Last Times

I went to my office Xmas party and something was different. Same white and gold tree in the corner as last year. Same music as last year; a bass played by our elegant big boss, a piano and a guitar played by some guys I didn't know, kazoo (!) played by the cheerful guy who'd survived a heart attack a couple of years ago, vocals by two women from personnel. Same arrangement of tables as last year with the same foods (2 for appetizers, 1 for desserts, 1 for drinks). Same-same...except. Except that this office party, with Dan's office party tomorrow, will be my last office Xmas parties - ever. Next year at this time I'd be retired, living on the boat, presumably anchored off some sandy beach.

I looked around the auditorium in which the party was held and realized that I knew few of the people, and most of those I did know were senior too. I felt uninspired to meet new people, and certainly uninspired to schmooze. I gave my door prize ticket to the woman sitting next to me (what would I do if I won? If I wasn't working here any more, what good would a logo coffee mug or shirt do me?), and left early.

Everything I do this season has the unusual clarity of something I'm about to lose, and want to sear into memory. The annual Thanksgiving dinner at Karen and Howard's in Philly, Melissa's gift swap in Alexandria, Parade of Lighted Boats in Annapolis that always falls on the same evening as my cousins Rob & Amanda's holiday open house ... this year is the last time for all of it.

Back in my office, I grabbed a textbook off my shelf to back up a comment I wanted to make on a document I was reviewing...and the last time for that, too is coming soon...and the textbook almost opened itself to where I wanted. This time I noticed that the pages were yellowing and the copyright was 30 years ago. I remember buying that book when it, and my career, were brand new. I don't want to be one of those people doing the retirement countdown because I believe in this job. I have one last thing I want to do, and that's revise my report on barriers and opportunities on getting science into public decisionmaking. I'm tired of driving the Beltway, and my eyes will glaze over if I have to read the plans for one more road or bridge. And yet, I need something bigger than myself to be involved in, some reason to get up in the morning. If my life is just about pleasing myself, lounging on the beach, who would notice if I was gone? My friend Cathy once explained why they came back from cruising, "You can only play so many games of tennis or golf before it gets boring." Exciting, and scary at the same time. Next year at this time ... who will I be, when I no longer hand out business cards that identify me as "Senior Environmental Scientist?"

Simplify Your Life

Got this email from my friend Dani:
"One thing that I've realized through the years, is that what I consider and define as simple, can be quite different from everyone else. Some people consider simplicity living off the earth, gardening, cloth diapering, making food from scratch, and "getting back to the earth". Others believe in having very sparse, minimalist, decor, eating simply prepared meals (via microwave) or eating out (then you don't have to cook). We went to a discussion on simplicity a year ago, and people were arguing about what it meant. Finally, a friend of mine pointed out that if microwaving vegetables for a meal, enables her to have more time with her children, or if using a dryer to dry clothes instead of line drying them frees up time, then isn't that simplifying too? It was amazing when people started to realize, that baked from scratch foods might be simple in one sense, yet in another sense and situation, they may not be.I loved how you mentioned in your last email Krissie:"I am happy with this and living simply means I can enjoy and not be a slave to the house which is feeling too big for us as we age. "It's causing me to wonder about what living simply means to me, and to the rest of you.-Dani"

So here's what I'm thinking of sending back:

Great question, Dani! Caused me to think a lot about what a simple life means. Do I automatically have a simple life because I live on a boat? I think not. I'm independent of the power grid and very conscious of the environment and limited in my possessions, does that make it "simple?" At the same time, the systems on a boat are in many ways more complicated than in a house - you never have to take precautions about your house sinking.

My attempt to define simplicity: Everything I choose to include in my life supports my chosen way of living. When I look at commitments on my calendar, or possessions on my shelves, or names in my address book, I feel these things give me energy and pleasure, they don't drain my energy or make me sad or stressed. I wish I could remember the name of the architect who said, "Have nothing in your home that you don't believe to be beautiful or know to be useful." I think that's a pretty good summary and guide for a simple life as a whole. I'd also add that I strive to have nothing that exists solely to impress others or satisfy others' expectations of what I "should" have or do.

Simplicity is also a matter of priorities. In one sense, moving onto the boat forced some focus. As my friend Linda said when I asked her how to decide what to take, it's simple: "first safety stuff, then tools, then everything else" (until you ran out of locker space.)

Simpicity for me also means no excess. My friend Lucy describes visiting her Uncle Bud in rural Texas, quite a colorful character. She asked for a cup of tea and discovered that Uncle Bud only owned two spoons. "Uncle Bud, why do you only have two spoons?" "Why do I need more?" Uncle Bud answered. "I only got one mouth."

One morning when we still lived in a house, I went downstairs to get a cup of coffee. I stood at the cabinet, coffee pot in hand, and saw a lovely set of ceramic mugs in a glowing shade of amber that I'd inherited from my Mom. I also saw a lighthearted mug that I had bought on the last day of a vacation with Dan, and the mugs that matched our dishes, and the freebies I'd gotten at a conference, etc. Suddenly I realized that here I was, standing at the kitchen counter while my coffee cooled, spending energy to make a decision about which mug would best suit my mood today. (Actually, spending double energy since I'm terrible before coffee) I call these "microdecisions" - whichever way you decide doesn't make any difference at all in the long run, but you still have to spend energy deciding! What a waste excess can cause, on so many levels!

A few weeks ago I pulled out my winter clothes. Some, like my cuddly Irish fisherman's sweater or my dark brown pantsuit, I welcomed back like old friends. Others I looked at with a feeling of dread - I was obligated to wear them because I had paid good money for them. Someone I was shopping with had talked me into them, or they were on sale for a good price, or they fit the image of what a grownup should wear. Ironically, those dreaded clothes are the ones I wear more than the ones I love - hoping they'll wear out enough that I can shed them without guilt. Now, whazzup with that???

So I've developed a litmus test that works for me, simplicity is support, and it's enemies are surplus and "should."

Verizon, and my solution to the economic crisis

It's been 3-1/2 weeks since we got back from St Maarten and moved to our new slip for the winter while F-dock is being renovated (yay!) We scheduled our phone & internet move with Verizon - we're only moving 100 yards away, how hard can that be?

We got our new phone YESTERDAY and we STILL don't have internet! And every time I try to call, I get the recorded voice saying "press 1 for billing and payments, press 2 for tech support..." and after about 10 minutes on hold and 4 layers of automated menus, I finally get a human who tells me I have the wrong department and need to start over...ARRGH! I just checked my cellphone records and have spent over 2 HOURS on calls to Verizon!! It really shouldn't be this hard!

So my suggestion for our president-elect: Instead of a 21st-century New Deal, hiring the unemployed workers to update our national infrastructure, roads and bridges ... let's give them all nice office jobs in customer service, and make automated telephone menus illegal. What do you think?

Day Trip to Saba (more St Maarten)

We took a day trip to the neighboring island of Saba, a tiny rock 30 or so miles from St Maarten. We traveled on this high-speed ferry: Here's an amazing little town nestled in the hills. We asked, and yes, there is a building code specifying the red roofs!

We took a short hike to the rain forest on the often cloud-shrouded peak:

When I first heard the name of this tree, the flamboyan, I was sure I'd heard "flamboyant!"

Typical West Indies style house

St Maarten - The Rest of the Story

Day 6

Golden Eagle

James claims that when one circumnavigates an island while sizing it up, it is called 'circumsizing' the island, and that is what we did on a charter catamaran trip. The crew was great fun to talk to and very inventive, the drinks flowed freely, and we really enjoyed the sailing!
This was only the second day the woman skipper Sam (at far right in photo) was in command, and she handled it very well. She said she'd been shadowing another captain for a couple of months. Dan spent a lot of time chatting with the crew, as one skipper to another.

This was a great day on the water. Conditions were just about perfect, with 15 kts of wind. The first leg was beating into the wind. We shared the trampoline on the bow with a smart 12-year-old girl (all the other grownups wanted to stay dry) and enjoyed the occasional splashes of warm water when we came down a wave. The crew did a great job of mixing up the activities, providing something for everyone, and conveying the sense they were having fun, too. The snorkeling was disappointing between the hurricane damage and the stirred-up water reducing visibility, but the swimming was lovely. We anchored off a nice restaurant for lunch and had the choice of swimming ashore or taking the dinghy. So of course I had to swim - I never swam into lunch before.

After lunch, more sailing, and one more swim stop, this one with a floating bar. Often the tour operators will feed the fish at a snorkel stop, to attract more interesting fish for the tourists to observe. I couldn't help but observe that the floating bar had the parallel effect on people that the fish-feeding did for colorful tropical fish. Surrounded by people floating with their colorful pool noodles, the bar looked exactly like "chumming for tourists!"

Day 7

Tweety

This is the car we rented. I am not making this up, the rental company refers to this car as "tweety bird." A taxi driver waiting at the taxi stand next to the rental kiosk explained to that to drive island style - "don't drive shy." So Dan with his greater directional sense was the navigator and I was the driver. With the best of the Washington Beltway experience to guide me, I was still tentative by island standards! The map showed only the most major of roads, and had no street names. However, there were few street signs either, so providing names would have been a waste. We managed to find almost everywhere we wanted to go, although in several instances we got there via the 'scenic route!'

Day 8

We've been everywhere on this island. We've had crepes for breakfast, driven up and down steep hills, found the beach, gotten groceries, and located the Moroccan restaurant we want to try for dinner tomorrow. We definitely still drive shy, i.e., not as aggressively as the locals. But hey, we don't know these roads. We spoke with one island woman who had also visited the States and asked how she felt about the driving in New York. "You can't speed," she said. "They're so strict about the rules." A far cry from what Robert told us: most of the traffic rules are treated as suggestions, but if you break a rule and end up causing a crash, the penalties for screwing up are much, much more significant than they are in the States. So, bend the laws at your own peril. For example, open containers are legal; drunkenness is not. Running a stop sign when no one's around, no problem; running a stop sign and causing a crash, big, big problem.

Interlude: Hurricane recovery

Category 3 Omar came through here a week before we arrived. Damage was moderate by island standards because the storm, although strong, was fast-moving, and no people were seriously injured. The south shore (where we are) took to worst hits. Water and sand smashed the plate-glass windows facing the ocean in
several of the ground-floor condos and public areas, and many plantings were damaged or destroyed. They're working hard to get things back in shape before the tourist season is in full swing. Here's a crew cleaning out sand and dirt that the ocean washed into a pool and patio area - note that there are both men and women working. Farther inland on the French side, you can tell which direction the winds were blowing: these trees are killed on one side by large amounts of salt spray.

Interlude: Politics
The American election is big news here - maybe because the economy on the island is so dependent on tourism, or maybe because people on this small island just feel it behooves them to be aware of happenings in their bigger neighbor. In any case, whereever we walked downtown on Tuesday we heard snatches of conversation and even if we couldn't make out the words due to the accents and that island lilt, we kept picking out the word "Obama." There is even a calypso
song whose entire lyric seems to consist of three words: "Barack Obama Hope." We bought the cd but I didn't play it until yesterday for fear of jinxing the outcome. The local bar had CNN on the big screen Tuesday night and was serving special drinks - a red something with cranberry juice and rum for McCain supporters and something with blue curacao for Obama fans.

Yikes! I just worked out that by the time of the inauguration in January the boss that I so enjoy working for will have retired, and he's said I'll probably be acting chief of the environmental affairs program until a permanent replacement is chosen. That means that in matters of policy, there will only be 3 layers of management between me and the President: Pres > Secretary of Interior > Bureau Chief > Sr Science Advisor to the Director > Chief of Environmental Affairs (me!!)

St Maarten, Days 4 and 5

Day 4We took a van trip to Marigot, the capital on the French side. There's a flea market on Weds and Sat, and I assume the resort billed this as a shopping trip. As always, we were more interested in the people-watching. It's always about the people-watching: wondering how they've solved the problem of making a life on this planet, what can we learn from them, what wisdom can we bring back home? We did a brief turn around the stalls and for the most part the had the expected wares: more t-shirts and tote bags, bead necklaces, some art in traditional island style. Every so often there would be a flash of something unusual, one that attracted us was trivets that folded into baskets covered with fabric from Provence. But our first "mission" of the day was French pastries for breakfast, and after a short walk we found a cafe. The first croissants were so good we went up for seconds! Dan suggested that we go downtown first, then come back to the flea market in the afternoon, since it was closer to where the bus would pick us up. We walked all over the maze of streets downtown, past shops displaying fashions more creative than what we see in the States, real-estate offices, jewelry, interspersed with more sidewalk cafes. One of the folks on the bus had said that it really did remind her of Paris. I've never been there except to change planes, but appreciated the sounds of French being spoken in the background as we walked. This was just the beginning of the season, so some shops remained shuttered, others were still on shortened hours. But there was plenty to look at! We toured the marina in the midst of town and checked out restaurant menus and mega-yachts. For lunch, in contrast to the elegant French breakfast, we went to a strip of narrow stalls, the "lo-los" serving local food, where a plate of rice and peas and a beer set us back a crushing 5 euros each.

While we were sitting it rained buckets, and it was fun to watch the way different people reacted. The vendors at the flea market quickly covered their wares with tarps, and the cafes had isinglass curtains to shelter their sidewalk seating areas. People walking either panicked or huddled in alleyways, or totally ignored the rain. These tropical storms seem to rain very hard for about 10 minutes, then the sun comes out again. We can watch them approach over the water from our balcony. Presumably the people who ignore the storms know that they will soon dry out again. We saw one person with a t-shirt wrapped around his/her head. I couldn't figure that one out - it certainly did nothing to keep the rain off.

Day 5...was a beach day. Dan pointed out that if we did something every day, we'd be exhausted by the time we got back home. So we did a bit of sunning, a bit of swimming, reading a mystery novel and playing scrabble. We ended up in lounges and under an umbrella next to Kyle and Kirsten, and met their parents. Talked about grad school, and moving frequently "in service to Uncle Sam," and islands. Went downtown for dinner - as we were warned, they rolled up the sidewalks at 6 pm. Shops were shuttered and no one was on the streets or the boardwalk. It's the slow season now still, but if we want evening action we'll have to look for it elsewhere.

We're still wrestling with whether to rent a car. Driving here seems quite intimidating. Roads are narrow, steep and winding, street signs confusing, and the locals drive unpredictably, plus the island habit of stopping anywhere, often holding up traffic, to briefly chat with a friend or give a friend a lift. We're both feeling a bit off our stride and vulnerable, Dan mentally and me physically, further contributing to our dilemma. So, what do you do when faced with a challenge? How do you know whether this reluctance to drive is fear or laziness that we should push through, or whether it's a warning from our instincts that should be honored? I fight the same fight in physical therapy, and it's one of the biggest reasons I so appreciate working with a therapist to give me a reality check. How far to push, and if I feel like I've done "enough" of any particular exercise and want to quit, am I stopping out of laziness, or body wisdom?

St Maarten, Day 3

lunching at the restaurant that Johan sent us to

street in downtown Phillipsburg, the capital on the Dutch side
the road into Marigot, the capital on the French side


one of the more rural views on the French side

We toured the island with a great taxi driver named Robert. He showed us all the basics - where to shop, where to eat, and where not to walk at night - as well as things of interest to our future cruising: marinas and protected anchorages. We went into the interior and saw the construction company owned by his brothers and cousins. Beaches of all sorts, including the nude beaches, the gay beaches, and the gay nude beaches. He dropped us off in town and sent us to "Johan,"
purveyor of (possibly pirated) island music. When we got to his stand he was playing some kitschy pan music, hoping to attract some cruise ship tourists. We asked to sample some soca, and told him, yes, we knew many of the words could be taken two ways. Next thing we knew, another island man had stopped to listen as well, and the four of us were bopping to Mighty Sparrow, and Johan was suggesting other things we might like, and the other guy explained that the double entendres were part of a game between the artists and the radio stations - the words are ordinary words, so the songs can't be 'censored' - but, how suggestive can you be and not get your song banned from the airwaves? My favorite of these is the one about the girl who has trouble waking up, so the neighbor suggests a rooster crowing. Pretty innocuous, no? It gets interesting where the song morphs into the singer recommending "a cock in the morning to get her going"!!! But as soon as we left, Johan put the kitschy pan back on, for the tourists.

Johan in turn sent us to a restaurant for local food, where we passed on the curried goat and Dan had snapper and I had mahi-mahi, both in a wonderful Creole sauce. We ambled back through town to do a little shopping. Prices for traditional tourist goods of the Hawaiian shirt and beach bag variety were ridiculously low. The island economy is 100% tourism, and there was concern about the upcoming winter tourist season. With Wall Street in free-fall, would the tourists come? We heard a scary radio ad urging people to buy American, because if the US economy is going, our island economy is going. Tired now, we walked back toward the resort, seeking ice cream along the way. We headed toward the boardwalk but were stopped by a woman in a public works shirt who explained that it was closed - last week's hurricane had buried it in sand. She noticed I was limping and told me where to get the local herbal cure for back problems, Nu-Ni (sp???) She repeated it about 4 times to make sure I got the name right.

And then, just as we got to the edge of town and were about to begin the climb up the hill to get back to the resort, along came Robert! He had indeed found Dan's forgotten camera, and he was going our way (sort of). He motioned us into the taxi, he was on his way to pick up a worker from our resort. So we got a little taste of the 'real' island and how the ordinary people live, the stuff that wouldn't be on any tour at all.

Later, back at the beach, we met Kyle, a younger black guy complimented Dan on his athletic swim out to the buoys and back. (Dan's convinced that the braids make me more approachable - certainly more recognizeable! - and as my tan builds I look less and less Caucasian) We got to talking with him and his sister. He said he saw us having coffee on the balcony every morning and asked how early we got up. I hadn't even recognized him as the guy in the unit next door - but of course he could recognize me as I'm pretty unmistakeable right now! So we told them the story of Dan's cancer survival and the ritual of celebrating each sunrise with something of a sense of wonder, never again taking the gift of another day for granted. Then we asked for their stories. It turned out that they're from Maryland and she's on 2 weeks R&R from Afganistan. She said she wanted to be with her family, and somewhere warm.