first impressions

It has taken me six weeks to wrap my mind around this new experience we are having enough to put it into words, and I will undoubtedly fall short even now. It is not an exaggeration to say that we wandered around for the first three weeks in a state of rapture, a golden haze. I had no idea that at thirty-six I could still feel like I did at seventeen when I stepped off of the airport bus onto Palace Court in London, as though the world was fresh and new, ready to be explored. Steve and I marvel to each other how suitable this place is in every way for our current stage of life. (More on "this place" in subsequent posts.)

Our new home is a 1906 row house in the Statenkwartier of The Hague, also referred to as the International Zone, due to its proximity to French and German schools, the International Criminal Tribunal and Shell's European headquarters. It was being gutted when we saw it in May and had been a looming mystery, with photos of a couple of questionably eclectic light fixtures being our only clues to its final state. We arrived straight from a red-eye flight for the "in-check" and found Henk and Lutien, she in a brightly-patterned jersey dress and intense blue eyeshadow, he in Euro-cut trousers and a black button-up shirt, eager to show us their pet project of the past six months. Both they and the house were more charming than we had dared hope. Antique tiles and chandeliers graced the pleasant entry and lofty rooms, and in the backyard a newly planted garden bloomed.  As they watched Violet and Townes thrill over every flower and fat furry bumblebee (which in subsequent days Townes would insist on petting, even after he developed a swollen red bump that we suspected of being a bee's angry retort), Lutien smiled and mentioned that they had left the tool shed empty so that the kids could use it as a playhouse when it rained.

Steve had wisely booked us into a nearby hotel for the first few nights, so we dropped into bed and met the movers bright and early the next morning, but not before wolfing down an enormous breakfast from the hotel spread.  On our first official night in the house three evenings later, we sat in a pleasantly arranged living room (it has since become the study/dining) and Steve looked around and said, "No matter what our lives will be like out there, within the walls of this house we will be happy and at home." Isn't that a nice thing for a husband to say.

Everything fell into place. My darling little sister, Danielle, with a conveniently-timed break between college terms, showed up to play with our kids while we unpacked, and we were out of boxes and feeling presentable when our friends Anne and Bill and their four kids showed up exactly a week after the movers. The day before they arrived was our tenth wedding anniversary, and as we loaded up the car again and again with a bed for the guest room, a television and appliances with European wiring, and various tables and doorstops, all temporarily discounted or otherwise absolute steals, we joked that it was an anniversary miracle. Even the gorgeous sunset behind an ancient windmill as we drove through brilliant emerald fields for our final visit to the big electronics store seemed as though it was just for our eyes. We started our marriage in Europe, with several miserable months in beautiful Paris, and as we reflected on the places we have lived and the things we have done between then and now, we felt so gratified to be able to use all of that experience, the good and the bad, to transition so easily into what might have, at one time, been a challenging new life. All of those missteps were good for something. Really and truly.

Feeling at home, having been favored with the warmth of friends and family and surrounded by our old familiar stuff, we could turn our attention to the first day of first grade in a new school, and being two hours late to pick her up, having forgotten that on Wednesdays schools in the Netherlands end at 11h30. Oops. We had packed her a lunch, though, so she didn't seem to mind too much. And here we are.

then + now

The summer has not quite been what I thought it would be. A cough with fever just after we arrived in Utah set off a chain reaction upon which I won't elaborate, except to say that it feels alternately comical and like something from the Book of Job. Nothing serious, just inconveniences enough to keep me humble and give me lots of time for escapist binge-watching of BBC offerings on Amazon while kind grandparents take my children canoeing and teach them the names of all the wildflowers and birds in the canyon.

Being in my adolescent home blurs space and time. I am fully in the present, a grown woman with a life and family of her own, just visiting. Then I find myself sitting at my grandmother's vanity, now in my parents' guestroom, drying my hair with Townsie, who so resembles my father, sitting on my lap. I wonder how often my grandmother sat in front of this very mirror with her baby, seeing an image so similar to the one I am looking at now. Or my car is in use and I find myself driving my dad's Toyota truck to fetch Steve from the airport. I pop an indie rock-chick cd into the player and relive being the twenty-year-old me for an hour as I drive through stunning mountains and suburban sprawl. 

Or I stand in my parents' backyard watching Violet ride a bicycle for the very first time, my dad holding onto the back to steady her, just as I remember his doing with me when I was exactly her age, or see my kids running through the sprinklers, once of my favorite summer activities when I was a kid. Later, as we lie on the grass at Sundance, watching a musical with our enthralled daughter, I am suddenly eighteen again, on a date with a boy I can't now remember. Even the British television is a throwback, reminding me of the semester I spent in London and how, upon my return, I would cuddle up in front of Miss Marple, Absolutely Fabulous, or Mapp & Lucia when I was pining for England.

And then there are the mental snapshots I take for the future. Townes charging about the house shouting out everything he sees for which he knows the words, even if they still emerge in forms that only his mother could understand. We laugh as he confuses grandparents' names, sure he has them down pat. Baba O! Dada Robba! My memory captures his delight in his newest cousin, gently stroking her tummy or kissing her cheek, begging Hold! Hold! Baby Lila! Violet running out onto on the deck of the cabin in pink Converse sneakers and white sundress, butterfly net in hand, calling to her grandfather that she just caught her first butterfly, her blonde hair loose and luminous in the sunlight. Townes plopping down next to me on the stairs and casually draping his fat little hand across my forearm before snuggling in. Violet poised to jump onto her daddy's back for a piggyback at bedtime, both of their faces bright with anticipation. They are glimpses of absolute purity that pass in an instant, moments of lucidity.

This morning, unable to sleep, I woke before dawn and wandered into the living room of the cabin. Outside, the aspens glowed so brightly against the darkness that they seemed unearthly, and I added them, too, to my mind's photo album. Two more weeks and these things, the beautiful as well as the frustrating, will melt into the past. We will be in a flurry of new experiences and places, completely emerged in a new life. Maybe I'll take it slow just a little longer. I still have a few more episodes of As Time Goes By, Ab Fab, and Good Neighbors on my playlist. Violet wouldn't mind a little more time on her borrowed pink bicycle, either...

 

family portrait

Vampire Weekend's Cousins has been playing non-stop in my head for the past week. Not only are my children's cousins smart and adorable, they love being together, and our two little ones are so doted on that it takes days for them to adjust to the quiet afterward. The joy is infectious.

6

 

this land, part iv

One of the most striking impressions of our trip was how remarkably homogenous rural America has become. We set out to find the charms of each of the towns and cities along our route, only to be disappointed again and again. Where once there were Main Streets and unique histories, now there are bland copies of one another, each with its Target or Wal-Mart, Starbucks, and MacDonald's. I want the Mom-and-Pop experience.

Hays, Kansas is a Mom-and-Pop kind of a town. Red-bricked streets and original storefronts bring the charm, and Gella's Diner & Brewing Co. dishes up great local food (that's Steve's fried bologna sandwich and veggies in the photo below). We grabbed gourmet popcorn salts at an adorable home goods shop next door and treats at a little candy store across the street. It was everything I would want out of a tiny Midwestern town, including a sordid history. In the nineteenth century, when it was still the Wild West, Hays had one of the highest murder rates in the USA and its own boot hill for all the cowboys who died gun-slinging (i.e. with their boots on).

 

Later, we met up with friends in Denver, on loan from Moscow. We meet every summer, here, there, and everywhere, and we love to eat and talk together and see our kids rediscover one another. This time it was tangy watermelon gazpacho and artisan cheeses at eat+drink in the urban revival neighborhood of LoDo (apparently this is a thing now), preceded by a day at a park and a walk along the river.

After a couple days' rest and company, we were ready for Rocky Mountain National Park, where we drove through the clouds at 12,500 feet and saw yellow-bellied marmots (that's Townsend's scream of Take me back to the marmots!, below), deer, and herds of elk. As we descended to beautiful Grand Lake, it started to rain, then sleet, then hail. We laughed and told Violet our respective stories of childhood hailstorms, and retrieved a tiny piece of ice for her to hold. It kept coming, getting larger and larger until it started making thunks on the hood of the car. We spotted a lone scraggly tree and pulled under it just in time to escape serious damage to the car as hailstones the size of small plums rained down upon us.

Those last two days offered the most incredible scenery, between Boulder and Steamboat Springs, Colorado, then to Utah. Green and blue mountains, few people, lots of cattle. A stop in Vernal at the Utah Field House Dinosaur Museum was the perfect place for running around indoors and engaging with prehistory.

Then more mountains, and dinner at lovely Sundance, ten minutes from where I grew up. It was the perfect ending to our road trip, and the beginning of our last six weeks of native life, at least for a while.

this land, part iii

I have always loved cities and mountains for their ability to block out the sky. A wide open sky renders me vulnerable to the relentless sun during the day, to the vastness of starry space at night. I cannot wrap my mind around it any more than I can grasp it in my hand. It is sublime, terrifying.

Ironic, then, that one of great pleasures of a road trip, for me, is watching the skies change with the topography. I grew up in the mountains of Utah, where the sky is a straightforward and brilliant blue, punctuated by cotton ball clouds. When it rains, they take on an aspect of charcoal but retain their reassuringly friendly form. In West Virginia, we had pale blue skies with long wisps of clouds, and when a storm was brewing the wisps would accumulate until they were opaque and heavy, dumping gigantic splotches of rain onto the windshield.  In the Midwest, we saw layer upon layer of incongruous shapes and textures, various heights and shades mixing together, sometimes flat and sometimes roiling, as fronts from north and south, east and west, collided.  And in Kansas, well...

A week before we left NYC I woke up at two a.m. in a sweat. Tornadoes! Was this tornado season? Was that a thing? Earlier that evening, a Pinterest search for Hays, Kansas, one of the likely stops on our route, had resulted in one promising looking restaurant and several pictures of single and double twisters. The longest stretch of our drive would be across flat, sparsely inhabited Kansas and eastern Colorado, with little chance of finding a cellar in case of a storm. I recalled two summers spent in Minnesota and the occasional evenings when the sky would transform in a few minutes' time from its typical grey-blue to a menacing emerald. Tornado watches and warnings would be issued, at which my friend's family would shrug, This isn't Kansas.

Still in bed, I reached for my iPhone. Tornado statistics. When there were earthquakes in San Diego I used to comfort myself in this way, with numbers. Earthquakes are really not as bad as you think, once you have the statistics. Tornadoes were probably not as prevalent as I thought.  Or... Kansas averages twenty-two tornadoes in June (National Climactic Data Center), and those are only the ones that are seen by human eyes? And there is no way of predicting them with any accuracy?  Headlines from the end of May were no more comforting: After two days of storms and tornadoes, Kansas is forecast to get hit again (The Kansas City Star), Multiple tornadoes reported in Kansas (Fox News), and best of all, More massive tornadoes leave trail of destruction in Kansas (CBS News). Public service sites mentioned that, while tornadoes can devastate neighborhoods, deaths from tornadoes are few; typically only those in cars, trailer homes, and other lightweight structures not heavy enough to withstand the winds are at risk. Reality was not helping my anxiety.

A few days on the road had dulled my worries. We had a lovely dinner at Julian in Kansas City, Missouri, I grabbed green tea and local Christopher Elbow chocolates at the Roasterie next door, and we got our wiggles out (some of them) at a pleasant neighborhood park. Earlier, we had found ourselves in Independence, Missouri, a town of significance in Mormon history. We went to the visitors' center there and had a look at the temple of the Community of Christ (formerly RLDS) across the street, which is one of the most unusual structures in North America, resembling a steel-plated alien spacecraft in the shape of a drill, or in Steve's opinion, a fortress from the Superman movies. The Community of Christ also claims Joseph Smith as its founder, but it separated from what is now considered mainstream Mormonism at his death. It had been a good mini-detour.

As we left Kansas City, storm clouds were visible ahead of us. I checked the weather on my phone. Yes, a rainstorm, but nothing terrible. Winds were low and it was already starting to clear in Salina, three hours away, where we were planning to spend the night. We stopped for fuel and it was as though the entire sky was sporting a dark wooly cap, with brilliance peaking out from underneath it at the horizons. We drove on.

It began to rain and we watched with relaxed delight as bolts of lightning ripping through the sky to our right. It looked like the storm would veer around us somewhat, on its way to Kansas City. Soon, Topeka was behind us and the rest of Kansas opened before us, vast and devoid of shelter. Tornado watches for central Kansas started to pop up on my iPhone just before I lost reception. I turned on the radio, hoping for both news and distraction, finding neither. We turned it off again.

Off to our right the sky cleared and we could see the sunset, fiery orange and brilliant against the clouds. It was stunning, celestial. To our left and above us the sky was increasingly apocalyptic, the clouds crackling and intensely electric, casting great white bolts of lighting to the ground with ceaseless frequency. A wall of darkness moved across the sunset, obscuring it from view, and we were plunged into night prematurely. I uttered a silent prayer and told myself that God is aware of the sparrow, and us. I clung feebly to the thought, though the scene before my eyes was a persuasive display of the sweeping power of nature and our little family's insignificance before it. I told myself that my fear was simply lack of familiarity, that the blizzards and hurricanes and gun crimes that threaten NYC, yet cause me nary a worry, are far more destructive than the odd Kansas tornado, but my white knuckles were unconvinced. We made an attempt at an audiobook, but it was impossible with the deafening thunder and we decided to let the storm have its way. We rode in silence.

For an hour, maybe more, we drove on through sheets of rain and searing lighting, simultaneously enraptured by its beauty and and alarmed by its savageness. I eyed the sea of glowering clouds, vigilantly searching for the slightest sign of funneling, though what we would do in that case was by no means obvious, since even such mean shelters as ditches and overpasses were nowhere to be seen on the bare ribbon of highway that stretched out before us. There were still a few tractor-trailers on the road, and seeking solace wherever I could find it, I reasoned that, were there any true danger, the drivers would have heard something on their CB radios and abandoned the highway in search of refuge. We passed the occasional farm or freestanding house and I envied the inhabitants' ability to regard the storm from the safety of a solid structure, evening routines undisturbed by the magnificent turmoil outside. We drove on.

As we neared Salina, small white dots began to glimmer in the velvety black and the torrents eased to a light mist. By the time we pulled up to our hotel, the air was warm and clear, and insects were emerging from their hiding places. We gave each other subdued smiles and assumed the business of checking in for the night. Half-an-hour later, I lay in my bed with nature silent outside the window and the sleeping bodies of my loved ones around me, and gave thanks for the marvels we had seen and our safety in the midst of them.

p.s. I will never be a storm chaser.