M10 and I have been out since the earliest days of our relationship, fifteen years ago this February. While I could probably go on and on about the definitions, the degrees, and the cultural relativistic importance of "being out," suffice it to say that we've had to come out over and over and over again to different people and, occasionally, to the same ones. M10 has had to come out three times and counting to her parents.

You would think it would be obvious enough--two adult women living in a house together when one clearly has no place to be in the middle of the day and therefore exhibits all the signs of a bread-eater (as opposed to a breadwinner). But, no, I suppose people shouldn't jump to conclusions as they would if an adult man and adult woman lived together; it's a heterosexist world after all. While these weren't the only times I've come out here in Vermont, these were two situations that, before moving here, I would never, ever have imagined experiencing. Under what possible circumstances would I ever be having a personal one-on-one conversation with an older white man (that situation alone is a bit bizarre) when I would come out to him? Read on to find out. Life is funny that way.

Scenario #1
I've mentioned Bob at least twice on this blog. Older, retired, and working part-time, he's the one who picks me up and drops me off at the local car rental dealership, when M10 and I occasionally rent a car. We chat. I know more about his life than he knows about mine. Most of my conversations with acquaintances run that way. While dropping off another customer nearby our place this past fall, he swung by while I was raking leaves just to say hi.

The last time we rented a car, he asked me where I was going. New Jersey, I explained, to visit my sister- and brother-in-law and their kid.

Bob: Going by yourself?
Me: No, I'm going with my partner, [M10's real name]. You've met her. It's her brother we're visiting.
Bob: You mean the one who lives in the house? You two gals share that house?
Me: Yeah, she's my partner.
Bob: Huh? {Bob wears a hearing aid, and he often says, "huh."}
Me: MY PARTNER!
Bob: Huh?
Me: SHE'S MY WIFE!
Bob: Oh, wife, huh?

There was a pause. Then we were at the dealership; it's a short ride. I couldn't tell if that revelation would affect our friendly-acquaintance relationship, not that I would be devastated if it did negatively. Strange how after all these years that's still a question that crosses my mind whenever I come out to someone. I suspect that reflex question will never go away completely. The next time I saw Bob, it was at the supermarket. We'd never bumped into each other accidentally before. "Hi, Bob!" I said. It took him a moment to recognize me out of context. But when he did, he gave me a hug.

Scenario #2
I've mentioned the man who takes away my bagged leaves so that he can build soil on his rocky land. He was very nice and kept thanking me for giving him my leaves. I kept thanking him for hauling them away. There was a lot of nice thanking going on. We were chatting, and the conversation naturally progressed like so:

Him: Do you work for the college?
Me: My partner does. She's a professor.
Him: What department does he work in?

I named the department, and inevitably he knew someone in it. He continued to ask about M10 using the pronoun "he" until finally I said, "It's she. My partner is a woman." A long pause followed. I couldn't tell what he was thinking. Then,

Him: You have kids?
Me: Not yet.
Him: You should have kids while you're young. My daughter works for the college library....

And the conversation continued as it did before. Did this older, straight, white Vermont man just encourage us two lesbians to have children as soon as possible? Did I mention that life can be funny?

In the neighborhood where I grew up, graffiti was ubiquitous. It wasn't a sign of neighborhood decline or dangerous gang activity, at least not to me or my family. It simply was. Graffiti was on the wall of our store which was the downstairs of our home. Graffiti was all over our school. It was on most public buildings and bus or park benches. My parents applied a new coat of paint whenever the graffiti got out of hand, but they did so without too much resentment or cursing under their breath. It was something that needed to be done from time to time. Our store's walls were always a patchwork of different shades of yellow, because it was too much work to paint the entire wall (They were two stories' high.) and because my parents bought the yellow that was on sale.

I remembered the graffiti being large, puffy or block-like letters--the initials of gang names--tussling with each other. One set of letters representing one gang would be crossed out and over-written by another set of letters, which would be crossed out and replaced by the original set of letters until my father or mother obliterated all of them with a push of a roller brush.

Last Saturday, I was with a friend when I spotted graffiti on the back of a building in a parking lot of the food co-op of Cute College Town. Gasp! I realized I hadn't seen graffiti in a long while. This version was pink and consisted of a series of parallel lines which didn't seem to form any letters. I wondered if it was graffiti at all, but it was unmistakenly spray paint and was applied haphazardly on the back of a building. My friend said she'd only seen graffiti one other time in Cute College Town. It was at the park on the underbelly of a beam of a play structure. It was scrawled in black marker and read, "I love the world."

In a rustic one-room library
I listened to poetry today
read by local authors
who were all white.

Yes, that's partly my attempt at a poem, but mostly my point that each additional line of detail conformed neatly to the stereotypical image of the lone writer scribbling away, shut in a cabin in wintry Vermont.

M10 has tried to convince me recently that it is okay to be a stereotype or at least a demographic. We most often have these conversations when my weakness for a certain type of arty-cute graphic design or certain type of white, square appetizer plate reveals that I am indeed a member of the 30-something, middle class (Doesn't everyone claim to be middle-class?), that marketers of Tiny Prints and Crate and Barrel target. (Gasp! I broke my own rule of mentioning brand names, but it was to make a point about their marketing, not to promote them.)

It's okay to be a demographic or a stereotype, because (trite statement alert!) it only describes a portion of the person, not all of her, right?

I'm not the biggest fan of poetry. I could always analyze poems and write papers about them that got good grades, but I never had satisfying experiences with them beyond intellectual gymnastics. I went to the poetry reading because a friend of mine, the part-time librarian of the venue who had to set up, suggested something for us to do so we could spend some time together. While I didn't doubt much that there would be "talented" poets, I did not have high expectations for my enjoyment or understanding of the pieces. Contrary to my preconceptions, I had a good time. Some of the poems (not all--that would be too much, wouldn't you say?) resonated and, for the first time, I think I understood poetry.

...or dare I say it?
I was moved by some of the poems.
Perhaps I don't dislike poetry.
Perhaps I can start to write it.
M10 gave me a pained expression.
She's not the biggest fan of poetry either.
Perhaps I'll stick to prose...
and paragraphs.

We don't have many streetlights here. When our neighbors go to bed and turn out their lights, and there is no moon, the outside is completely dark. We can't see the houses next door, the trees in our backyard, our backyard for that matter. It makes such a big difference when the moon is out. You can see! I know this sounds obvious, but in cities, the moon can be out or not, it makes no discernible difference in how much one can see. The streetlights are on. Commercial buildings have their lights. There's always enough light to get around. This is the first place which made M10 and me fully understand the direness of those situations in books and stories when the protagonists are trying to get out of the woods "before dark" when there was no moon that night.

When there is a moon, however, we can actually see, even when all our neighbors go to bed and turn off their lights. We can see their houses and not only the trees but their branching shadows cast by the moon. When there is snow on the ground, the moonlight is reflected back up so that it is even brighter. At dusk, with the moon and the snow, there's a glowing pale blueness everywhere before the sun fully sets. It's very interesting. Tonight is the brightest full moon of 2010. I looked out the window after I read about this on the Internet, and sure enough that round circle was shining. And, I could see the bright pinpoint to the left of it which is Mars.

When I woke up this morning, there was a rectangle of light on the wall. Sunlight! We haven't had bright sunlight in more than a month. Really. Not bright enough to make a rectangle of light on the wall. And! the sky was bright blue! We also haven't had that in more than a month. Most days the sky is white or gray. Well, with the blue sky and bright sun, came the cold weather. It was five degrees today. The low tonight is supposed to be negative one. I said to M10, who was bemoaning this fact, that one way to look at it was that the difference between the high and low was only six degrees. She didn't say this, but I know she was thinking, "So what? It's still &$#@%! cold!"

Raisin scones have sorta become one of my signature baked goods. It's a great recipe. The scones are flaky, taste lightly buttery, and have a glossy finish due to the egg wash. M10 asked me to bake some breakfast items for her students for the last day of class for winter term. I thought of these. I also use this recipe to make batches with dried cranberries, crystalized ginger, or both. Yum!


I love how this camera makes the middle scone look like that special one in a crowd.

topped with flor de sal or fleur de sal or just plain fancy salt

Vermonters kept mentioning that the temperature warms up in January and most of the snow on the ground melts before new snow comes again. We didn't see that happen last year. But, oh boy, did it come today, this January thaw. It was in the 50s--warmest it's been in weeks if not months. Water kept pouring off our roof, from the melting snow and the constant rain. Not a very pretty sight. Our backyard and all the yards have gotten patchy, with puddles and grass poking through the once pristine snow. It will be treacherous soon. With the temperature falling back down, we'll have ice everywhere. Not very fun or safe.

Enough said.

Woohee! This week was jam-packed with activities, but that's what a life sabbatical is all about, no? It started last Saturday, thusly:

Saturday, 1/16/10--baby shower in the morning, potluck at night with friend not associated with College (way to branch out!) but saw many professors (okay, maybe not so much branching out)

Sunday, 1/17/10--watched Avatar at night in 3D at the big box cinema complex outside of Burlington (am getting so mainstream these days)

Monday, 1/18/10--in addition to my morning dance class and early evening Aikido, went to an MLK, Jr. choral and dance concert at night

Tuesday, 1/19/10--went to a behind-the-scenes discussion of an upcoming play to be staged by College which included free lunch (yay! was hungry that day), had a tent rental company person come look at our backyard to see how big a tent could fit back there, plus Aikido in the early evening

Wednesday, 1/20/10--dance in the morning

Thursday, 1/21/10--tried to attend a lecture on Bollywood, which was postponed but am still counting it as an activity since I missed Aikido by the time I walked there and back, attended dress rehearsal at night of a dance concert invited to by the lighting designer who is friend, made a nearly midnight run to the library to check out some books and DVDs in preparation for M10's return (see last line of post)

Friday, 1/22/10--went to lunch at local institution of a diner (am truly a lady who lunches, now.)

Saturday, 1/23/09--tomorrow, hope to go to Winter Market for my bi-weekly purchase of two half gallons of apple cider and to convince M10 to come with me to a free performance of Beethoven's Eroica Symphony in the evening. M10 was in NYC with her students from Tuesday to Friday, so might not be able to get her out of the house.

...on the spur of the moment, last Wednesday, January 6, 2010, when a fellow Aikido practitioner happened to mention after class that he was taking his daughter the next day to Montreal before she returned to college. "I want to go! I want to go!" I kidded. "Do you want to come?" he responded.

And we were off the next day at 9 a.m. I'd never been to Montreal before. M10 says it is the first place she wants to visit after she finishes The Diss. Although I know they are two very different cities, I had Toronto in my mind as we pulled into the center of Montreal and thought, "Wow! This is a teeny city for being Canada's great metropolis." When I recognized the switch-up in my mind, what I saw made more sense: small-scale buildings, office buildings not more than 5 to 8 stories; a definite but small city center with clear financial/business district; an old, touristy part of town; a few blocks of restaurants and shopping. What I noticed (M10 knew this about Montreal.) was all the brutalist buildings. Even the three-story town homes seemed touched by brutalism. They were made of flat, dark, unadorned concrete, but had cheerful white windows, and some had awnings that took off the stark edge.

The holiday lights and decorations were still out so, with the light fall of snow, they provided a nice feel.



My impression was that Montreal was a bustling but mellow city--a combination I rarely feel in U.S. cities.

We visited the BioDome, had lunch at an Indian restaurant, went to Pointe-a-Calliere (Montreal Museum of Archaeology and History), and had dinner at an Italian restaurant. These were a bit more touristy than I'm used, but good activities for the cold of winter. All in all, a fun, spontaneous, inaugural visit to Montreal. I can't wait to come back with M10 to do some exploring on foot. They have a great subway system, I'm told.

Whenever it snows, there's a muffled-ness all about. It snowed most of today and a bit of yesterday. Dry, light, powdery snow. The kind that lands and slides off my upturned hand. Once in a while, a tiny, lone flake might catch, free from the others, and display its perfect crystalline form against my black glove. Unlike the snow of a few days ago, this is the kind that falls apart like sand when I try to make a snowball. I'd gone out to shovel our motorcycle path. When I was done, I lay down in the untouched snow of the driveway and watched the flakes swirl down onto my glasses. My trusty long jacket (referenced several times before on this blog) kept me warm, as I lay in the peace and quiet.

Happy New Year, dear blog readers. Ten years ago, we had just moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts. We heard about Boston's First Night celebration and thought we'd head into the city to see ice sculptures, fireworks, and other festivities. About an hour before midnight on December 31, 1999, we were freezing our buns off at City Hall Plaza and cursing the slow passage of time. While we thought about heading home, M10 insisted that she didn't want to spend the moment of the arrival of the new millenium riding on the T, even though she's the biggest public transportation fan. Every new year's after that, we've spent indoors, either at our place or our neighbors' across the hall.

Last year, our first in Vermont, we rang in the New Year's with a visit from the Love Muffins. This year, we watched, from our bedroom window, fireworks shot over the local high school fields at around 7:30 p.m. M10 quipped that, around these parts, they celebrate First Afternoon rather than First Night. While the fireworks were popping in the distance, we saw a small dark animal glide across our moonlit, glowingly-blue, snow-covered, communal backyard. It was bigger than a cat, smaller than a dog, and moved like neither. It was fast and graceful. We think it was a fox. Is that a good new year's omen, I asked. M10 said it meant we will have a foxy year. We'll let readers interpret that in a PG-13 way or not.

Later that night, two friends came by for hors d'oeuvres and fondue. While they warned us that they may not be able to stay awake until midnight, they wound up leaving at 3:30 in the morning. Wow. That's late, even for us, because, after they left, by the time we cleaned up and went to bed, it was 4:20 a.m.!

Peanut Chicken Rice Noodle Lettuce Wraps


Black Bean Cheese and Salsa Tostaditas


Chocolate (splashed with rum and sprinkled with a pinch of coriander) Fondue with Apples, Home-Made Gingerbread, Pretzels, Wheat Bread, and Artisan Raisin Walnut Wheat Bread (not pictured)


Walnut and Date Coffee Cake, baked and brought by one of the guests. Beautiful and yummy!

So after I called for the sun to come out in my post last night, it did. I kind of forgot that when it's sunny, it's REALLY COLD. Ten degrees today. But I'll take the cold if it comes with sun. I went out to snap some photos. Since there was more snow by this time and I'd already posted some big bang photos last year (A Perfect Day, It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas Cards, Frosty Falls, More Phrosty Photos), I thought I'd post a few photos that were a bit more subtle--some might say "boring."


This looks like the middle of the woods, but it's just around the corner from our house.


I turned around to take a shot of my footsteps after I crossed the college's outdoor track. Inexplicably, I thought of the beach and an inspirational poem about Jesus. Sorry--bad joke.

M10 (as well as GodzillaIsaGirl) loves donuts. She and her family used to mark special occasions with donuts. This Christmas we forgot to buy donuts the day before, and nothing was open on Christmas. So, I baked M10 banana papaya ginger coconut muffins. They happened to be vegan. I don't know if they will be a new tradition, but I do know they tasted good. Notice (just for fun) the reindeer in the background, with the one on the right cheering.

Not that Vermont is an unknown state, but we got some national attention today, because a nearby bridge was demolished this morning.

For real. The puffy, wet kind of snow that clings to and coats tree branches. By the time I'd walked back from the grocery store, my head, shoulders, backpack, and two re-usable bags I was holding had little white pyramidal caps on them.

As nice as that was (Snow is nice to look at, and Vermonters do get happy when it snows.), it would be nicer if the sun came out. We haven't seen the sun since my birthday last Tuesday. The sky has been white and sunless for nearly a week! And the sun sets before 5 p.m. We've read that rates of depression are higher in places that have seasons with little daylight. We can understand why. Sun, sun, come out!

I baked myself a birthday spread.




Two-Layer Butter Cream Frosted Lemon Cake


Coconut Macaroons


Flourless Chocolate Cupcakes

M10 saw on the Internet this morning (She loves knowing about the weather.), Ardenonia mentioned it in an e-mail today, and, I looked it up just now: DC has tons of snow! Well, more specifically, 14 inches and counting. (Added on 12/20/09: final count of 20 inches according to ardenonia.) More snow in one day and cumulatively for the month of December in a long time. More snow in one day and cumulatively for the month of December than Vermont. In fact, this storm is forecast to miss us completely. Go figure!

It's embarrassing to admit how late I get up (but then again M10 and I go to bed really late, sometimes at 3 a.m.) I won't self-incriminate, but I will say I barely made it in time for today's winter market. The vendors were packing up when I showed up at the apple and cider stand. The man recognized me and asked, "You want cider?" Yup, I bought two half gallons again--Northern Spry and Gravenstein. They were both paler in color and lighter in taste than the previous ciders I had bought. M10 and I agreed that they neither tasted like apple juice nor like cider, but they still were liquid apples in the mouth. Yum! Yum! Oh, and just for comparison's sake, here's what I wrote about cider last season.