Category Archives: a sense of place

from the neighborhood: athan’s bakery

05 Monday Dec 2011

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Yesterday, Hanna and I branched out from out usual weekend haunts to try out a new spot for weekend brunch: Athan’s Bakery in Washington Square, Brookline. It turned out to be a great place for people watching, reading (Hanna: Freud’s collected letters to Wilhelm Fliess, Anna: The Reactionary Mind by Corey Robin), and nursing our morning espresso. Here are some photos I snapped while we were there.

The front room, full of sunshine and sugary things.
Cookies sold by the pound
Not exactly breakfast food, but …
There were lots of students with laptops working away
Hanna’s left arm, lovely earrings, and
new-hairstyle-in-progress
Abandoned coffee cups at the espresso bar.

from the neighborhood: BU bridge

19 Monday Sep 2011

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Last Friday, Hanna and I walked from our apartment over to Cambridge via the Boston University bridge which has been under extensive restoration for the past several years. It was a gorgeous September day. Here are a few photographs that we snapped on the bridge.

Hanna looking west up the Charles river
(photo by Anna, obviously)
Moon over I-90 (photo by Hanna)
graffiti on the freight rail  bridge below
(photo by Hanna)
girders in the sun
(photo by Anna)

Cross-posted at …fly over me, evil angel….

from the neighborhood: home improvement

29 Monday Aug 2011

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In the midst of Hurricane Irene this week, Hanna and I not only managed a trip to visit friends in Providence, RI, but also built some shelving for the bedroom in order to better organize books and clothes … the dressers we’d saved from the apartment building trash (yes, we have been known to dumpster dive) and the wine crates from the store up the street just weren’t cutting it any longer. The downside, of course, is that we had to spend yesterday evening constructing a 9′ x 7.5’x 1′ shelving unit in our tiny apartment. In tropical humidity.

Ah, the price of literacy.

First, we had to clear a space for the new shelves.
(If only we could keep the wall empty! So restful.)
We moved one of the old bookcases into the closet to hold VHS tapes
and periodicals. Play spot the cat for extra points!
There were 72 bolts to tighten. Ouch!
Gerry supervised from her perch on the piles of books.
By 10pm we had the whole thing constructed and
called it quits for the night.
Here are the shelves mostly filled (the wine crates remained … but our
clothes are finally not buried at the back of the closet!)
The cat’s supervisory responsibilities exhausted her.
And now we have space for more books!
This time we’ve actually interfiled our books for subject continuity!
This bookcase indicates the relationship is serious folks.

And now as I type this, Hanna is making us Tassajara whole wheat millet bread which is one of my new favorite treats! I promise a recipe one of these days. We plan to enjoy it with Magic Hat Hex and matzo-vegetable soup.

Cross-posted at …fly over me, evil angel….

from the neighborhood: chihuly at the mfa

21 Tuesday Jun 2011

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Cross-posted at …fly over me, evil angel….

Now that I’m finished with graduate school, I have my weekends back (hooray!) and Hanna and I have been trying to re-learn what it means to spend leisure time together … time not compressed by the anxieties and demands of trying to complete academic work on top of a 35-hour work week and, you know, the daily tasks of living.

Walking home through Fenway Victory Gardens
Photograph by Hanna

I seriously don’t understand how couples who have full-time jobs manage to care for children. Is there time travel involved? Because caring for our family as just two adults is difficult enough.

Anyway. Back to basics. How do you enjoy a weekend that’s truly a weekend … as in: time off from one’s regular mode of employment?

I thought it might be fun to spend a few months playing quasi-tourist in our own city. Particularly since, as an employee of the Massachusetts Historical Society, I have free admission to lots of cultural sites in the region. (Free entertainment always being preferable when you’ve got student loans to pay off!) Over the past four years, I haven’t found a lot of time to make use of this benefit, but I’ve decided that this should change. Therefore: watch for more “from the neighborhood” posts in the coming months, as Hanna and I explore new parts of our own backyard.

Our first stop, this weekend, was the Museum of Fine Arts, just up the road from the MHS. The MFA is currently hosting an ehibit of work by glass artist Dale Chihuly. I’f you’ve never seen Chihuly’s work, I highly recommend checking out the photos and video clips on his website — the installations are breathtaking. I first saw his work at the Frederick Meijer Gardens in Grand Rapids, Michigan about a decade ago and can’t think of anything that’s more soul-enriching than sitting in one of his galleries and soaking in the color. Here are some photographs we took at the exhibition here in Boston.

So much of his work looks like ocean life of some kind
The camera washed out the color on this one, but I love the reflection.
See a better image at Chihuly’s homepage.
See what I mean about the tide pool effect?

Hanna and I agree he should design
sets for Tim Burton…
Chandelier detail
Shadow pictures especially for my mother, who is
currently working on a photography series like this.
Chandelier (by Hanna)
Hard to tell here, but these are massive.
I love seeing his work in organic settings;
sadly, the MFA space had few outdoor installations.
Purple reeds (by Hanna)

All in all, it was an amazing way to spend our Saturday morning. Not sure what we have planned for our next outing, but rest assured I’ll take the camera and report back!

memorial day monday [photo post]

30 Monday May 2011

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Hi all! I missed my planned Friday photo post because I was felled with a migraine (vomiting and all) and Hanna didn’t have my login information, so there could be no cross-post. And then we were traveling over the last few days. So here’s a belated photo post for the holiday weekend.

We drove back to Boston via Vermont Rt. 9 to Brattleboro, Vermont, to visit their lovely co-op. On the way over, we stopped at the top of Hogback Mountain and for the first time since Hanna’s been taking me up there we weren’t actually fogged in and I could see at least part of the famous “100 mile view.” Hanna tried out the new panorama setting on our digital camera.

Here are the results.

For a little more on what we’re doing today, post-unpacking, check out the post I just put up on Lyn’s Friends Feast. And look forward to a special two-for-one fic post scheduled to post tomorrow.

Stay cool, everyone, and enjoy your week.

rainy thursday [photo post]

26 Thursday May 2011

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It’s rainy in Michigan, but earlier in the week, during a quintessential bright, clear summer day (we spent part of it in the hammock), Hanna snapped these gorgeous sun-drenched photographs.

lemonjello’s (Holland, Mich.),
the coffee shop where my sister worked in college

I’m not frowning, just squinting in the sun. Also, I look like my mom!
Brewery with bicycles (we bought some to take home)
Detailing from the facade of the building that once housed my bank
Marbles in the sun
Marbles in jars
Hand puppet
Loom in the window

wednesday in the woods [photo post]

25 Wednesday May 2011

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Cross-posted at …fly over me, evil angel….

As promised, photos from the Saugatuck Dunes. Photos by Hanna; selection and commentary by Anna.

On Sunday morning we went hiking with my (Anna’s) parents

One of the major things I miss in the city is lack of access to the woods
Woodland violets
I also miss Michigan sand dunes
And the lake (I am hot & sweaty in this picture)
Root washed up on the shoreline
I wish there was a way for us to live & work in Boston
and still spend time here every weekend…

tuesday on twelfth street [photo post]

24 Tuesday May 2011

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Welcome to part two of vacation photo posts, brought to you by Anna (text and composition) and Hanna (photographs). Cross-posted at the feminist librarian.

Toby takes a cat nap on the windowseat

Hanna’s personal favorite: sunlight through the
French doors
Dinner preparations
Basil tomato pasta = yum!

The (uncharacteristically tidy!) dining room table
Up to the second floor (bedtime!)

Stay tuned for tomorrow’s photos from our hike at the Saugatuck Dunes State Park.

monday in michigan [photo post]

23 Monday May 2011

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Cross-posted at …fly over me, evil angel….
 
Hanna and I are in West Michigan (Holland, to be precise) this week, visiting with my parents and various other childhood acquaintances. I haven’t been back here since October 2009. Hanna hasn’t been here ever. I’m showing her the stuff I remember, discovering with her the new stuff that’s happened since I’ve been away, and we’re enjoying not having to go to work for the week. We’re watching Season Two of Life on Mars and catching up on the leisure reading.

As I write this, Hanna is sitting next to me at the dining room table reading a history of coffeehouse culture in Europe, 1600-1720. I’ve been learning all the ways in which the responsible coffee user was supposed to ingest his/her drug of choice at the time (an hour before and after ingesting food, at as hot a temperature as could be tolerated) and all of the wondrous effects it was supposed to bestow.

Anyway. Here are some pictures from our Saturday walkabout. On Tuesday I’ll be bringing you photographs of domestic life at the Cook household and on Wednesday photographs from the Saugatuck Dunes State Park, where we went hiking on Sunday.

Later in the week, there may be more photos … or there might be a Friday Fun video. We’ll see what the vacation brings!

All the photos were taken by Hanna.

On Saturday morning we went to the local farmer’s market

It was nice, after two days in the car, to be out walking.
Miquel Fuentes, age 11, on his cello.
The turtle in the cello case is named PeeWee.
This was an addition to main street since my last visit.
We purposefully missed Tulip Time but the flowers are still blooming.
Sailboat on Lake Macatawa (latter-day Swallows & Amazons)

Stay tuned for Part Two (Hanna’s lovely photographs of the interior of my parents’ home) tomorrow.

from the neighborhood: validation thursday

05 Thursday May 2011

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cross-posted from …fly over me, evil angel… where I wrote this post for Hanna this morning.

So for some reason, this seems to have been the week from hell for a lot of folks. Here in our household, Hanna has the flu, which is why I’ve volunteered to break radio silence with a photo post so you don’t think she’s been, you know, abducted by Mulder’s alien friends. Or something.

Yeah.

Anyway. Here are some pictures by Hanna from our walk last weekend along the Charles River Esplanade. May 1st, through some strange coincidence, happened to be one of the first truly gorgeous spring/summer days here in Boston — and we took photos to prove it!

Even the sailboats were enjoying the weather
Joggers and walkers were out in spades; and leaves
are finally starting to fill out along bare branches.
About halfway along the walk, we found that someone
had been busy with chalk writing encouragements on the pavement.
Encouragements like this — charming in their artlessness.
(And to be honest, moving as well — that someone took the time.)
This was my favorite. The text reads:
“<– DUCK. Don't be afraid to fail (even at drawing)"
This was Hanna’s favorite. The text reads:
“Just keep swimming!” (and a picture of a fish)

All of which reminded me of T.J Thyne’s little gem of a film, which really should be broadcast on a weekly (daily? hourly?) basis across all forms of media worldwide. Possibly then there wouldn’t be so many people doing stupid things which make us sad. It’s 16:24 and I swear it’s worth it. Make time in your day. You’ll thank us.

We hope to see you again next week for our regularly scheduled programming.