a crazy play which quickly evolves into them all doing their own thing. maya is spinning around in circles laughing like crazy and falling down, being crack puppy. miles is a scary wolf but the girls don't mind. one nine year old is doing a conga dance with her mom chanting " you don't make friends with SAlad" from the simpsons. one little friend is flying around the group being a night fury, another is waving a flashlight at kids, almost hitting them in the head as she plays the role of an evil person assigning them chores.

it is free enough that the kids can just wander up alone to the kitchen for breakfast in the morning, and safe enough that parents can simply say "can you keep an eye on my kid?" and no one minds at all. i spent some quality time in the hammock with myself, looking across the river and up the steep canyon wall of that golden grass, dotted with trees holding on the the sides. our friend who invited us here said she saw a mountain lion up at the top of the other side of the canyon one morning last year.

it's my birthday. my son who has been quite difficult this summer looked at me before bedtime and said "we haven't argued in three whole days, mommy." then he told me he loved me, i was the best, and i was exquisite. only one is true, of course, but these things are good to hear, and were a perfect birthday present.

goodnight.

busy

hi blog

we have been busy, so here is a little rundown of recent events in the lives of the deiner and millman family...

we fled the city again for a week in sonoma. we bonded with the family who lives in my mom's condo complex, and i found i had quite a bit in common with the divorced, very bleached-blonde and tattooed single mother of two. miles had lots in common with the older boy, and they spent hours several days in a row playing aggressive boy games in the pool. maya went from timidly sitting in the (warmish) hot tub to jumping into the pool and swimming laps across the pool wearing water wings to actually swimming across the hot tub with her head under, water wing-less. from this pool there was a view of hills through trees, with a perpetually blue sky overhead. soaking up sun on a black lounge chair with maya wrapped up in a towel peacefully in my lap felt good. we visited a huge community garden and went to the cheesy but nice county fair. from sonoma my mom and the kids and i took a three day trip to stay at the inverness valley inn near point reyes. another pool and hot tub with cool kids to keep mine occupied. we watched an osprey family return with fish to a huge nest in a tree which towered over the inn. miles got to herd the inn's little farm animal group of llamas and sheep and goats and we got to eat fresh blue and brown eggs in the morning. we visited limantour beach and got a little sunburned and the miles ran about 10 miles chasing the waves. we also went to kule loklo indian village where we quietly felt like miwok indians, and quietly felt a little sad they were gone.

now we are back. i just harvested a bunch of carrots and potatoes and greens and lettuce from the garden. tomorrow we are heading out again to rancho cicada, east of sacramento, where we are going to stay in little wood cabins next to a swimming river, with a big group of people we do not know all too well, but who we will get to know better.

of course i am wondering again why the heck i live here if i am so happy being in nature and quiet, but it is really the juxtaposition that feels good to me. the other day i took the kids downtown to see a movie and we killed a little time in yerba buena park, riding the carousel, making the metal man stand and sit on the metal globe, sliding the giant slide and running around the maze. the city is not peaceful but it is never boring. and i am feeling full of new ideas for making my kid's elementary school more full of experiences with the natural world.

if only there were no earthquakes the city would feel a little more peaceful too, but it is hard for me to let go of earthquake images as i navigate a parking garage, or a huge glass-windowed movie theater complex. i have been in avoidance mode, taking ferries instead of bridges. or maybe it is the threat of earthquakes, which will strike when they want, not when we are ready, that cast a shadow of preciousness over our lives here.

i promise more photos soon.