 |
| Birthday Girl |
 |
| Marlena, With Cousins, Hayden, Marisa and Halle - 2015 |
A gray, depressing morning, the only positive, a few buffleheads, floating then diving, in front of our house. It's cooler today, 35º, with rain forecast on and off during the day. I listened to NPR this morning, not MSNBC, and forgot how different its programming is from the the three Trumpeters, FOX, MSNBC, and CNN. And it was nice to have some local news.
 |
| 8:30 |
No surprise, yesterday was back to routine for both of us, as I went to yoga in the morning, a fun class of lots of women and two guys, sounds like a burger place (Five Guys). My knee still bothers me in some poses, but I am getting pretty good at avoiding them. This morning I read an article entitled 'what namaste really means,' a Sanskrit phrase said at the end of every yoga class. In India, it's a sign of respect, usually said to your elders, meaning, "I bow to you." When you say it, you put your hands together at your heart, close your eyes, and bow. In American yoga classes, however, it's more like a Hindu mantra, a divine chant, with a spiritual connotation. So, depending where you are, whether in India or a yoga class in the US, it has different meanings. When we lived in Turkey, I can remember some of my teammates, bowing and touching their forehead to the feet of a respected elder, a grandfather like me, a Muslim sign of respect.
After yoga, Evie had started to think about our trip to South Carolina, getting out some of her summer and beach clothes, beginning to put away the winter stuff. It was warm and sunny out, so I decided to vacuum and clean our car before the predicted rain. It's amazing how dirty the inside gets during the winter, with snow and dirt from your shoes. Afterwards, I had a lunch of chicken salad which Evie had made in the morning, and I watched the third episode of Games Of Thrones and I am starting to understand the conflicts, beginning to enjoy it. I finished my Russian novel, ARCHANGEL, and returned to Southern France, Bruno the Detective, in Walker's newest novel, THE PATRIARCH. Evie left for the gym, albeit reluctantly, around 1:30. The wind really picked up mid afternoon, giving me an excuse to avoid going out for a walk because I did not feel like it.
We relaxed with a glass of wine, as is our wont, after Evie had put together our dinner of a lamb curry, the curry we always made when we lived in Istanbul from our then 'go to cookbook', Craig Claiborne's THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL COOKBOOK. This particularly curry was called 'Curried Lamb a la Francaise, with bananas, apples, celery, tomatoes and cream. We always made it on the day after having a leg of lamb. We serve it with rice, of course, and it brought back memories of our meals in Turkey with our kids sitting around the table in our kitchen, on the third floor of our house, Barton Hall, among the tree tops.
 |
| Barton Hall, Istanbul, Turkey |
We watched the next episode of THE AMERICANS, as things are tense, violence is becoming necessary. And we finished our night with the last two episodes of OCCUPIED, tense and scary, but the ending left us hanging, no doubt, preparing us for Season 2. We also watched bits and pieces of the four basketball games. I will watch more today because I saved all of them on our DVR.
No comments:
Post a Comment