What Grows

My first year growing more than tomatoes and flowers in containers has yielded real crops. I ate my first cucumber today and it was delicious. Beans are slim and sweet. When will my tomatoes turn red?

Bag Lady

I knew there was a problem when my Mom opened the extra large Saks shopping bag that had been carefully folded among a 10-inch pile of "collected bags," and her eyes opened with a mix of wonder and triumph. It was a really big shopping bag. But in her mind, it was a one of a kind treasure. For some reason it was easier for her to part with the Russian antique urn worth over $5000 than this large heavy duty bag with corporate logo.

She folded it back up and brought out a smaller, even sturdier grey bag from Saks that didn't hold the aura the much larger, more unique temple to shopping bags had held.

I filled it with lovely linen table mats and one old white tablecloth, and a few packs of paper doilies she begrudgingly agreed to part with during our purge of her drawers. We had spent several hours paring back centuries of belongings to make her move to a smaller apartment easier.

Somethings it appears, are harder to part with than others. Back to the bags.

My mother has mountains of bags. She has gorgeous pocketbooks with labels from Hermes, Channel, Judith Lieber, Ferragamo. The creme de la creme of leather pocket books. Then there is her collection of canvas bags amassed from golf outing goodie bags, airplanes, cruises, and who knows where. I'm guessing if we took count, we'd find over 100 such bags.

But the real "collection" is the Mount Everest of paper and plastic bags accumulated over a lifetime of saving. For some reason, these reminders of shopping trips past are not as easily discarded as the already mentioned antique. Or the slightly worn white channel now destined for a thrift shop.

I know she's not collecting bags to save the planet. Or to win an award as these enterprising Junior High school students did in Boise See here

In my search for the cases of this irregular compulsion, I discovered that the town of Newark actually held it's 6th annual exhibition of shopping bags in 2003. Open the bag exhibit here...

Bag Lady today has a different definition than it did when I was younger and it meant a lady who literally lived on the streets out of a bag. I'm hoping with therapy we can get Mom through the purge and convince her that tattered, useless bags over 10-years old are not worth moving to a new home. But that may be wishful thinking....

My Garden

This beautiful Peony is from my garden. And I picked it. I have a habit of picking other people's flowers. Lilacs, Peony's a rose from time to time if I can maneuver around the thorns. But this one grew up in my garden. And more are blooming.

On my deck, the vegetables are all green thanks to the abundance of rain. My gardening lesson is to follow the sun. It took a while for me to realize that not everything was going to grow in my garden because of a lack of direct sun, that's why the veggies are on the deck. Photos coming soon.

Philip Johnson's Retreat

Today I visited the Philip Johnson Glass House in New Canaan. It is really more of an "experience" than a house. The house is actually one small part of the 47-acre retreat that Johnson and his partner David Whitney built into an oasis. The surroundings -- the trees, pathways, meadows, use of shadow, sky and horizon - all play a role in the experience.

The entrance is protected by a gate that features an aluminum bar that is the mast of a ship. The pathways are specifically designed to lead you down to the house and to enter the house at an angle. The grass surrounding the house itself is carefully mowed to be a "carpet."

Opposite the glass house itself is the brick house, the guest house. It has no windows that face the glass house because Philip Johnson didn't want to see his guests -- and he didn't want then to see him. The house overlooks meadow and pond with a vista of trees carefully planted. The property was farmland so when Johnson and Whitney planted the trees, they would sit a top the landing where the house stands and through a bullhorn, instruct those planting the trees exactly where to plant them.

An art gallery is built into the side of a hill and is constructed in a clover leaf pattern. Inside the clover leaf's form three circular spaces that allow the gallery to turn the walls and display different art work from the collection (Jasper Johns, Julian Schnable, Frank Stella - you get the idea). Then there is a sculpture gallery that is also wonderfully built to allow light to play of shadow and sun.

I ordered tickets 6-months ago. They only go on sale once a year. I got tickets for summer and fall - hopefully when we return in October, we can see it a new.

You can visit the site here.

Speak- easy

You know you have a trend when you can cite 3 examples of the same thing. That's what happened today -- three different times the word "speakeasy" was part of the conversation. And in two of its uses - it meant a different thing.

First - a new Wall Street Journal section that they are calling "Speakeasy." A mash-up of culture, trends, the arts, style, etc that shows a softer side to the newspaper. I'm guessing it's their attempt to build readers online while the paper itself sticks to harder news.
You can see it here.

Then, I heard about a mobile marketing campaign for Remy Martin that was called "Speakeasy" a program that provided a mobile link to those who opted in to secret bars and clubs. You gain admittance by bringing your phone and downloading the secret invite.

Finally at the end of the day was the ultimate story about what a real speakeasy is in the NYTimes Dining section. Seems that the cocktail party of prohibition era is once again hot (which I knew from my sister and her neighborhood hot spot "Drink.").

You can see the NTY story here.

Personally, I've been obsessed with mixology since my first visit to drink where each cocktail came with ice carefully molded for each drink. Chopped, blocked or simply shaken and strained, each drink made as much out of the ice as ingredient as the tinctures, alcohol and mixers that were included.

Of course if you look at the etymology of the word, all of the cases cited seem to meet its meaning: From the online Etymology Dictionary a "Speakeasy" is:
"unlicensed saloon," 1889 (in New York "Voice"), from speak + easy, from the practice of speaking quietly about such a place in public, or when inside it, so as not to alert the police and neighbors. The word gained wide currency in U.S. during Prohibition (1920-1932). In early 19c. Ir. and British dialect, a speak softly shop meant "smuggler's den."

Fish of a Lifetime

I grew up fishing. My father was a die hard fisherman. Every weekend, evenings in the summer after he came home from work, early in the morning. Whenever he could get out, he'd take us with him. My best memories are out on the boat with the whole family catching blue fish after blue fish.

The one fish that eluded my father was striped bass. He spent days and nights in search of this fish -- that in the early 70's had nearly been wiped out. We trolled, we used fresh bait, fresh bunker, every trick in the book. He never caught one. He caught his fair share of other fish. I have a huge Wahoo that was mounted that I watched him catch in Florida. And he'd go away and fish for Salmon in Canada and to the keys for bonefish with my mom.

I got the fishing gene. It is my favorite past time. I could be out on the water and not catch a thing and have a good day.

I broke the family striper curse about 7 years ago in Martha's Vineyard when we went out with a guide one early morning, and in a fog bound bay hooked into a mess of stripers. I called my brother who had just gotten a boat and told him that it was now his turn.

My brother has since caught stripers in the same fishing grounds that confounded my father. But until today, I'd never caught one in the Long Island Sound.

We got up early and left the dock about 6 am and by 6:30 were fishing off Rye Playland where a week before, my husband and friends pulled out a 40 pounder. Just after dropping our bait, my line took off. I jumped on the reel and brought in a beautiful striper. We continued for about 3 hours catching about 10 fish in all with my son pulling in the catch of the day at about 17-lbs.

A perfect morning, The sun not too hot, the water calm and the fish seemed to be everywhere. As we motored back to dock all I could think about was that I was a year older than my father when he died. And I wondered if perhaps he'd had just a little more time, he would have caught the one fish he had searched so hard to catch.

My Office - Changing the Space

I have two offices - one at home that is my very favorite place. It comes with snoring dog, very short commute and allows for my day to start with Yoga, spinning or some sort of exercise.

The other office is in NY at my clients building - the photo above does not really capture the real beauty of the view. I've worked for this client for almost 11-years and it's taken me that long to finally get a really lovely office with a beautiful view of the Hudson River. I know this sounds weird, but when I open the door to that office I feel a calmness. I'm sure it's the proximity to the water and the view out the window. But I really love it. And now I have to leave it.

The company is moving into new space with an open floor plan. Instead of private offices, we will be sitting in an open space with cubicles - really just desk, chair and a drawer for files. No room for photos. No place for a calendar. No way to shut the door.

I am all for collaboration - but I actually think that open space is detrimental to work - at least the kind of work I do where if I'm not on the phone, I'm writing. And when I am on the phone, I'm loud. I once had a boss whose office was next to mine tell me to stop laughing -- I was laughing so loud. I'm not quiet.

Here's the conundrum: the open plan gives me the perfect excuse to work from home more. BUT, the more I work from home, the less I'm seen at work. This should be interesting. NOT looking forward to it. Move is Thursday.

Thought this piece from Wired was interesting on the evolution of office space. Wish it had answers on which space works best. Read it here.

What have I learned? Driving 101

Since I know my son does not read my blog, I feel ok blogging about his recent car accident. It was a true example of boy not understanding the power of the machine and driving too fast.

I'm wondering if it is genetic. He get is from both sides.

He's lucky. And we're lucky. He rolled the car into a ditch, blew out the windows, smashed all sides of the car, smashed the hood and was able to walk away with a scratch on his side.

We all know that a new driver is going to have an accident the first year or two of driving. But as Eric said, he was thinking it would be a fender bender.

When I was working for Grey Advertising, they had the account for the Australian Driving safety organization. The ads depicted hard core car accidents and the aftermath of the accidents. Harrowing ads that I said at the time I'd like to make sure my child saw before getting behind the wheel.

Now I have to consider what he has learned. This is a tough lesson. It's about responsibility and being responsible for your actions. What happens as a result of things you do. And the shock of understanding what might have been...



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This Year's Vegetable Garden

While I live in the country and have lots of room for a garden, my property is surrounded by a canopy of trees leaving me with unsuitable area for growing vegetables. It's taken me about 15-years to really figure it out. I've always had a vegetable garden. When I was a kid, my job was weeding. Still is.




But not this year. With failure comes wisdom. My garden this year will live on my deck -- the only spot where I get a good 6- hours of sun, a requirement for good plant growth. And with plants all in containers, the weeds will be non-existent (theoretically).

I've planted lettuce, peas, radish, cucumber, broccoli and herbs. Tomatoes to follow as it gets warmer, I've always grown tomatoes on the deck, but this year I'm trying out this new planter that lets them grow upside down.

So far, I'm optimistic. While something seems to be nibbling on the cucumber, they still look robust. The lettuce is filling out. And for the past two days I've been visited by an indigo bunting - a vibrantly blue bird that is of the finch species. And not for nothing, but birds are nesting in my old bird feeder... I feel like this could be a good growing season.


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My lesson from Peter Kaplan

Here's the gist - where there's smoke there's fire. Or, if a reporter is asking about something -- and it's not good news -- there's usually some truth in it.

Yesterday, Read it here,Peter Kaplan, the editor of the New York Observer for the past 15 years announced he was leaving the weekly newspaper about New York and its personalities. Clearly he had problems with the new owners. This photo tells it all (he's the one looking down).

But, he was a visionary editor. In fact, he was a reporter's editor. Because he really was a reporter at heart.

I met Peter Kaplan about 20 years ago when he was an editor at Manhattan, Inc. magazine - once a powerful business magazine that chronicled the inner workings of business in NY. I was working on the Manhattan, Inc. account while at Howard Rubenstein, trying to get PR for the magazine. Mostly I was fighting rumors about layoffs, troubles at the publication and with its owner.

As I read the story in today's NYT about Peter assembling his staff to let them know he was leaving, I was transported back in time to 20-some years ago when I witnessed another meeting that Peter was on the outside of. I was called to a meeting with the editor of Manhattan Inc. at the time, the very great Clay Felker and his staff. As we entered the offices, a staff meeting was underway. There in the middle of the entryway, the publisher of Manhattan, Inc. was announcing to his staff that he was shutting down the magazine. It was a stunning moment. We were there to talk about promoting the next issue -- but there was not to be a next issue.

Clay and Peter were shell shocked. They had no idea this was coming. And as for PR - we were sent into crisis mode.

Prior to that moment, our PR efforts had been about denying the rumors of problems at the magazine. Apparently the media covering the industry knew more about what was going on on the inside than those inside knew. Lesson learned? After many years, I've come to expect that there is always truth in those rumors. It might not be right on, but there's always a little something. If you hear it from the press, be prepared for it to happen. At least that way you can be prepared when you walk into a meeting in progress and bad news is on the agenda.