Category Archives: london

club sandwich

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we didn’t go out to restaurants very often when i was growing up.  so on the rare chance that i found myself at a freshly set table staring at the myriad of goodies listed on a menu, i wowed at the chance to order a club sandwich.  something about those layers fascinated me: i’m sure i thought i was getting more than only one persons share of food.  and as someone who eventually became adept at space planning and design, i’m certain that the sheer tidiness and structure of the thing called to me: quartered, stacked, tidy triangles assembled ‘just so’ on the buffalo china place of all restaurants in the 60s and 70s, and finished off with a jaunty festive bedazzled toothpick!

i took my children on an overseas adventure last month, their first. (i don’t know how else to refer to them: they’re not really children any more…2 in college, 1 nearly out of high school…’big kids’ sounds crass and conjures up images of overfed baby goats…)  i’d been to the uk, europe, italy, et al two previous times, quite ages ago, and found that i’d fed my wanderlust and longing for those aged, wonderful cultures through the meals i’ve created; music that has been my personal soundtrack; films whose subtitles we’ve all labored through; stage i’ve set in my quirky house; and most vividly, the sketches that i’ve conjured up.

this morning, i popped over to my europe sketch file and took a long look at this whimsical sketch of the champs elysee.  brimming with busy little cars as they skedaddle up and down the famed boulevard. (all of the cars, of course, are quite small in europe: my friend last month shrieking that a hired hyundai compact suv was ‘gigantic’ as she dodged oncoming motorists and at one point, a cow!).

but like that club sandwich of yore, this little sketch layers so much within it’s tidy frame.

years ago, flash back to my little house in the village, a paris wind blew through my window and sent me imagining on paper.  i’d always wanted to write and illustrate my own children’s book, and this little french vignette was meant to inspire me further in my story development. one thing or another, most likely life with some grade schoolers, a middle schooler, soccer, school performances, earning a living, tending to a series of adopted senior citizen dogs…i never finished the book.

but in between those dashing cars and swaying trees, i hear the back gate swing open and a posse of boys calling through the kitchen window for my son.  i see my two younger daughters tugging their chef hats onto their earnest, lovely little heads to conquer a new baking project in our italian-bistro-esque renovated farmhouse kitchen.  i hear the brakes of the ups truck pull up to our front sidewalk and the thump thump thump of tom’s brown boots trailing down the steps with his arms filled with packed and labeled boxed notes.  the creek, slam of the corner blue postal box interjects most of the day with it’s cymbol-like clang.

accordian music wafting through the air, i’m cuddled on my great big couch in our newly built country barn loft kitschy house, watching my son leap and hide behind the barn and trees outside, chasing his high school friends as they carry on yet another airsoft battle.  next to me are two adolescent gals, getting zippier and more beautiful by the minute, yet never tired, ever, ever, of popping a vhs tape of some of our ‘let’s take a trip for free’ movies:  hip teen favs, “passport to paris” and “what a girl wants”; classics, “charade” and “to catch a thief”; quirky, “8 women” and “the valet”…and i can hear them, their voices slightly higher, half a decade younger, earnestly talking about ‘some day’ when they see paris, london, europe…some day…for the first time.

then, turning away, i look again at this little painting.  i’m in a mercedes taxi, cause that’s what they do in france, racing past the parisian lighted treasures, tucked in tidily between two young women, my view the brilliant and majestic arc de triompe and the back of my son’s head, now a man with a trimmed beard and sparkling, all-seeing eyes…as he and the taxi driver ferry us home after a hilarious and unforgettable night all together along the seine and clambering down the steps of the eiffel tower.

and now, i’m stalling in getting my work day started, caught in this self-imposed reverie of the magic that whirls through me as i sit and stare at a silly sketch that i whipped up, gosh, probably ten years ago.  memory is one powerful sorcerer, it’s mate, imagination.  they’re my constant spirit guides, best co-pilots and sweetest bedtime story tellers.

this is my life, my own club sandwich, impossible to think of something as only being ‘one’ thing with this mind of mine, i see the layers, a game with time travel that costs nothing, and offers everything, happily swirling past, present, future, maybes, what ifs, all together tidily stacked and sandwiched, held together by those brightly colored toothpicks, i pull my chair up to the table, relishing the menu.

just staring

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m wood traveling

i’m one year away from an empty nest, although, believe me, there’s plenty of other stuff here to keep my nest overflowing! but in the full-time parenting sense, yes, the countdown officially is here: child 1 & 2 are settled in cozy college city apartments, and my youngest child is 17 and a half, has already applied to her retinue of colleges, went to school dressed like tom cruise from ‘risky business’, and, oh yeah, drove herself there.

the shutter ‘open for business’ of my 24/7 “mother” job is showing signs of needing sprucing up.  i’m less pulled onto the parenting spot by the very early bits of business as i was when all three of them were tots and babies, and i’m fine with that.  i remind myself daily that the goal is to groom, mold, encourage, cheer on, guide, push, hold and love ‘em until they’re as ready as a perfectly nested, roosted egg: off, up and away.

so what is it that i am really doing this year?  what’s the plan???

soaking it all up.  drinking it all in.  gulping it all down…even the fitsy-pies: give me a crabby teen, or even, remotely via text, a surly college kid: the exchange and the problem and the solution and the little bit of a string still there, honestly yes: it’s nice to be in on whatever simmers and swims around these budding grown ups that sprung from their parents imaginations.

my wagging the carrot of a long trip to europe in front of my kids was both giving and receiving: i wanted more than anything to help catapult them over the atlantic ocean for the first times as, honestly, it was time.  and, cue the accordion music man here: “la vie en rose” as background music to a grainy-captured image of four similar-looking people wandering down a lamp-light street: i wanted time with them, free of distraction, cell-coverage and normal life.  all mine!

selfishly, i wanted to watch the whole thing unravel, as at this point in my nearly 22 years of parenting: i get it.

time flies.  life moves forward. it’s not a moat or a whirlpool or an orbit. it’s a conveyer belt, an escalator, a forward-only moving treadmill and once you’ve scurried past a moment, it’s disappearing from view in your rear view mirror.

so, lapping up the moments, staring and delighting in their nearly every move, i lucked out big time by spending 2 and a half straight weeks with three incredible, hilarious, adventurous, goofy, sometimes-moody, open-minded, well-dressed, curious, tall, smart, lovely, funny, hungry people.

passports in hand, stamped to prove we’d been where we were, (along with about 5000 pictures for my nostalgia-filled slide shows), it’s just a microcosm of their lives that have overlapped with mine: for now, we’re just about all moving into those little individual pockets of our own lives, the official cluster life that i’ve so blissfully lived with my children ebbing closer to it’s finale, yes, i’m soaking it up.

the poor thing! this morning as i sipped my coffee and she grabbed her backpack to zip off to beat the early morning school bell, she found me staring at her, just staring, so much so, that she laughed and impersonated me.  ”i’m just thinking”, was my weak, unconvincing alibi.

“no, mom, you were staring.  you do it all the time.”

and then, with a laugh and a kiss, she was out the door.

london calling

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m wood london here we come

carried out enormous family reunion. check.

feted darling daughter for her 20th birthday. check.

encouraged & oversaw issues related to son finding new apartment in the city. check.

dealt with new kitty, behavior management (spray bottle of water), and several vet visits. check.

aided and abetted daughter with new apartment furniture & fittings acquisitions. check.

hosted fab gals weekend with dear college friends. check.

worked, despite the continual interruptions provided by life. check.

it’s been an over the top summer with one moment clogging the next: kind of unusual for me.  maybe it’s the ages of my children, and the transitions that are vying for their attention, and subsequently, my assistance.  maybe it’s the hellish hot weather that kept most of us indoors rather than sprawled and relaxing on the deck or in the pool or garden.  or perhaps it’s just life itself: spinning madly, sometimes on a tilted ‘faster than normal’ orbit.

whatever.  frankly, too tired to consider anything beyond the check list that means that, officially, with less than a week to go, my main focus, my big to do list, is all about london2012, the english countryside adventure, a mini-tour of scotland, and 5 days in paris, all swaddled in the enthusiastic and kookie company of my three big kids.

the last time i was in europe, i had two tots and was on an excursion to research a famed italian violin maker.  a business trip, it was filled with a zany cast of characters that included a violin maker from nebraska, the first violin chair of the tokyo symphony, his girlfriend (his wife stayed behind in japan), an italian guide, and her kookie italian friend.  a good time was had by all, and i returned with bags filled with italian leathers, colorful clothes for the children, and two mini-espresso cups to use as i trained my children to love coffee.

the first time in was in europe, i had a new boyfriend, a backpack, and a fresh diary.  the trip lasted a month, the boyfriend became a husband and father of my children, and europe became the end all of all to me: haven’t spent a day since, in those 25 years, wishing somehow i lived across the pond, and adopted as close to a european/british/italian/french joie de vive in my lifestyle.

so i’m heading back.  years of dvd’s and subtitled movies, anything with hugh grant, pouring over agatha christie mysteries, smelling good italian leather whenever i’m out shopping, gulping espresso by leaps and bounds, cooking up exotic and non-american feasts in my country house, the whole bridget jones stuff keeping me focused on the places that i long for and that hold such mystery and infatuation for me.

i’m a planner, so i’m a bit freaked at the moment as i haven’t read all 54 books that i stacked on my ‘travel table’ last winter. i haven’t poured over every map gathered to earmark our itinerary.  haven’t really uploaded enough apps to follow the olympics, the travel options, the train fares and ferry tables.  haven’t copied passports or cc information.  haven’t even decided what to wear.

it’s daunting, at 52, to do all of this as the head of the familia, with 3 enthusiastic college/high school travel companions. i somehow feel responsible for providing them with a sure-fire fun and informative first ever trip to europe. i panic that i’m not prepared, or haven’t planned and researched enough.  i’m worried that i’ll get there and just become a noodle of absolutely no-good as tour guide.

so my choice is to spend these next 6 days going in circles around my house staring at my millions of lists.  frazzled and thinking i’m forgetting something.  thinking i’m not prepared enough, not informed enough, not ready.

granted, we have our experts in the field readily waiting: a savvy designer friend & her brit husband to host us in chaotic london; a goofy wonderful college pal set up in surrey to drive us around quaint towns and a few castles; a hired car awaiting us and an actual scotsman to point us in the right direction on the wrong side of the road as we scour scotland for it’s myths & wonders; and a cozy, gorgeous apartment in paris that will afford us soft slumber and a place to hang our hats.

so, with the above trajectory of padded locales, hosts and accommodations, i think i’ve planned just about enough.  leaving room for surprise, i’m done thinking and will now just relax and pack my bag. like the trips of old, not unlike that wacky old movie, ‘if it’s tuesday it must be belgium’, i can just throw care, planning and caution to the wind, throw things into a bag, pile the kids into the car, line up and board the plane, and see where it takes us.  no over-planning, no agenda, no big feats to check off our list even before we land.

i think the expression, go with the flow, is what i’ll embrace.  soak it in, see where the river (thames, dee, seine) take us, and come back stuffed with the newness of the old, the saturated in history, culture, language, olympics, souvenirs, beer, food, friends and a reinvigorated love of the world.

to diary?

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m wood diaries

i’ve been a bit stymied lately.

somehow i feel wedged between two folds of time: longing for some sepia-esque vintage-shrouded existence not unlike the one conjured up by woody allen in ‘midnight in paris’…or perhaps a decade, two later, and the time-tricking interconnected today world that zips and flips and is just somehow so smart.

i spotted a joint called ‘the coop’ while i was twittering around on twitter, and did some internet stalking, which unveiled this again, cool-o-cool world where creatives, entrepreneurs, free-wheeling people can hang out, rent an office, network (overused word, but fits here), guzzle espresso, tinker at their laptops, all the while surrounded by like fish: inspiration in a neat, coffee-scented human&machine partnership. where was this when i was archaicly starting my little business, tucked into the land of maternity?  the days when i had to wake up little sleeping baby to dash off to the nearby ‘facsimile machine on premises’ copy shop in order to respond to a client?

back in those days, the early 90s, nothing was cool or hip about running a business in ‘the home’….and trust me, with one, two and then three little tots wandering around, thank goodness the cordless phone magically appeared in my world so that i could hide, literally, in a closet, to take a notecard order from a big shot client in new york.  in no way did you want to show ‘what’s behind the curtain’: just wasn’t something to brag about, but rather, to sort of hide!

by the end of the 90s, all of that fuss of running my own business in and around motherhood, a stove, and a pile of laundry, was being embraced.  what a relief and vindication when oprah herself, when talking about my little boxed notes, blasted out her praise of a mom working at home with her children…”and we like that!” she said to wild cheers from the studio audience.

my how time changed.

so this wedged between one world and another hit me tonight as i looked over at my diary, stacked on a pile of other goodies that have been gathered carefully to get popped into a suitcase at months’ end for a trip that my children and i are taking.  i would never  travel without one, especially on the sort of once-in-a-lifetime vacation that we’ve cooked up.  but as a part of me is clearly enamored with tech stuff, especially this iphone that i seemingly can’t live without, i realize i’m about to travel back in time, in just a couple of weeks.  and it’s a struggle.

the issue, of course, starts with roaming charges.  spend time out of your at&t zone and just forget about affording the regular text/phone/linkedin/twitter/fb/etsy/pinterest/huffpost/nyt addictions.  can’t afford to maintain my daily (hourly, minute-by-minute) addiction to invisible, intangible communication once our trip starts.  so what to do?

the phone issue has been resolved, ingeniously, by my youngest.  bring the old, retired 3g’s and zap into wifi and do a bit of the old magic on the cheap and free side of things.  brilliant!  meets the budget, and still lets me post photos on instagram…like a junkie, lining up my next ‘hit’, i instantly felt better with this solution.

but…

it did strike me, looking now at my diary, glancing over at my juiced up digital camera, leaning behind a stack of books to see pens and fresh sketchbooks that hope to make the trip, too: how much have i changed in the way i see the world.

my daily bread, here at my funky cool house, comes to me only because of the gadgets that link me to the rest of the world.  i couldn’t do what i do, and still hang with my kids and work in ridiculously ripped jeans at all hours of the day or night, without all of this interconnectedness.

but…

my trip isn’t about that. and my trips, before all of this gobbledegook arrived on the scene, were never, ever without pens, camera, diary, sketchbook, paper map, guide book, backpack.  silence.  asking for directions.  asking for advice.  striking up chats.  making new friends.  taking a risk.  seeing into someone’s eyes.  wandering without first knowing where i might be going, or where i would end up.  sketching vistas, rooflines, turrets and shores.  flying through ink like oil to a ewing, writing, writing, writing in diary after diary.  my impressions, traveling at the speed of my pen as it matched my mind and my imagination.  inspired, listening, watching, tasting, feeling, learning, longing.

so, there it is. one foot in two worlds, and rather than quarrel with myself over which one lures me more, i’m going to tip my had towards the vintage me this time around.  it suits the destination, stepping over to lands that make me shudder with the wonders of the ages, the history of anglos, the roots of my people, the whispers of all that came before all that i know: yes, decision made.

scratching pen to paper, lugging a bit of extra weight of that long-lens camera, and some fountain pen refills, i’ll be traipsing along, three curious, bright, hilarious offspring as my most wonderful companions, we’ll be going the woody route: step back in time in slow motion and soak up another world.

i’m just amazed sometimes, thinking of this zap world and how mind boggling it’s changes really are.

diamond jubilee

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m wood diamond jubilee

in a nod to last night’s spectacular ’round the commonwealth lighting of fire-breathing beacons to salute the radiant queen of england, my daughter is preparing her own fire-themed evening.

the tradition here, at the start of summer and the end of yet another school year, is quite pagan: a roaring bonfire where all of the remnants of the previous terms notebooks and homework are gladly tossed into the dancing flames.

i’m reminded of the pure paganism of burning things, and was reminded last night as i ‘followed’ the beacon’s progress via a fluttering of twitter updates.  as each torch of flames danced and crackled, watched by circles of adoring and festive brits, i launched a fast-backward in time, envisioning the cluster of mankind in the history of humanity celebrating, honoring, nurturing, cremating, cooking, feasting, praying, warming, breathing and existing around a great big roaring fire.

in the tradition-rich four days that unfolded in the united kingdom, i had a bit of time to feel something sink in to my awareness.  that is this.  long live the queen, and on and on and on.  as far as symbolism goes, give me a blood and bones stalwart old gal who’s seen the worst of times and the best of times while warmly and steadfastly hovering just around the bend, the ties that bind a great nation are the ties that also link far and away back through history, creating a golden nugget of pride: in their nation, in their glory, in their sacrifice, in their service, in their people.

i’ve realized that the existence of a constant, as the monarchy represents, the stronghold of the heart of that gang of brits, really makes a difference in glueing them all together.  call it a family, with the matriarch, or down the road, patriarch, assembling all of the little ducks in a row, round the great big table for sunday dinner, something that is stronger and bigger than the turnstile, revolving door representatives that inhabit, for short shifts, 10 downing street, or the white house.

like everyone else around my age and gender, i had a hopelessly huge fan card for the diana club.  and i surely still do, and will, as i think of her radiance through the smiles of her dapper boys.  and in those days, before that paris crash and just afterwards, i was surely soured on the entire windsor clan as somehow representing ‘downers’ and ‘naysayers’ to the peppy loose cannon princess.

but, over time, and certainly in the vast bit of time over the long weekend as i learned more of queen elizabeth II’s life, i have a new, deep appreciation for her stick-to-itness, a far cry from her silly self-interested dandy of a runaway king uncle.

as i watch my parents and their generation play out their lives, there is a constant.  they lived through the depression, the awful second world war, and all that came as a result.  what formed their character, all of them, almost as chisel to a rock, is the same committed sense of duty and honor that is, sadly, vanishing more quickly than imaginable.

i have come to respect someone who puts country ahead of self.  it’s rare these days, and to have an over the top billion dollar really long weekend to toast this cute little lady is, really, the least anyone can do to thank her for always showing up, an earnest twinkle in her eye, tending to business and her great land, with her sturdy black purse eternally dangling from her bent, bejeweled arm.

bagpipes

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engineering + math + science = heartsongs

studying structure, design, architecture and all of that jazz comes in handy when i have to draw a bagpipe.  actually, for that matter, when i have to draw anything.

my scottish friend is celebrating a birthday today.  i love being able to say that, “scottish friend”…as in, a scottish fellow who lives in scotland.

so for today’s facebook special birthday m. wood doodle, it was a compelling task…either that or the loch ness monster.

now the fact that i even know this scottish fellow is because of a pair of john’s: hughes and belushi.  a forever fan of both “ferris bueller” and “the blues brothers”, somehow the windy, gritty city of my backyard compelled this guy to impetuously travel from the glorious green highlands to a grey november weekend in chicago.  fast forward to my being in town to, of all zany things, stand in line for the casting call to my matt damon movie. (notice it’s “my” matt damon movie…).

late that night, after a giddy evening of food and spirits, i wound up, on a dare from my pal, striking up a chat with the tall, dark stranger, smack dab in the middle of the packed crowd of the zebra lounge.  stranger things have happened, and they just keep on happening, in my life, anyway.  but the moment that the rolling vowels and consonants came rolling out of his smiling mug, i was hooked.  ”you have an accent!” was my immediate reply and the start of a great conversation and even greater friendship with this doppelganger-sean connery-sort of a bloke

since he’s a “stewart”, i did a bit of research, meaning, walked over to my mudroom to find my scottish wool scarf, featuring the scottish tartan, a deeply appreciated gift, used daily this past winter to keep me warm and cozy.

my cat watched me stroll past her food dish (set near the lovely display of wine, always at the ready for unexpected guests), and noticed, with a frown, that i didn’t stop to “top off” her kibble.

back at my desk, i took a look at a few photos of bagpipes in my “eyewitness” scotland book…then settled with a pen and paper to do the odd looking thing justice: transforming a blank piece of paper into a black line, color rendered birthday bagpipe sketch.

i had no idea that there were three alternating length wooden sort of handles, each stretch of wood clustered together by a toggle…that all of these moveable arms were tied together with a braided rope, gaily tasseled at the end.  how clever is that???

the fittings remind me of detailed working drawings when, back in the day, i was drafting elevations and sections of custom designed millwork for architectural projects: everything that is built by hand has to be fitted together somehow, and i love learning the ‘how’ of it all.

so, the cutest part of this bagpipe, which just suddenly occurred to be named aptly, as it is a bag with a bunch of pipes, is the little mouthpiece.  in a reverse trumpet sort of shape, the rounded end is fitted into the wool bag with, of course, a nice round fitting, and the tapered end is the little bit that the musician blows into.

in a reverse shape appears to be the actual horn.  i could be making this up, but i just drew the identical shape, only the tapered end is fitted to the bag (beneath a lovely fringe of wool), leaving the horn-like end unencumbered.  yes, i think that is where the shrill, ages-old, unworldly bagpipe cry escapes from.

that old argument, nature or nurture, comes to mind.  but i think the wordsmiths who came up with these catchy sayings left out one important factor: add in spirit, or ancestral genes to that and i will, one hundred percent of the time, vote on the side of the ethereal inheritence that, by nature of our stone soup dna, as having the strongest vote in how our heart sings.

i’ve spent my life loving the hypnotic strains and sounds, notes and chants, tunes and ballads from the portion of my ancestry that hotbed of history in the united kingdom.  great britain, for my history has taught me that, and ireland. yes, the french part of me swoons along to edith piaf and the accordian sounds of a parisian street cafe, but deep in my lungs, blood and soul, i’ve felt a yearning connection to the other side of the channel.

the little flute thingy, is that a flute or tin whistle?  a fiddle, stomping feet, angelic sweet voiced enya, clannad, the march of the constant single drum to carry the melodic scream of a lone bagpipe, the floaty waves of voices that conjure ghosts and centuries of life, stacked up one by one, layers of tradition, jigs, tartan, green, sheep, twinkles in the eye and a solid, sleepy march from one tried and true century to the next.  simple, unfussy, digging in the soil, loving in the technicolor green grass, fable upon fable, wink with a side of smile.

years ago, i was set to meet my waiter boyfriend in london and then discover all of england, scotland and ireland on a backpacking adventure.  the maps and plans were set, the british air tickets tucked safely beside my very first passport.  before our initial parting, whereby later i’d meet him for the start of our monthlong trip, we made the fatal decision to see “room with a view”….

strike the uk, give me italy!  helena bonham carter, dame judi dench, firenze, italy, italy, italy!

yes, my life has indeed had it’s share of distractions, and i’m a bonafide impetuous elf, time and time again.

after meeting in rainy, cold london (it was january….), we set off for the south, following the sun as it showered us with a roman holiday of our own, and a lifelong love of all things italian…saving england and it’s sisters for another day.

that day has taken twenty five years to come.

so the best of all, in this morning bit of side-tracked research, is that not only is my friend having a birthday today, but that, in a matter of a couple of short, busy, summer months, my children and i will be trekking to the mysteriously beautiful land of scotland itself to buy our pal a belated stout ale, wax and visit at the pub, and enjoy a personally guided tour of his beloved country, castles and all.

and on our list?  check out a highland game with the haunting soundtrack of a gathering of bagpipes, of course!  with a side of soul-nourishing everything else.