“Hey, she pushed me!”
“Ashley’s using my hairbrush!”
“STOP IT!”
“Get OFF of me!”
That’s how my sister and I talked to each other when we were growing up–the way sisters do. Now that I’m back home from a fantastic Adventure Girls trip to San Francisco, I’d like to report that my sister pushed me. AGAIN. A couple of times.
Monday night, she pushed me out of a cable car. It was her idea to take a nighttime cable car trip to see the city lights in the first place. We got on the Powell Mason (or Powell Hyde? I dunno, she’s the one with the sense of direction) and rode up and over the hills of San Francisco. From one end of the line to the other. When the car was crowded, we stood inside the glassed compartment. But at the first chance, we got some seats out in the open air. Vivi kicked her feet against the side of the seat and stuck her boots out into the wind. I sat there next to her, ready to grab her by the collar in case of sudden stops, untoward jostling or…earthquake.
Gay said, “Come stand on the running board and hang on.”
Me? With my sensible purse and imperious shelf of matronly bosom? Why, I don’t even color my hair anymore and I am wearing Dr. Scholl’s shoes for goodness sake.
But she pushed me.
I hung my ass out in the wind and it was GREAT. I couldn’t stop grinning as we sailed up and over, down and around all those wonderful hills. When I looked out over the Transamerica Pyramid all lit up in orange for the Giants’ World Series win, I got that deep seated feeling of joy in my heart–that place where my sense of adventure lives. All because my sister gave me a little push.
And Vivi? Vivi got to see her mama being bold. She got to see two women having fun in the wide world.
My big sister isn’t one for limits. I had decided to change my grand plan of renting a car and taking Vivi to see the redwoods on our last day. It was just too much hassle. Instead, we rented a tandem bike and set off around the marina. Gay went off to her surgical conference to earn some CME hours.
Then right when Vivi and I were getting saddle sore, I get a text: “Want to rent a car?” By the time we got back to the house, Gay had us a car and a Plan. We took off over the Golden Gate (and Lynrd Skynrd’s “Sweet Home Alabama” happened to be playing on the radio) and up into the woods. Muir Woods, to be exact.
I would have been happy to walk along the wooden boardwalk under the giant sequoias, but Gay decided–in her flipflops–that we should go for a little hike. We went up to the top of the valley on the Canopy trail so we could look down from the tops of the giants. I never thought I would be teetering on the edge of a gorge filled with ancient redwoods, but my sister pushed me and there I was.
We wanted to go to the beach–she found Muir Beach. Vivi played in the cold water of the Pacific for the first time. I picked up striated rocks I had never seen before and old shells tumbled by the sandy waves. 
We had to leave before sunset to get the car back, but Gay was already ruminating. “Next time, we come PREPARED to hike! We’ll stay until sunset! We’ll…”
She busted it back to San Francisco through evening traffic. Didn’t even need the GPS for directions. I was ready to get Vivi back to the apartment. Gay assured me there was time for one detour.
Our route was so circuitous that I was sure she had gotten lost. Then she turns up a hill so high that it looked like a wall in front of us. She starts giggling. “Ready?”
Ummm…for WHAT?
I couldn’t even BREATHE. She floored that little Kia and we shot straight up into the air. Both of us leaned forward instinctively, as if we could urge the car up that precarious angle. Gay had her face pressed so close to the windshield, I snorted, “You look like Aunt Eula!” That got us tickled.
When we made it to the top, she slowed to a crawl so I could look out across the vista of lights and down into the bay. The three of us paused there in that moment, the whole world spread out below us. Vivi squealed from the back seat, “Whoa!” when she had been getting whiny about dinner just seconds earlier. Aunt Gay said, “See, Vivi? You gotta trust me!”
She hit the gas and pushed us over the edge of the hill. It was so steep and dark, it actually looked like the road had disappeared beneath us and we might sail out straight to Alcatraz. We hurtled down Taylor Street as the lights of the city whizzed by our windows. I laughed and laughed and laughed. I couldn’t quit clapping like the Mama in “Nutty Professor”–Herc-a-LES, Hercales!
Gay popped me on the leg with the back of the hand and asked, “When are YOU going to learn to trust me?”
I trust her. My sister pushes me, and I let her, because I know she’s also the one who would never let me fall.
Thanks, Gay. I love you.
ego. Gay and I taught Vivi how to find a name of a prisoner, look it up in the index books, and learn more about why they are held. We found two young girls who are held captive in North Korea because their father didn’t return. We found a long list of prisoners in Bahrain and talked about the Arab Spring. We explained dictators and juntas and freedom of speech. And there we were on Alcatraz, where we also talked about bad choices that reap bad consequences, like when you shoot someone or don’t pay your taxes like Mr. Capone.
mess hall, where prisoners assembled for meals three times a day, visitors like us could write postcards to the political prisoners we had learned about in the earlier exhibit. Each card was decorated with an image inspired by the country in which the prisoner is being held. Vivi wanted to write to the little girls, but their address is unknown. After she processed that information, she chose a card with a falcon on it. I chose a bumblebee for Ethiopian journalist Reeyot Alemu.
We settled for breakfast at the cafe across the street from our house just because it had the closest coffee. We got homemade cranberry scones, a bagel smeared with fresh avocado, black bean burrito…and enough 
At the beach, Vivi took off her shoes then rolled up her pants. She walked straight over to the only other little girl on the beach and said, “My name is Vivi. I’m seven. Do you want to be friends?” Zoe said, “Sure.” They 
Based on an article that asked local chefs where they like to eat, we took a cab over to Cow Hollow to have lunch at a noodle house…that only serves dinner. Oops. But thanks to Aunt Gay’s Magic iPhone, it turned out that we were right around the corner from the restaurant owned by that chef. We stopped into Causwell’s for brunch in a sunny window. Omelet with pork belly, pastrami hash with fried egg. Vivi got herself two sunny side ups with toast and homemade butter. The waiter brought us a couple of fresh mimosas on the house because he had forgotten our silverware for a few minutes. Ahhhh. Ain’t much that brunch can’t fix.
We wandered past a garden shop display of Halloween themed floral arrangements. Aunt Gay liked the sugar skull with succulents for eyes. I voted for the fanged bunny. Vivi liked the gnome buried head down in moss.
The cab driver for the trip back home heard “805 Lombard” and asked Vivi, “You want to go through the crooked part?” She grinned. When we got to the top of the switchbacks, he told her to hop in the front seat and put her seatbelt on. She giggled the whole way down.
atching the sunset from a sidewalk table at Park Tavern. Food that is art, prepared with such finesse. A glass of California Chardonnay paired with seared scallops. The waitress surprised me with a slice of 
The 
s–can’t see anything! With all this newness to navigate, only one solution came to mind: we needed to get high.
Today was my birthday. It was happy.
“Alice laughed: “There’s no use trying,” she said; “one can’t believe impossible things.”
2. As we backed out of the driveway and turned up the hill, I stopped the car and said, “Carlos, look! Two deer!” Two small does stopped at the corner of Miss Sarah’s yard to look at us with their ears perked up. We didn’t appear too threatening–just another clunky metal purring thing with heavy round feet. They tiptoed across the road and into Mrs. Hodgson’s azaleas. Carlos whispered, “deer!”
3. When I got back home after dropping him off at school, I stepped out on the deck. There’s a sourwood tree out there that I tried to cut down many years ago. My saw was too small and my arms too weak, so I gave up on it. Now, the sourwood tree grows up and over the deck, giving us shade from the heat, a perch for chickadees, and brilliant red leaves in the fall. As I admired the leaves, I remembered–leaves don’t “turn” colors in the fall. The colors that we see now have always been there, but the green chlorophyll that the plants need to make fuel overpowers the color during the spring and summer. When the year turns to the months of rest, the chlorophyll dies away and we can see the colors that have been there all along.
4. Then my eye fell down to a row of shells that we found on our vacation this year. Oysters, whelks, conchs. As they bleach in the sun, all those plain grayish shells start to show their colors too. Pink and brown, orange and cream. From the bottom of the sea to right here on my deck. Then I remembered that half of my state used to be at the bottom of the ocean a long time ago. And the water in that river that runs through the backyard is the same water, recycled from the ancient ocean, the Mississippi, the Ganges, the Jordan, the Nile. Nothing is so far away after all.
5. I went back inside to load the dishwasher. And who do I spy outside the kitchen window? It’s another writing spider. This one is much smaller and browner–the male of the species. If all the pretty yellow girls are “Charlotte,” I decide he will be named “Charlemagne.” Welcome, spinner, to our space. When I stepped back outside to get a better look at him, the dewdrops made his web sparkle in the gray morning haze.
6. Time to make breakfast. I stirred together some oatmeal and milk, then added a dash of salt. I diced up a Honeycrisp apple to throw in before cooking it. I put a sliver of that apple in mouth and the flavor was so perfectly what I wanted at that moment, that my first thought was, “I don’t care if they cost $5 a pound. I’m going to buy these every week until they’re gone. This is why I went to graduate school–to afford these apples.”
Between your child’s birth and his or her 18th birthday, you’ll have 940 Saturdays to share together. That’s the premise behind a new family activities guide and keepsake journal by Dr. Harley Rotbart.
I can’t think of a writing spider without thinking of Wilbur the pig, Fern and Charlotte and Templeton the rat. That story turned the legend of the writing spider upside down. The clever spider in “Charlotte’s Web” spelled encouraging messages like “Some Pig” and “Terrific” into her web to keep Wilbur from being turned into bacon. In turn, Wilbur watches over Charlotte’s egg sac so that her babies will be born back at the farm after she is gone. So she can pass something along to the world that lives on without her.
Before I tell the story of how I was a totally unrepentant jerk this evening, let me preface it with a couple of facts:
I turn right up an aisle and spy an empty spot on the left side. At the same time, a little red car turns down the aisle from the other end. We both stop at the open spot then she drives on past. I figured I had won the showdown at the KRO Corral.
