Midlife (Mid-Cape) Crisis

Decisions, decisions

2009-11-12T08:12:00.000-08:00

It's very interesting being in this caregiving position as the health care debate rages on. One of the big issues in these conversations has been the concept of "rationing" - opponents of reform fear some sort of "death panel" will be making decisions about who does or does not receive treatment, based on some arbitrary criteria of worth to society. Proponents, on the other hand, talk about the irrationality of current treatment protocols, which can end up providing mammograms to 86-year-old female Alzheimer's patients. Neither side seems to look at the other, instead preferring to stare directly into whatever television camera may be looking their way.

Like most folks I come at the issue with a bias. I'm a self-employed, liberal-leaning Democrat who sees the current health care system as ready for the scrap heap. Anyone who doesn't think rationing already occurs certainly hasn't been responsible for their own health care coverage - the current system simply rations care to those who can afford to purchase it. As a healthy 50-year-old, I'm paying more than $400 per month for insurance right now (and I have to have insurance because, like the plans likely to come up for final votes, Massachusetts mandates individual coverage). That gets me a policy with a $2,000 deductible - translation: the first two grand in expenses come out of my pocket, aside from an annual physical - and, once that deductible is met, I still have to pay 20 percent of every bill until my total out-of-pocket expenses hit $4,000. So, add my $4,800-plus annual premium bill to the $2,000 deductible, and I'm out almost $7,000 before the insurance begins to kick in, and almost $11,000 before it's paying all the bills.

Of course, there are some benefits before I reach the deductible max. A big one is that the doctors and drug stores can only charge me at the rates the insurance company has negotiated with them. Last fall, I came down with Lyme disease (kind of a rite of passage on Cape Cod), and the nearly $700 in tests cost me only $139. But anyone who thinks a freelance writer with an extremely variable income isn't going to think two or three times before making a doctor's appointment - even a necessary one - isn't doing a very good job of looking at life through another's window. Reform opponents call mine an example of the power of patient choice to limit health care spending. Call it what you want, but I call it rationing.
[/end personal rant]

So, what does all this have to do with my father? Well, I've been pretty closely involved with his health care since his six-way bypass (yes, even his bypasses had bypasses) in 2004. And, since he moved out here in March 2008, I've been with him to pretty much every doctor appointment he's had. The number of those appointments has snowballed over the last 6 months, as his kidneys have begun going seriously downhill, his congestive heart failure has begun getting worse and his diabetes has turned foot care from vanity into necessity. In the past three months, he's had x-rays from head to toe - literally. They photographed his head to check for sinus blockages (they also confirmed the existence of a brain - I've questioned this from time to time, so the result was reassuring), his chest to check for fluid build-up and pneumonia and his feet to make sure a toe infection hadn't gotten to the toe bone. He's also had an ultrasound of his heart (aka, and echocardiogram) and more blood tests than I can count. All of this for less than $200 per month - what Medicare takes out of his Social Security check, along with the $100 he pays for his Advantage HMO program.

I've also taken over managing his prescriptions, which have multiplied as his specialist count has grown. I now have a two-page spreadsheet to consult during my weekly exercise of filling his pillbox. Two different blood-pressure medicines, a diuretic, a prostate shrinker, a pee-encourager, a cholesterol-reducer, a sleep enhancer, a blood-sugar reducer and a fistful of vitamin supplements. All this for an 87-year-old man who refuses to cut back on his drinking, orders veal parmigiana and pie a la mode for lunch when he gets the chance, and refuses to recognize the connection between what he puts in his body and how he feels the next day.

Now, believe me, I don't begrudge my father his pleasures at his age - good Scotch and the Golf Channel, along with a periodic poker success, are among the very few he has left. But one of the biggest contributors to Medicare's pending financial distress is that something like 80 percent of a person's lifetime medical bill is often spent in the last couple years of life. I'm seeing this phenomenon play out right in front of my eyes. Tests lead to other tests, which then lead to more prescriptions. Crises lead to hospitalization, and then to weeks of rehab, before the patient returns home, rarely regaining his or her former functionality.

It's easy to see how this happens, having been in the middle of it all. Yes, the current fee-for-service payment approach can potentially encourage overly aggressive care. But, beyond that, doctors really are human beings - I've certainly recognized the humanity in most of the medical pros who've treated Dad. They want to see their patients get better, they want their patients' families to feel hope and, I think maybe just a little bit, they may want to solve a puzzle.

So, an 87-year-old's cholesterol starts climbing? Throw a statin into the mix. Hearing a little more fluid in his lungs? Send him in for an echocardiogram. Blood sugar's getting higher, and you know he won't change his eating or drinking habits - get him diabetes medication. Oh, and if his urine flow is slowing, how about a drug that may help shrink his prostate over several years.

Yes, that's right, prostate-shrinking medication for an 87-year-old man who shows no signs of prostate cancer.

Now, I'm not arguing for an elders-onto-iceflows approach. If a treatment or medication helps make a person's current quality of life better, it makes sense to me. Dad's Flomax means he often gets six straight hours of sleep before he has to hit the bathroom, where he's lucky to get two hours' sleep without it - plus, fewer times in and out of bed means fewer opportunities for falling. But medication that may or may not have an impact on a condition that may or may not happen five years from now, in an 87-year-old man with heart disease, kidney disease and diabetes? That raises questions, to me.

So, I have two different views of the current health-care system visible from my own home right now. Neither of these presents a rational picture, with too little care available to some (well, me) and, arguably, too much being given to others (Dad). All of which makes me think, maybe it's time to take a step back from conversations about the rationing that's already going on and see if we can talk about rationality, instead.

Karma connecttion

2009-10-25T18:35:00.000-07:00

Of course, parents and their children have a connection. Conception, birth, diaper changing - these all build ties between progeny and their progenitors. But there is still something between my father and I that makes me feel like there is something deeper, something beyond a generation and the generated. When I think of all the forces pulling us apart, it makes me reconsider, even more, the forces that brought us together.

My father walked out of the house in which I first knew him when I was 4-1/2 years old. It was a second marriage for both my father and my mother - a tad atypical for solid-middle-class in 1963. But, both had had badly ending first marriages, involving infidelity and alcoholism, and both just wanted their own happy endings. They got me, instead - and I think that was enough, for awhile. But personalities have a way of asserting themselves, and neither of my parents had any shortage of personality.

So, Dad leaves. Mom, my two brothers (sons from her first marriage) and I move 1,200 miles away, to Duxbury, a gorgeous little waterfront town about 35 miles south of Boston. For two years, life was grand. Imagine the town Wally and the Beav lived in, with a harbor a half-block away and a barrier beach upon which you could spend an entire summer - accessed by, I kid you not, the longest wooden bridge in the U.S. It was heaven, entirely navigable by an 8-year-old on bicycle, and as imagined without fathers.

Almost a month after I turned 8, on the day my brother Jeff turned 15, my mother died of breast cancer that mestastasized into lung cancer and killed her 2 months shy of her 45th birthday. Her devastated parents became my surrogates. An extraordinary couple, they had met in 1910, when she was 12 and he was 14; and my grandmother always said that, at the moment she met Earle Clark, she knew - that man would be her husband.

And that's when my father re-entered the picture, because, when she knew she was dying, my mother told my father he'd have to step back up to the plate - injured reserve, no longer, he'd have to be a Dad.

To take a step out of this picture - if my mother hadn't gone through a pack and a half of Parliaments every day, if some little cell in her breast had just stopped reproducing, if the 1967 surgeons had somehow, surprisingly for that time, gotten it right, it might have been high school graduation before I'd seen my father again.

It's hard for people now, in 2009, to remember what divorce, old-school-style, was like, but, back then - dads just went away. They paid child support when they could, they drank like fishes, they remarried, and they figured moms were just the ones who were supposed to take care of the kids. From the time we moved away from St. Louis, in the summer of 1965, until my mother died in October 1967, I received no phone calls, no birthday cards, no Christmas presents, no reminders of a biological - at least - relationship from my father. And then in late October/early November 1967, a month after my mother had died, two weeks after I'd moved to live with my grandparents in a rural, Mississippi River community 20 miles south of St. Louis, I met my father, again, along with his third wife.

So, that's one karmic reconnection.

I end up getting transferred again, to live with him and my new stepmother. We live our life. He travels for his sales business. I become the albatross around my stepmother's neck. As an adult, I even worked for him as an employee for a couple years. At age 45, I'm visiting St. Louis from Chicago for a brief weekend, before a Thanksgiving trip to Ireland for a trip to visit dear friends. Dad's moved into an apartment. My stepmother is in a nursing home. Dad and I are at the old homestead picking up a few things, when he grabs his arm, then his chest, falls onto the sofa and passes out. The phone's already been disconnected and the nearest neighbor is a quarter-mile away. My cellphone's 9-1-1 works! The dispatcher talks me through getting him flat, massaging his chest, keeping converation going even though he's passed out, as the EMTs make their way to the house.

A six-way bypass later, and he's back on his feet.

Another step out of the picture. If I hadn't decided to be a mensch and help with the last odds and ends that weekend, and stayed home to pack for my trip, and if I hadn't had my cellphone with me - I still really don't like carrying the things - he'd have been on his own, passed out in an unheated house. The doctors later said the event had not been a heart attack, but I don't know how he ever would have had the strength to make it to the car if he'd ever come around again.

Flash forward 3-1/2 years. Dad has seemed to do alright on his own, in his little Chesterfield, Mo., apartment - until I get a phone call at 10 a.m. one Friday morning in February 2008 from a St. Luke's Hospital ER nurse. He's fallen getting out of bed, is severely dehydrated, seems to be bleeding internally - and there's no way he should be living on his own. A few serious conversations with my sisters and with him later, it's decided - he's going to live with me. The man who walked out of the house in the fall of 1963 walked into my house in March 2008 - a circle of sorts.

I don't believe in "purposes" or predestination. But I do find a personal truth in the idea of connections that exist for reasons out of our understanding. Kurt Vonnegut developed a religion called Bokononism is his book Cat's Cradle, which had as a central premise the notion of a group of people called a "karass", who, often unknowingly, work together to do God's will. It's sort of like that notion that the movement of a butterfly's wings can change the weather half a world away. Yes, this is a satirical novel intended to poke fun at religion and its dictates, but the idea of the karass still resonates with me. What will Dad and I might be working to fulfill is way beyond my comprehension, but there certainly does seem to be some sort of binding tie - or rubber band - that keeps pulling us together.

The Power of Make Believe

2009-10-19T19:53:00.000-07:00

So, I don't know what it is that draws me to British TV, but, there it is. Whether we're talking Masterpiece Theater period dramas or the latest Dr. Who, I'm on it. I've already milked Netflix for the best old period serials. I've made it through all 4 seasons of the original Forsyte Saga (and read all the original books - the t.v. series only covers the first of 4 volumes) and all the original Upstairs Downstairs. And then there's been Gemma Jones in the Duchess of Duke Street - you haven't seen real television acting if you haven't seen her take on the truly original character of Louisa Trotter. But it's not just the amazing acting and reverence for text - and humor. I just love the escapism - and I love the British Isles.

I've been to London at least four times. To Dublin three times. And I've been once to Edinburgh. And I can't wait to get back to all of them. So, especially now, I've begun enjoying a particularly 21st Century indulgence. I've signed up for a VPN - or, virtual private network - service that, to British and Canadian TV companies makes my computer look like it's based in either the UK or Canada (Canada has some GREAT sci-fi shows, another partiality for me). If you're a 24 fan, you may have heard the character Chloe talking about the need to connect through a VPN to track down some particular ne'er do well or another. But, in this case, it allows me to stream British video like any other UK, BBC-subscription-paying, chippie-shop patron. For the last couple nights I've been watching City of Vice on Channel 4, which is a really seamy look at the founding of London's first police force, and the latest BBC adaptation of Emma, which is bound for Masterpiece Theatre, Season 2010, I'm sure. I've also been catching up on missed Dr. Who episodes and periodically indulging in the Coronation Street habit I've picked up on my trips across the pond.

It's amazing the power of streaming video has to take us miles away. I trudge up the stairs to my bedroom, haul the laptop in from my office and hook the VGA cable up to my little bedroom flat screen, and it's like I've just gotten off a 6-hour Virgin Air flight and settled into my Russel Square B&B. While, sadly, Old Compton Street - and my favorite gay pub - is not just around the corner, I can still feel transported and free. Because that's one of the great things for an American travelling in the UK - you're in a completely different place, but you still (mostly) speak the same language. Yes, everything costs 50% more, but it's really more like a pleasure tax if you're on vacation.

So, even after a day when I've seen my father's left big toe in technicolor several times, had to track down doctors' orders and hash it out with their receptionists over referrals, and when I've had to politely ask clients about promised jobs and late paychecks or figure out what semi-healthy dinner I can put together after a day of the previous two events happening within an hour of each other - I can climb the stairs, hook up a cord, and be 3,000 miles away.

Private VPN service - $10/month. The illusion of being 3,000 miles away .... priceless.

On Our Own Again

2009-10-08T10:58:00.001-07:00

For the last five weeks or so since Dad has been out of the rehab hospital, he's been getting nursing and physical therapy care at home, through the visiting nurse association. A nurse has come a couple times a week to change the dressing on his toe wound, and the physical therapist has come a couple times a week to work with Dad on mobility issues. Additionally, we've had an electronic health station, complete with scale, blood-pressure cuff and that little finger doohickey that checks heart rate and blood oxygen - it's connected to a cell-phone modem and sends the daily vital-sign readings to a telemedicine monitoring office, staffed with nurses who review the readings as they come in.

When it first started it was a bit overwhelming to me, having all these people calling, coming into the house, and dealing with the daily exercise of taking Dad's vital signs. But the value of this added medical attention soon became apparent, as Dad's blood pressure started to go a little wacky. Blood pressure is, as they say, a silent killer - you don't feel all jittery like you do when your blood sugar is too high, and you don't get any minor chest pains, as with angina. You only know your blood pressure is high by measuring it regularly. Whenever Dad's readings would get much above 160 (for the high number), we'd get a call from the telemedicine nurse asking us to retest. And the physical therapist generally took it before and after any exercise - the times it was 180 or higher after just a 20-foot walk to the bedroom where the machine was, she'd be on the phone to telemedicine or to the nurse at Dad's doctor's office. It was through such calls that the doctor knew Dad's blood-pressure-medicine prescription needed to be increased.

Well, all that is over now. Once Dad got his license and began driving again, the VNA had to discharge him - the services, which are covered by Medicaid, are intended only for homebound patients. So, Cindy the physical therapist came by for her last session last week, the nurse had her last visit a couple days ago (during which she checked out my dressing technique for Dad's toe), and a technician came by this morning to pick up the telemedicine monitor.

In preparation for losing the monitor, Dad stopped by CVS yesterday to get a digital blood-pressure cuff, and already I see how this will play out now that the professionals are out of the daily picture. He measured himself yesterday afternoon and got a reading of 188/65. Of course this meant the machine was "all screwed up." Later that evening I learned that he'd taken himself to lunch and had a full order of beer-battered Polish sausage - individual slices of salt-laded sausage, dipped in a salty beer batter and then deep fried. Who knew you could get a meal like this anyplace but at a Midwestern state fair?

In the past, I might have gone ballistic at hearing that - all "What the hell were you thinking?", "Do you know how many days' worth of salt you ate?" and "Why do I even bother with all this work reading labels and trying to find decent low-sodium recipes?" - but knowing that the day would come when I wouldn't have a medical professional to rat him out to within a day or so, I've tried to teach myself the five-deep-breaths method of confrontation avoidance (it is helpful if one has a freshly shaken gimlet nearby to occupy oneself between those five breaths). I took my breaths (between gimlet sips) out in the kitchen, noted that we can probably be sure the new machine is not "all screwed up," and let it go.

When I tested the machine out on myself this morning, I got the lowest reading I've had since the telemedicine monitor was first installed. I used to use that machine on myself when Dad was out at poker, to see how my own blood pressure doing. The first few times it was as high as the 130/80, which was kind of scary, especially seeing as it had been 112/60 at my physical last year. But this morning it was back down to a much more acceptable 115/60, a good sign that, just maybe, I'm getting better at not letting Dad's inability to manage his own blood pressure drag mine along with his, up through the stratosphere.

Sunshine and Serendipity

2009-10-04T14:23:00.000-07:00

So today started out full of foggy gloom. Not rainy, but with the air full of moisture and gray as damp felt. Church was somewhat less than inspiring and I thought the afternoon would be not much more than laundry, the gym and grocery shopping - none of which was stirring any kind of positive energy in my soul. At least the house was quiet, because Dad had taken himself out to lunch.

Then, just as I was getting through load number two of laundry, the sun started to break through. I was still trying to figure out how to work a dog walk into my afternoon plans when the sky turned bright blue, and I thought, hell with the gym - I need to find a cool place to walk the beasts.

I'd heard of a state conservation area the next town over - Harwich - called Hawksnest State Park, but I'd never been there before. I piled the dogs into the car and headed out. On the way, for a lark, I pulled into a little inexpensive antique shop just down the road from my house, thinking I'd check to see if they had a dining table to replace the about-to-collapse table in my living room where dad and I eat dinner. I was just about to walk back out again when a little gate-leg number caught my eye. The finish is a little beaten up, but it's structurally very sound, with nice little turned legs. I took some measurements, but left pretty sure it would fit in just fine.

After a little exploring, I finally found the trailhead to Hawksnest and drove the Subaru in a bit, before the potholes began looking deeper than the car's roofline. I found a place to pull over, called the dogs out and proceded to have one of the nicest hour-or-so hikes I've had in a while. It was almost deserted and it was like we had acres and acres to ourselves. One of the little trails led down to a really beautiful pond, and I spent 15 minutes or so tossing sticks for Bart into the water - I only wished I'd had a suit on under my jeans, because the water was awfully enticing to me, as well. We wandered on for another 45 minutes or so, before heading back to the car, knowing that we'd be back to do more exploring soon.

Then it was back to reality and on to the Stop & Shop. As I was unloading the three stuffed grocery bags in the kitchen, I called out to Dad to ask him how his lunch had been, he said "Great. But I had an accident." Apparently it had been a Sunday buffet brunch he'd found, which can bring out the worst in him. He'd had a cheese and onion omelet, with sides of bacon, ham and sausage. This was followed up by multiple trips to the dessert table to pick up a piece of lemon meringue pie, two brownies, a couple eclairs and who know what else. (Did I mention that he's diabetic?) The result could be found in the bathtub, with the boxers, socks and washcloth he'd left to soak, and in the stains all over the bathroom floor tile. Out came the bucket and mop and amonia, down went the dirty clothing to the washer. Dinner-menu plans changed in my mind from chicken cacciatore to broiled salmon. And, of course, there was the toe bandage to change.

But, I'd still had a wonderful afternoon, and that helped me just sigh instead of slump. And I'd learned a good lesson, to boot: the shit will always be with us, so it's up to us to look up and appreciate the sun and blue sky when we can.

So, how does this play out?

2009-10-02T20:01:00.000-07:00

I had a visit today from a social worker/therapist who has a grant to spend three sessions with caregivers of elderly family members. Lucky me. She's a nice woman, and I'm sure I'll gain some good information from her over the next two sessions, for which her grant pays her to spend time with me. But, really, I don't need a therapist to tell me this is hard work, to validate my experience and let me know that, really, it's understandable if sometimes, late at night, I sit on the toilet in my upstairs bathroom and just sob. Maybe an anti-depressant is in order, she says, and maybe she's right. But, if it's understandable that one would sob in such a situation, then, maybe the sobbing's o.k., too.

Here's the dilemma, in my mind - life is beautiful, but sometimes the appreciation of that beauty is tempered/put into relief by its pain. I am watching a beautiful man (seriously, if you saw pictures of this guy from the early 50s, you might not be gasping, but you'd at least be thinking B-movie supporting-actor potential; and if you'd heard him sing back then, you'd think you'd heard a serious Sinatra wannabe) decompress into just another one of those old men hanging out in the Dunkin' Donuts. He talks back to TV commercials and is winded walking up the driveway from his car to the front door. I fear my 70-lb. golden retriever is just going to tip him over someday.

And when he's gone to bed, and all I hear is the quiet I once heard all the time, before he came to live with me, I think - this is what it will be like, again.

And, really, I appreciate quiet. I'm a quiet person, unlike my father. I really am at peace hearing nothing but the ticking of my great-grandmother's mantle clock and the periodic snorting of my sleeping dogs. But that quiet will mean that his presence is gone. That this man who spent his life worshiping St. Louis baseball and Benny Goodman and Scottish golf courses has passed. That's when I cry. I don't think I need a pill to make that go away. I just need to know there's another side, after this is over.

My mother died when I was eight. I know what it is to lose a parent. But from that experience, I also know the time it takes to get past, go on, regain life. It's like I see two tasks in front of me: the getting through and the getting over, maybe like soldiers in a trench see the reflection of artillery fire in the clouds, knowing their captain soon will be calling them forward, knowing their survival - emotional or physical - soon will be on the line. Even if they make it through, their comrades won't, and they'll have to live with that knowledge, wondering why. Keeping that anticipation at bay requires a willpower every bit as strong as the sense of duty that carries those soldiers into battle, in the face of enemy artillery and their own fears of death.

So, I get up every morning, make coffee and change wound dressings and breathe deeply, thinking of the quiet I'll someday, again, enjoy. But not the reason why.

When You're 87, Nothing is Simple

2009-10-02T07:42:00.000-07:00

One of the lessons I'm learning while living with and caring for my father is how even the simplest activity can get more complicated when you get to be his age. For example, since Dad now has trouble bending over, putting on socks requires the use of a "Sock-Aid" - a plastic, chute-shaped gizmo with a rope attached onto which you slide the sock. Then you pull on the rope to slide the chute up your foot and calf. Taking off a cardigan sweater can take a full minute, and watching him do it standing up makes me steel myself to catch him, because he often sways and has to catch his step. And doctor appointments often offer unexpected surprises that can just re-emphasize the chronic health issues catching up with him, even as his vital signs show some improvement.

The visiting nurses who have been tending to the wound on Dad's left big toe had been urging him to see a podiatrist - they said a foot doctor could prescribe shoes that might rub less against the toe to help encourage the wound (a little smaller in diameter than a pencil eraser) to heal. So I got him a referral, and yesterday we headed for what both of us thought would be a simple 45-minute visit to order a new pair of shoes. But, when you're 87, nothing is that simple.

After doing a thorough examination of Dad's toe, the doctor suggested we needed to initiate a new wound-treatment procedure. Now three times a day, the wound needs to be cleaned out with a saline wash, dried with a piece of gauze, dabbed with a prescription antibiotic ointment and covered with a bandage. Oh, and we needed to drive over to the X-ray lab to get pictures taken of the toe to make sure no infection had gotten into the bone - a 15-minute drive, plus a 30-minute wait. All in all, the simple 45-minute appointment turned into a 2-hour event.

Plus, as you might surmise, given the difficulty with socks mentioned above, Dad can't carry out this new treatment regimen on his own. So now, in addition to the once-per-day vital signs reading I have to help him with, I now need to take time out three times a day to clean his toe.

However, on many days, when he's out in the afternoon, it may just be a twice-a-day treatment - he's only really out of bed 12 hours a day, so mid-afternoon is the logical time for the second cleaning. But on his poker days, he's gone from noon until 5 or 5:30 p.m., and it just doesn't make sense to me to change the dressing at that time, and then again at 9 or 9:30 when he goes to bed.

One issue I've come to peace with over the last couple months is that I'm not a bad caregiver if I allow our personal reality to supersede the doctor's suggestions. It was almost easier when I followed the doctors' orders to a T - I could just say, "because the doctor says so," when Dad asked "Why?", and leave it at that. But that absolutism made for standoffs and resentments, and I've decided that's just not how I want to be interacting with my father in what could be the last year or so of his life. He's laid the underlying causes of his eventual death in place over a lifetime of eating and drinking habits, so I'm accepting that, while my actions may help him stay healthier than he otherwise would be, I can't single-handedly keep him alive. It hasn't been an easy acceptance, but it certainly does make things, well, simpler.

It's Really Nothing at All

2009-10-01T06:42:00.000-07:00

There’s an aggravating question that’s become a regular presence in my life since Dad moved in with me, and it’s an even bigger part of my life these days: When is something really something, and when is it really nothing at all?

Does this sound confusing? Let me give you an example. I’ve been noticing little memory glitches since Dad’s last hospital visit a couple months ago. First, during the middle of a large family reunion last month, Dad for a few moments talked to me as though I were his twin brother (one of the reunion guests), but we were in the car, which was filled with cousins, so I paused and passed it off as fatigue, since he was only two weeks out of the rehab center. It was really nothing at all.

A couple weeks ago, I made kind of a big deal of moving the antique mantle clock I inherited from my mother’s parents from its usual spot on the living room table where Dad and I usually eat dinner. The table is slowly collapsing on itself, and I had discovered that a crack in one of the legs was growing, so I moved the clock to safer ground one night after dinner and explained the reason to Dad, who agreed with the move. Then, five days later, he looked at the table and asked, “Where’d the big clock go?” When I reminded him of our earlier conversation, just five days previous, he had no recollection. I mentioned the incident to my stepsister, who went on to tell me all the ways her overstressed and aging memory played tricks on her – it was really nothing at all.

Last night, as I was fixing dinner, Dad asked if we were going to be having dinner by candlelight. I asked him what he meant, and he pointed to the two large candlesticks – really, just repurposed spindles from an old knitting mill – on the same living room dinner table. “Well, you’ve got candles on the table,” he said. “Dad, those candlesticks have been sitting on the table in the same spot ever since you moved here a year and a half ago.” He did one of those goofy V-8 commercial forehead slaps and said, “Really, I never noticed them before.” Really, it was nothing at all.

Also last night, while watching TV in my bedroom I heard Dad talking on his phone down in the living room. He was talking to a hotel reservation clerk, about a trip he’s taking a few weeks from now (against my advice), flying to St. Louis and then driving 90 miles to his 60th college reunion in the little town of Rolla, Mo. He’ll be spending the first night in St. Louis before making the drive, spending the next night in Rolla for the reunion dinner, then driving back to St. Louis for a last night before catching the plane back first thing in the morning. The conversation I heard was with the St. Louis hotel, about the two, non-consecutive nights he’d be spending there. After that call, he spoke with his lady-friend in St. Louis, with whom he’ll be having dinner both nights he’s in the Gateway City. A few minutes after he hung up from that call, he called the hotel back and must have gotten the same desk clerk – he wanted to make a reservation for one of the nights he’d already reserved, not 30 minutes earlier. “Oh, I already did that?” I heard him ask. “Yes, I’m fine, I’m alright,” I then heard him respond to the clerk, who was apparently concerned that something might be wrong, but it was really nothing at all.

So, now I’m wondering if all these nothing-at-all’s are, maybe, adding up to something. But, short of some sort of brain scan – if that would even pick anything up – or other kinds of diagnostic testing, there may not be any way to find an answer. My gut tells me there’s something going on, and I’ve learned over time that my gut is often right. However, the thought of what it could be is pretty darned scary, so I guess until I find out something is really wrong, I’ll keep watching for new signs but keep hoping that it’s really nothing at all.

I'm Back - At Least for Now

2009-09-29T11:13:00.001-07:00

I've been absent from the blogging thing for more than a year. Life - or, rather, my father's life, caught up to me about a year and a half ago, when a health crisis in his life forced my two sisters and I to realize that his living on his own was not a good idea. For a variety of reasons, my home was the best one for him to join, so, since March 2008, I've been a caregiver.

It's gotten a bit more challenging since late July, when an infection sent him to the hospital for a week and, then, to a rehab center for two weeks. He's now driving again (one of the legions of old men driving Mercury Grand Marquis' whom Cape Cod residents know to give wide berth), and kind of walking, with a cane. But he's really just a fall or other health crisis away from real trouble.

I had the oddest dream last night. I was sitting at the kitchen tale, looking and feeling like my current, 50-year-old self, and I was about to take my usual allergy pill and realized I had three or four other bottles of pills in front of me. I started reading the labels and suddenly became very confused about when I was supposed to take which medication. And then I looked at something – maybe the refill date? – with the current date on it, did some math in my head and realized I was 80 years old. I looked and felt the same, but I was 80 years old. Very disturbing. It took me several seconds during the waking-up process to realize that, no, I really was still just 50.

I think this comes out of several recent experiences. Dad pretty much expressed the exact same feeling a couple days ago, when we were in the midst of a blood-pressure meltdown. The doctor had quadrupled his metoprolol prescription to deal with blood pressure that had been creeping steadily higher. For a few days, the medication increase really seemed to be working, and his blood pressure fell substantially during the daily readings. Then it started climbing up again, reaching 185/80 on Saturday. “How did this happen?” Dad asked. “I feel like I’m the same guy I was when I was 20 – I can’t do some of the things I did then, but I feel the same. What’s going on?” He ended this monologue by pointing his finger at a mechanical culprit – “I think that blood-pressure machine is screwed up.”

I began paying significantly stricter attention to sodium the next day, which may be at least part of the reason why his blood pressure fell significantly, to 151/60, the day after – which was yesterday. This is the same day we had to go over to the registry of motor vehicles, so Dad could take his driving-competency test. He had to use my car, because the registry requires the exam vehicle have an emergency brake accessible to the examiner. I sat in the back seat, directly behind Dad, as the examiner directed him through the quiet residential neighborhood located behind the busy strip mall in which the office is located. Dad passed.

While I’ll be able to enjoy some respite, again, when Dad takes himself out driving or to lunch, the test results did little to assuage my concerns about him driving. I don’t think we passed more than two cars during the whole exam, as we wandered the little two-lane streets, where the speed limit was never higher than 30. We didn’t even go near Rte. 28, the bustling four-lane thoroughfare in front of the strip mall, which also serves as the major traffic artery for the south side of the Cape. And, of course, there was no medical or occupational assessment of Dad’s health or motor skills, beyond a simple eye test. All the test showed was that Dad could stay to the right of the dividing line without running up over the curb.

So, I think my dream was a subconscious expression of empathy, an exercise in looking through the eyes of an 87-year-old who can’t quite figure out how he got to be so old and frail. I’ve got to say, it was a pretty scary dream.

Purple Passion

2006-09-27T06:29:00.000-07:00

Moving from a city-sized, 25-ft.-x-125-ft. Chicago lot to my current 1.3-acre site has meant a mindshift for me. In my former home, I could see the entire backyard from a single spot - hell, I could almost spit from the back door to the detached, lot-hugging garage with a little effort. Here, I feel a bit like one of those ranchers in "Giant," whose spreads stretch out as far as the eye can see. O.k., so the house itself is basically riding 6A's breakdown lane. The backyard, though, stretches back through a full acre of trees, raspberry vines and wild grape - lots and lots and lots of wild grape.

I'm not sure what, if anything, the land was originally. A good portion of it was once cleared, so it may have been farmland at one time. But I think it's been pretty much left on its own for the last 10 or so years. Just re-establishing some of the old paths is like acting out a part in some National Geographic special. I keep wondering when I'm going to come across an ancient tribe of head-hunting Puritans, or a colony of sea captains gone missing on their way over to Harwich's harbors.

The local conservation officer tells me the wild grape is a native plant here, but it sure acts invasive on my property. It has climbed up over the field of bush honeysuckle that has taken over a good 50 percent of what I grandiosely call my "back 40," to create a sea of broad, waving leaves. The vines also have reached up most of the trees, as well, spreading out across branches and smothering out all available sunlight. Some of the vines are almost as big around as one of my arms (granted, I have kinda skinny arms), and have begun pulling over the weakened, sunlight-deprived trees.

There certainly are other obnoxious plants on the site. The green briar and bittersweet climb just as high, and the green briar's thorns are sharper and longer than my 12-lb. cat's claws. There also are big patches of wild raspberry, which were flavorfully productive this summer, but are running out of control in broad swaths. But, while these other feral varieties each seem to thrive in relatively restricted areas of the yard, the grape grows everywhere - sun, shade, dry or marshy, every location seems to be right where it wants to be.

Over the summer and into the early fall, as I've been opening the old, previously established paths back up, I've been cutting many of the tree-climbing grape vines at their bases, hoping that the trees' leaves will once again be able to see sunlight and photosynthesis will once again allow the trees to prosper. Then, as grapes began to ripen in fat, juicy clusters, my realtor, who has become a good friend and doubles as a local Martha Stewart, suggested we harvest some of the crop to make our own jelly. So, I slowed down on the clearing to ensure better picking.

Well, life got in the way of domestic productivity and the grapes started to pass their prime before we were able to gather their bounty. But a few days ago as I was wandering in the back, trying to figure out which of the overgrown pathways to attack next, I caught the most amazing scent. It was like I was walking past one of Welch's factories. For some reason, I always thought that grape jelly smell was something manufactured, a byproduct of artificial coloring and high-fructose corn syrup. What I smelled in my woods was a lighter version of that sweet, fruity aroma, but it was still there, like one of those undertones connoisseurs speak of when discussing fine wine. It flowed with the breezes, wafting and fading with the rustling leaves, a new sign for me that fall's turning leaves and frosty weather are soon to come.

Now, going forward, I think I'll be approaching the grape vines with more respect. I still want to rescue my trees from the smothering coverage and provide walkable routes to the back of my land. And, given the sheer quantity of vines, it would be unlikely that anything short of an aerial Round-Up bombardment could rid me of them, anyway. But, even so, my clear-cutting ways are over. In addition to providing for a potential jelly crop, I want to make sure there are enough of those bulging purple pearls to ripen and burst in odorific splendor. The smell is addictive, but fleeting - the kind of thing mass-market candlemakers attempt, but fail to master. And, I predict, enjoying its passing presence will, in time, be added to my list of seasonal pleasures unique to Cape Cod, along with exploding springtime daffodils and lazy summer swims.

Five Years and One Week Ago

2006-09-11T07:37:00.000-07:00

Five years and one week ago today, I was two days into a week-long visit to Provincetown, taking a break from my job as a Chicago-based consultant. I spent much of that week completely engaged by "The Outermost House," wandering the bike trail dunes and studying the tidal changes of Herring Cove. Reading Henry Beston while wandering the cove's grassy marsh as the tide returned, first trickling in with herring fry at its forefront and then flowing waist deep only 15 minutes later, felt like an immersion course in the ecology of tidal marshes. The weather was early-September perfect, with that touch of approaching fall mixed in with the clear skies and mid-70s temperatures that can make early fall so perfect on the Cape. I felt cocooned by sand and sea and a small town that seemed to exist in a dimension unique to that particular nexus of latitude and longitude.

Five years and one day ago today, by date, at least, was a Monday. I was back at my desk in Chicago, still high from a week of sun, sand and salt water, trying to explain to my co-workers the miracle of the cove and the tiny fish, and the gulls that migrated back every 12 hours to feed on that tide's batch of herring and crab. It's a place I'd move to in a heartbeat, if I could, I said. Sitting across from me, my friend Mary drew a plan for the vehicle she believed could make this relocation happen - a bicycle pushcart set up to vend freshly-shaken martinis to Herring Cove beachgoers. It would surely earn me the money for a nice little P'town condo, she argued.

Five years ago today I was back at that desk, booting up the computer a few minutes before 8 a.m., central time. For some reason, I wasn't able to get to the New York Times website, the usual accompaniment to my day-starting coffee. The office network is just kludg-y today, I figured, until Mary showed up a few minutes later. "Did you hear about that plane hitting the World Trade Center?" she asked. So then I tried CNN.com, and it was overloaded, too, as was WashingtonPost.com and every other online news resource I could think of. A few minutes later she was back with her coffee and the news that a second plane had hit a second tower, and soon, a gathering number of us were circled around a conference-room t.v., watching Peter Jennings narrate that now-iconic video feed.

Within 45 minutes, as news that the Sears Tower, sited diagonally across the street from our own office building, was being evacuated and the second tower to be hit became the first to collapse, we were told to pack up and go home. Take your laptops, we were told, because no one knew when we'd be coming back. Down on the street, as I made my way to the el, it was like evening rush hour at 9:30 a.m. Mayor Daley had ordered the Loop to be evacuated, and I blended in with the crowd of other workers who had suddenly found their day had been fast-forwarded. Almost everyone, it seemed, had a cellphone to an ear, providing a real-time update as my Brown Line train headed northward - the North Tower had collapsed, there really had not been a car bomb at the State Department, that out-of-touch plane had crashed into the Pennsylvania countryside. Once home in my condo, which sat directly under the flight approach to O'Hare, the skies were eerily free of jet noise, in that kind of silence that falls in the countryside as birds and other animals sense an approaching storm. Only the sound of the occasional fighter jet pierced the quiet, as I picked up the uninterrupted news coverage where I'd left off, glued to the sofa in front of the television for the next 12 hours straight.

Today, I'm sitting at a different desk watching that video feed all over again. CNN.com is streaming the tape of its Sept. 11, 2001, coverage in real time today, and watching it is providing an experience of sense memory I wasn't expecting when I first clicked on the "start" link. The most heart-affecting point for me was at the beginning of this re-broadcast, which started about 10 minutes before the first plane struck. What one saw was a brief glimpse into a time before the numbers 9-1-1 became anything other than an emergency phone number - an insipid interview with a maternity-clothes designer, a check on the weather, that annoying morning-show banter- and no mention of terrorism, or IEDs or that phrase that epitomizes the term "oxymoronic,": homeland security.

My setting is very different today, as I watch this five-year-old rebroadcast. Instead of staring directly into the raised back of my friend Mary's laptop screen, I look out a window at the scruffy Cape Cod woodland that is my new backyard. I made it to the Cape, albeit Brewster and not sky-high-priced Provincetown, even without that martini push-cart (but the idea is still a possibility, so I'll come after you if you try to cash in on it without me). I'm hoping to be here five years from now, when, possibly, that video feed rebroadcasts again. But I can't help but wonder, what will the context be in which we recall those events of what will then be a decade in the past?

Just 10 minutes before American Airlines Flight 11 tore a hole into the Trade Center's north tower, we were oblivious to the extent our lives would change just 10 minutes later - that we'd soon be routinely slipping off shoes before airline flights, staring concernedly at a backpack left behind by a forgetful tourist and even eyeing neighbors suspiciously simply because they followed a religion we didn't understand. That such acts could occur was simply inconceivable to us then, at that moment five years and 10 minutes ago. I pray they could be just as inconceivable, again, when we watch that tape five years from now.

Surviving a Shoe-Storm

2006-08-30T06:24:00.000-07:00

For much of the last few months, I've felt like I've been living in a raging shoe-storm. Those "other shoes" we're always warned about weren't so much dropping as they were raining on my head. These weren't sleek Prada slip-ons, either - more like size 12 Carharts. The cost of redoing my two aging bathrooms went up a good 15 percent as estimates progressed from initial to final, my basement seemed to be sweating water even when it hadn't rained for days, I hit an extremely dry spell with work, my microwave oven died (caused, I believe, by one too many NStar power glitches - what is it with that company's lines?), and my washing machine began showing signs of imminent demise. The combination of a 2-ton dumpster (see bathroom note, above) and 2-1/2 weeks of no water (also see bathroom note, above) completely fried my front lawn, and I developed a sinus infection, thanks to all the mold floating around my house (see bathroom/basement notes above), which lasted for almost five weeks.

I began to feel like the house I loved hated me, and I started saying little prayers every time I opened the refrigerator door, pushed the dryer's "start" button or turned on a sink faucet - "please still work, please still work, please still work." Having moved myself 1,200 miles from a tried-and-true support network, it seemed I was going through this possibly fading love affair all alone.

Lately, though, the clouds of shoe leather seem to have parted, and I'm starting to breathe regularly again. I've had two successful rounds of guests in the last month, and all functioned fine during the visits. The corpse of a microwave still lingers in my basement, next to the trash can, but the washing machine is still running (though I have to manually move the cycle knob to get it to progress from "wash" to "rinse" and "spin"). I also think I know what's going on with the basement's sweating issue - the copper water-supply line from the meter runs along the top of the front basement wall, and water was condensing and dripping from it in streams during the really hot, humid days of July. I just had to look up - instead of staring down, preoccupied, at the damp concrete floor - to figure out the problem. I think a simple foam insulating sleeve should keep the pipe, and floor, nice and dry.

The bathrooms, though they cost more than anticipated, are possibly the two nicest I've ever had. I just finished painting them last night, reinstalled all the hardware and hung a couple pictures and, suddenly, my house seems to like me again. It's like I picked out just the right let's-make-up-not-break-up present, and now all is right with the world. I'm even looking forward to spending the Labor Day weekend painting the two guest bedrooms, with the thought the house will like me even more at the end of that job. And work is now keeping me busy again - at least enough to pay the mortgage for the next month or two, which is about as much job security as a freelance writer gets.

Of course, my ever-cautious other side - the side that looks down at a damp basement floor instead of up at the culprit sweating pipe - is just waiting for another shoe-storm to show up on the radar screen, like the next named-storm news from NOAA. That part wants to keep worrying through the bright spots. It's as if not fully enjoying the good times will somehow appease fate enough to make the difficult times just a little easier around the edges when they arrive.

But the trick, I think, to really enjoying life is to turn that logic around - maybe the good times are really the prize we're given for getting ourselves through the rough patches in one piece. Not enjoying these rare moments is like rejecting a gift life has handed you, and could make the next bad spell even worse. So, I'm going to work on smiling at my bathrooms instead of frowning at the washer and not knocking on wood every time I mention good news. And, instead of worrying about the next major disaster in the love affair I'm carrying on with my house, I'm going to be thinking about that perfect pair of tassel loafers I could earn for making it through the next shoe-storm that passes overhead.

On Houses and Homes - And Those Who Write About Them

2006-08-08T07:23:00.000-07:00

I learned from a very early age that words others may have used as virtual synonyms actually had quite distinct meanings. Take, for example, the words "lady" and "woman." As my stepmother made quite clear to me, every lady is a woman, but not every woman is a lady.

Similarly, I try to be quite specific in my use of the words "house" and "home." A house is a physical object, with its own distinct roof and walls. An apartment is not a house, but it may well be a home, for home, as we all know, is simply the place where our heart lives.

For some reason, I've been writing about both houses and homes for most of my professional life. When I write about design and architecture, I'm mostly writing about houses - how they function, why certain kitchen decisions make sense, how furniture placement makes a space work more effectively. This blog is a place where I can write more about home - the emotional response a structure and its location can evoke.

I'm also fascinated by the sub-genre of personal memoir and essay writing that focuses on personal relationships with buildings. Artists are often said to "live" in their works in a metaphorical way, but those who restore, renovate or build a home from scratch - and then write about the process - live in their creations in a very real way. New England seems to have spawned more than its fair share of these works, and I thought I'd share some thoughts about some of my favorites.

"The Outermost House," by Henry Beston (Henry Holt & Company) isn't really about a house, but the house is certainly a character in this masterpiece of naturalist writing, which has sadly become almost a cliche. Thanks to the book's notoreity, the word "outermost" has become ubiquitous in Cape retailing. But stop on a walk out along the National Seashore some deserted autumn day and open this book to almost any page, then imagine living in a 20-ft. by 16-ft. uninsulated structure in this setting through all four seasons. Beston's little dune shack became both a master to be served - sand climbing its outside walls had to be regularly dug away - and sanctuary, especially when howling nor'easters threatened to tear it board-from-post. When the house finally blew away in a 1978 storm, the Cape lost an important touchstone in its inhabited history.

"Cottage for Sale* *Must Be Moved" by Kate Whouley (Commonwealth Editions) documents a beach shack of a very different sort. Whouley fell in love with one of those cute little vacation-park cottages from its listing in a classified ad. The land upon which it and several neighbors had sat had been sold off for redevelopment, and Whouley was convinced the unit would make the perfect, ready-made addition to her existing 3-room cottage on Cape Cod. She spent the better part of 18 months, along with a fair amount of cash and no end of detail-tending, making this relocation happen. This is an obsession with which I can completely relate. I moved myself 1,200 miles to live in a house I'd fallen in love with, and she moved a cottage 20 miles to create a home in a spot she already loved.

At the other end of the size spectrum, "The Big House" by George Howe Colt (Scribner) tells the story of one of those massive shingled piles whose original owners had the audacity to call a "cottage." The 100-year-old structure is about to be sold after a lifetime in Colt's family - it needs a major overhaul and the family's fortunes aren't quite as fortunate as they once were. Colt wraps 42 years of summer memories in this tale told so well that you can feel the sand-worn floors under your feet and smell that salty-mildewy scent that defines summer on the Cape. You also can feel the vodka-and-tonic-infused tension as family relationships shift and reestablish themselves in the house through each year's three-month tennancy. It's like a soap opera told in stop-action format.

"Red House," (Penguin) is an epic, of sorts, spanning the more than 350 years during which the author's family home has stood on its Marshfield, Mass., foundation. Sarah Messer's parents bought the place, called New England's oldest continuously lived-in house, from a direct ancestor of the original builder in 1965, and Sarah grew up among its horsehair-plaster walls. It's difficult to explain the ghostly presence this house and its former residents seem to assume in the Messer family's life, but Sarah tells a compelling story of how intertwined these entities become. The original builder, Walter Hatch, stipulated in his will that the house should never be sold to owners outside of his direct decendants, and there's often a sense that the house, itself, resents the presence of these outsiders. But the Messers are as devoted to the structure as the Hatches, as proved in their eventual restoration efforts (following two near-catastrophic fires), which may help keep the place standing another 350 years.

"Home: A Short History of an Idea," by Witold Rybczynski (Penguin) is a bit of a cheat on this list. It's not a memoir at all, but it does fit nicely on any bookshelf devoted to houses and their admirers. Rybczynski's an architectural historian, and he explains how we can thank the Dutch for our current differentiation between house and home. It seems the culture known more recently for legalized pot and prostitution also is responsible for making domestic life comfortable. As the Dutch became trading masterminds, a middle class emerged with budgets large enough to afford homes with specialized rooms - rooms for sleeping that were separate from rooms for eating, for example. Purpose-driven furniture design followed, and, voila, 300 years later we had the Lazy Boy recliner, complete with cupholders.

houses...relationships...houses...relationships

2006-06-20T07:52:00.000-07:00

The great thing about houses is how they, generally speaking, stay the way you make them. You paint a wall green, it doesn't, two days later, decide it would rather be blue-gray and pout about the difference. You decide to change out the bathroom, and manage to find and call in a competent contractor and, presto change-o, you have a toilet that flushes without leaking, a shower that features both hot and cold running water and a light over the medicine cabinet that highlights what remains of those oft-remarked-upon dimples.

Perhaps this is one reason why my relationships with my homes have been so much more successful than my relationships with significant others. It's not the control, so much (though the ex-es might debate that point), as the dependability. Sure, that sage-green wall may fade to an unfortunate, Linda Blair'ish, pea-soup color, or the over-sink light may short out thanks to the leaking toilet above, but another coat of paint or a quick electrician visit can bring these wobbling elements back into alignment. People are just so much more complicated than that.

And what if you hit a point in your house love affair when things seem, somehow, just not quite right? You get that indefinable feeling one often tries simply to ignore in relationships with people, because dealing with people in these situations can be so darned prickly. In this case, you've tried to add a new spark to your house affair - painted your bedroom what you thought was the perfect periwinkle, rearranged all the furniture, hung new prints, bought new linens - but, still, you're afraid something may be pulling the two of you apart, dulling your feelings for each other little by little, a day at a time.

Because you know your house isn't going anywhere, though; isn't going to decide it just needs some space, or more sessions with its therapist, you relax, give it time and just live... drink your morning coffee, handle your clients' business, shake up your evening gimlet, try to make it through one more chapter of whatever it is you're reading now before drifting off to sleep. With trust that your shelter will remain sheltering, you can allow the love to return on its own.

And then you wake up one morning and say to yourself as the early light hits the western wall, "What was I thinking? Yellow, that's what this room needs is yellow!" And it's done - rollers and paint pans later, it's the same room, yet completely different - the same house, even, yet completely different.

"Wow, that was great," you say, as you lay back in bed the next evening, spent from the furious expenditure of energy, and luxuriating in comfort of re-found bliss. "Why can't relationships be that much fun?"

So, when do the frogs arrive?

2006-06-09T07:00:00.000-07:00

For the last month, I've been watching the winter moth caterpillars feeding like locusts throughout my yard, turning my trees' leaves into green lace handkerchiefs. Last week I came down with poison ivy between my fingers, complete with boil-like blisters. I've spent most of the last two days bailing my basement out - for the second time in three weeks - as a result of Wednesday's torrential storms. With up to three more inches of rain predicted for this evening, I'm beginning to wonder, is the Cape trying to tell me something?

We hear everyday about how fragile the ecosystem is here, out on this flexed arm of earth. The last month or so has me thinking that our environment has its own ways of defending itself against its human interlopers. And this time also has provided me with a crash course on just how important it is here to pay attention to my immediate surroundings in a way I haven't had to in a very long time.

The biggest lesson I've discovered in the three months since I arrived is that one is much closer to the environment here than in a big city, like my old hometown of Chicago. I don't just mean that it takes less time to get to the beach, but, in a larger sense, what happens around us here has a much bigger impact without the added safety net a big city can provide. Many of our homes (mine very much included) may look like something out of a suburban landscape, but they are built in a setting that has never been tamed the way those former farm fields have.

Sure, we got major rainstorms in Chicago, but we also had an extensive sewer system and a brand new, multi-billion-dollar stormwater tunnel that carried most of that water away. I'd occasionally get a slight trickle from the basement wall next to the gutter downspout, but that would be the most of it. Rain might slow down traffic a bit - Chicago drivers turn into raving idiots in the rain, ask anyone who drives there - but that would generally be the extent of any real impact.

And, in Chicago's much-ballyhooed winters, we would from time to time get a major snowstorm. The television stations and newspapers would kick into gear two days ahead of time, pushing fears of an oncoming Armageddon with images of emptying supermarket shelves. But those of us who had followed the city's political history knew we could ignore the hype. Mayors had lost their jobs in that burg as a result of botched blizzard clean-up efforts, so snow predictions there are like a call to war. With the first falling flakes, an armada of snow plows and salt trucks resembling the build-up prior to Operation Iraqui Freedom hits the streets, and doesn't stop until the last frozen crystal has been vanquished.

Here, I've discovered, when a storm hits, it can have real impact. Weatherunderground.com has become a regular resource for me - I learned about it from my brother, who lives on the hurricane-prone North Carolina coast. Not only do I visit the site, I also pay attention to the forecasts and watch the radar. I also am starting to actually learn about the plants around me, especially since some of them make me break out in hives. And, though I ignored all those government urgings after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks to stock up on duct tape and plastic sheeting, I'm starting to think about what I might want to have around if a natural disaster hits here.

This closer relationship to the world around me has amped up my stress levels a bit in the short term. But, it's also made me feel much more connected to my environment than I ever did in my former, more urban home. When you're one resident in a city of 3 million, putting up walls and ignoring the surrounding cacaphony can become an important survival mechanism. Here, one needs to pay attention and react, because there's a chance that stock of bottled water and batteries could actually come in handy.

I'm learning to be more aware, to maybe be more prepared for the next way my new home will try to surprise me. I keep an eye on the water levels of the mighty Considine - the drainage ditch that cuts across my backyard. I mark the locations of particularly nasty poison ivy patches. I make a note to call the tree guy first thing next spring to spray against munching pests. I keep my senses open for signs of the next plague with which the Cape may threaten me.

So, tell me, has anyone else found the peepers to be especially loud this year?

The Joys of the Architecturally Insignificant House

2006-05-26T06:11:00.000-07:00

I live on Cape Cod, one of the birthplaces of American residential architecture. A place where the oldest homes aren't called, simply, "really old," they're called "antique." Even if you've lived in one of these structures for decades, raised a family there and poured small fortunes into upkeep and repair, others in town will likely refer to your residence by the name of the sea captain (or smuggler) who built the original structure, perhaps some 200 years ago.

Driving Route 6A, the road that runs past my front door, is like taking a Disneyworld ride through American residential-architecture history. Instead of animatronic presidents, 6A presents salt boxes, classic capes in their half, three-quarter and full versions, Georgian and Federal style manses and Greek revival farm homes. Many of these long-lived wonders have been restored to their original appearance with textbook accuracy. You can stop at just about any point along this winding road and find a house with historic past worthy of conversation.

Unless, of course, you stop in front of my house.

Now, if you're working on some kind of obscure doctoral thesis on classic 1960s Cape design, you might find a wealth of worthwhile information within my four walls. The use of knotty pine in just about any vertical application, say, or the evolution of speckles in vinyl tile flooring - 1965 through 1967. Otherwise, the 1,300-sq.-ft. structure that I call home is just another shingled Cape. It would fit comfortably in many aging suburban developments throughout the Northeast, but, instead, it's been plopped down in the middle of the country's longest continuous registered historic district. It's simply new-old in a land of old-old.

After just a couple months of living in it, though, I find I'm falling in love with this undistinguished - and indistinguishable – house, despite its lack of pedigree. Life within its un-historic confines is proving to be surprisingly freeing. My neighbors have windows made from 200-year-old hand-blown glass and chimneys wide as redwoods, but I feel no sense of envy toward these historically significant Joneses. I drive past centuries of style with every supermarket run, and return to my 1960s Cape on its concrete-block foundation, knowing that if a pipe bursts or an electrical outlet shorts out, I won't need an architectural-history degree to make things right again.

My last two homes in Chicago each had their own unique historical aspects, each an example of a classic style unique to that city's storied design past. My spacious condo in a circa 1904, six-unit apartment building, had a gracious, airy floor plan made for entertaining, with a split-parlor living room, beamed-ceilinged dining room and original windows throughout. My most recent home, in the city's famed Bungalow Belt, was one of about 80,000 brick houses built between the early 1910s and the late 1920s, in a collar around the city's outer borders. It had two layers of crown molding, 9-ft. ceilings and built-in, glass-door-fronted bookcases on either side of the ornamental fireplace. Both of these places had acres of full-grained oak trim, still with the original finish.

Have you ever tried decorating with that much oak? There are, perhaps, three colors that go well with it, and I used variations of these dark, earthy, depressing hues over and over and over again. I could have simply painted the trim white to accompany a brighter palette, but covering original trim in Chicago is a violation akin to doubting the Cubs will, in fact, go all the way next year. And 100-year-old windows are only beautiful until you have to live with them through a Chicago winter. I could have parasailed down the hallway in my old condo, with the wind that passed through the ill-fitting sashes.

I went into each of these purchases understanding the possible shortcomings, but I had lived in older structures my entire life, and couldn't imagine calling new construction, "home." I saw these properties as valuable, yet ignored, resources in a time when society's quest for newness was forcing our consumption of ever-larger portions of the world's limited resources. Just as importantly, I think I felt a need to surround myself with history others had created, as I worked out what, exactly, my own legacy might be.

So I stripped wallpaper, pulled out rotting sculptured-pile carpet and sought out period-looking plumbing. I collected a forest-worth of paint chips and spent hours simply sitting on the floor, staring at the samples I'd taped to the walls. In time, as I got to know the history-rich quirks that defined these two residences, they each became a home I lived in, loved and, eventually, left.

Moving from my Chicago bungalow to the Cape brings me something close to full circle in my own personal history. In addition to simply being a beautiful place to live, this sandy spit also is home to some very fond memories of summers spent with my grandparents. They bought their little 2-bedroom, 1-bath Cape-style ranch in 1968 – one of the few brand-new houses anyone in my family has ever owned. The eight summers I spent with them there were spirit-saving respites from a life lived in the shadows of my parents' unhappy marriage.

In coming back to Cape Cod, I am, in a way, using this place of personal history as a jumping-off point to a new beginning. Chicago became my home mostly because it wasn't St. Louis, where my parents lived. It remained my home because the friendships I made there made it easier to simply stay put. With my conscious decision to move to this new house, I feel I've been given the chance to rewind the tape of my life and push "start" again, from a point of happiness and connection – a unique opportunity for anyone.

My new Route 6A roost is just a few years older than my grandparents' little home, and sits just a few miles away. The neighborhood here, though, is markedly upscale in comparison. My grandparents lived in a middle-class, suburban-style development filled with houses that looked just like theirs and all built within a few years of each other – a Levittown by the sea, if you will. The two-lane highway I now call home, on the other hand, began life as a Native American trail and now serves as the picture-postcard image of Olde Cape Cod, and local historic commissions make sure it stays that way.

As a result, I still have to contend with history in my 1965 Cape – changing the color of my front door, for example, could require an appearance in front of the historic commission, to argue my case for, perhaps, "autumn harvest" red over the current forest green. But within my new home's walls, I work with a clean slate. And this little house that needs work just about everywhere I turn is giving me a chance to revel in its potential.

Windows leak like sieves? Get new airtight double-panes! Think the fireplace mantle is just too wimpy? Chuck it! And what about that cheap, varnished-pine clamshell molding surrounding every door and window? I'm now buying Benjamin Moore Decorator's White by the contractor-size bucket to cover it all up. After years of having to consider architectural significance, I now have the chance to create my own, instead. It seems that, in this land of 300-year-old salt boxes, I have found new possibilities, and a home that belongs, not to history, but to me, alone.

Sometimes ignoring the problem is the best solution

2006-05-19T07:54:00.000-07:00

As I've been learning since my move to the Cape two months ago, this region has its share of issues. The term "affordable housing" is an oxymoron here, rabies has invaded from the mainland and a tiny little creature may be munching its way through our salt marshes. In addition, scientists have recently discovered that the hot air released in the increasingly vociferous wind-farm debates is, itself, a greenhouse gas, which is now threatening to advance global-warming problems at a highly accelerated pace.

So, to help myself get back in touch with why I actually moved here, I took an afternoon's sabbatical during yesterday's idyllic sunshine, dragged my bike out of the garage, filled up the tires and headed out on the Cape Cod Rail Trail. I've got to say, despite all the travails facing this extended spit, when the Cape gets something right, it really gets it right. I wandered through woods and alongside a salt marsh, riding as easily as if on a (occasionally potholed) city street. What an amazing resource - and I only made it as far as Orleans Center. I'm already looking forward to a trek out to Wellfleet.

On the way back, I checked out another jewel I'd previously overlooked - Nickerson State Park. O.k., now Massachusetts might really suck at health insurance, but it sure runs a mean state park. What a great place. The bike trails are wonderfully maintained (and seemingly most of the park is back in shape after last winter's storm), and there are several really pretty little kettle ponds that had me itching for a kayak. (Please don't sic the rangers on me for admitting this, but I even took a quick skinny dip in one and said hello to some extremely friendly fish.)

I made it back to my house exhausted and smiling. I suppose athletes would call what I felt an endorphin high, but, to me, what I felt was like a joyful reunion with a long-absent friend. I just wanted to stop strangers on 6A to say, "do you know, this place where we live is really amazing!"

So the next time the Cape Cod Times headlines have you imagining wind-turbine blades as politician-whacking samurai swords, and rabies fears have you locking your animals into air-tight containers for the night, head for a bike trail or beach or still-existent salt marsh. Walk through a wooded grove or spot some birds worth spotting. The problems here on the Cape aren't all that different from the issues facing others throughout the state, across the country and around the globe. But the places we have to get away from those problems are truly unique.

The Joys of Waterfront Property

2006-05-10T11:23:00.000-07:00

Last fall, as I began my hunt for a house I could actually afford on Cape Cod, I had a little fantasy of stumbling across some down-on-its-luck, shingled matron of a home, on a bluff overlooking the bay. Of course, once I started getting serious, that fantasy was put away - even the poorest excuse for shelter in such a location was three times more than I'll likely earn in my lifetime. Beyond that, taxes and insurance would have been astronomical, and then there was the danger that the whole bloody thing could be swept out to sea in a storm. So now I live along the historic Old Kings Highway, about a mile's walk to a nearby town landing. A lovely setting, but water views are not part of my everyday life.

This changed, however, for an all-too-brief period during this past weekend's epic rainy spell, when I was able to live my dream of waterfront living. Arriving home Sunday night from a quick weekend jaunt to visit friends in Chicago, I pulled into my driveway to find that the mighty Considine (the drainage ditch that cuts midway through my lot) had overflowed its banks and filled much of my backyard with up to six inches of water. My pair of faux adirondack chairs were sitting on a barely-above-sea-level island, as a bed of nearby irises waved its leaves like marsh grass above high tide.

Apparently that tide was already ebbing from its high-water mark, because a quick trip to the basement showed that the water had actually made it up onto my little parking area and under the garage door. The area of the basement that had been dry after ugly water-heater and washing-machine incidents a couple of weeks ago now rested under about a quarter-inch of water - so did the bottoms of the boxes of books I'd moved over to this previously safe zone. Now I had to relocate those boxes yet again. (The pieces of the shelving unit that might have kept everything high and dry remained unassembled in the corner.) Then I shook myself up a nice, stiff vodka gimlet, looked out over my drowned backyard and thought, "So this is what cocktails on one's beachfront deck feels like."

There I sat, boat shoes on the deck railing, martini glass in hand. Wasn't that a sail boat on the horizon? Did I just see a dolphin break through the waves? And is that some trespassing nincompoop walking his poop-producing dog across my private beach?! I may not have had the plaid pants, but I was beginning to get the attitude down.

But, by early this morning, the waters had receded, leaving a couple small ponds behind (sorta like what the glaciers did when they pulled back). Soon, these, too, will have evaporated or percolated down into the sandy soil, and I'll be back to living almost a mile from any notable water body. For a few short hours, though, waterfront living was mine, and now I know my tide might return with the next torrential rainfall.

Please don't tell the assessor, though - he might just have to raise my taxes.

Grave yards, but not grave thoughts

2006-05-08T05:55:00.000-07:00

Cemeteries have always fascinated me, as far back as I can remember, the older, the better. There were at least two very old cemeteries in Duxbury, the small town about 30 miles south of Boston where I spent first, second and part of third grade. One of them, where my mother also is buried, is the final resting spot of Myles Standish. Stepping into one of these old, old grave yards is like stepping out of time for me, especially when it is filled with the ancient and worn slate stones, with their archaic script and fire-and-brimstone imagery.

One of my favorite places in Chicago has long been Graceland Cemetery (opened about 100 years before Elvis moved into his Memphis mansion). This grave yard is more like a well-groomed public sculpture park than a gloomy slasher-movie setting. It's surrounded by several very busy streets and an elevated train track, but step through its wrought-iron gates and you might feel yourself transported into the gardens of some wealthy steel magnate. This is all the more appropriate since some of Chicago's wealthiest former residents now call this address home. The grandest memorial, set waterside along the banks of a small manmade pond, is the open Greek Temple built for Potter Palmer, founder of the Palmer House Hotel, and his beloved wife Bertha (her family, the Honores now rest right across the small street fronting the Palmer temple). Wander the narrow paved roads of Graceland, and you'll also come across memorials for many of Chicago's most important architects, including Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Daniel Burnham, John Root and Louis Sullivan - whose Getty tomb, also in Graceland, is considered one of the pre-eminent examples of the first Chicago School of Architecture's design principles.

Of course, Cape Cod is filled with any number of smaller, old-fashioned graveyards (the prefered term, instead of "cemetery," here, I've been told). Some like the amazing Old Burial Ground, in back of the First Parish Unitarian Church in Brewster, are in the center of town or behind prominent churches. Others, like the Pine Grove cemetery, set in the woods off a community of mostly summer residences, are scattered and isolated, set up on hills or nearly forgotten in wooded groves. These remind me of the old grave yard in Thornton Wilder's fictional Grover's Corners, where once-active members of a tightly knit community now lie forgotten.

I think the thing that draws me into these spaces, more than the beauty of a well-carved stone, is the preternatural silence that seems to embrace them, no matter how urban the surrounding area may be, and the notion that each marker holds the story of a life within it. Crack that stone open and you could learn of the shores Capt. John Nickerson saw in his seventy and seven years - of the treasures he brought back to his wife, and the storms through which he led his ships. Break another, and you would learn who wept as little John Simpkins, aged 2 years and 1 month, was laid into the earth - what prayers his mother whispered - and what flowers or small mementos lay with him - as the first shovelful of dirt fell upon his coffin? Sit and simply listen in one of these ancient and sacred places, and that ever-present quiet can seem to give way to a cacaphony of voices, each saying, "I lived, sit here and I will tell you how."

Mickie and me

2006-05-04T10:43:00.000-07:00

So, while engaged in the seemingly endless task of cutting away the years-worth of bittersweet and green briar vines choking my high-bush blueberries, I began thinking of the perhaps-apocryphal quote attributed to Michelangelo communicating his belief that his sculptures were always present in the stone - his job was just to carve away the marble that surrounded them. The vine-swallowed blueberry bushes present an obvious equivalent, but the more I thought about it, the more Michelangelo's belief also seemed to describe my feelings about this house and the life I hope to make for myself here: I can almost make out a vision of what I want it all to be, now my job is to carve it out of what is now standing.

On a less ethereal note, the contractor says he'll be able to start May 15 if all the fixtures have arrived. And my faithful realtor has assured me that sinking $30,000 into this place isn't an example of good money following bad, so I'm going The downstairs bath (left) is tiled in a lovely plastic marbleized product - note the rotting wood window in the tub area.
to be holding my breath and signing a contract in the next several days. In this case, I'm hoping the contractor is able to carve usable, attractive spaces out of the two areas that currently go by the name of "bathroom."

Thinking this all through last night was pretty stressful - I got kind of cranky with Mike the Contractor yesterday afternoon when he came back with final numbers that were $2,000 above previous plumbing estimates, based on higher copper-pipe prices and fixture choices I had made.
Upstairs, you may think that's tile, but it's actually fiberboard patterned to look like tile and nailed to the wall. And that's no fancy valance above the window - that's a towel shoved above the upper sash, which refuses to close all the way.

As I spent the evening running logic circles in my head ("That's so much money" ... "You knew it had to be done when you bought"... "It has to be done" ... "That's so much money" ... "Bathrooms recoup 102 percent of their investment"... "That's so much money"...), I realized what I really wanted, more than an upstairs toilet that flushed without leaking and a downstairs bath with a usable shower, was someone to calm me down and tell me it was all going to be o.k.

It turns out that adventures lead to scary places when you might least expect them to, and, when carving out a new life, one is likely to hit knots or veins (depending on your material/metaphor of choice) that can force you to work harder to ensure that envisioned design emerges. One hopes the satisfaction of achieving the desired goal is worth all the added sweat and tears, but it wouldn't be a real adventure if you knew the ending ahead of time.

Small-town parades are really fun - and democracy in action can be a little boring

2006-05-02T06:21:00.000-07:00

So the Brewster in Bloom parade passed right by my front door this past Sunday, complete with Grateful Dead cover bands on flat-bed trucks, old guys on funny little motorcycles, little kids dressed up as spring flowers and, of course, the Daffodil Queen. Only the most cynically confirmed urbanites could have failed to enjoy themselves during the event. I sat at the street edge of my newly reseeded front yard, chatted with the neighbors across the street during the slow spots and tried to keep Bart the dog from nipping at the heels of horseriders' mounts. I wish the parades were a monthly event.

Then, last night, a small-town tradition unique (I think) to New England, the semi-annual Town Meeting. In the Midwest, we generally elect our representatives, and then let them go about the business of running the government. At election time, we give them our thumbs up or down, based on whether we agree with whatever taxes they might have imposed or rescinded, and whether they got our street onto the annual repaving schedule. Here on the Cape, and in many other towns in the region, the citizens, themselves make those decisions - selectmen can make recommendations and present statements backing their opinions. But, when all the yammering is done, local residents call out their individual "aye" or "nay" on virtually every decision. And if you want your street re-paved, you better be ready to defend your need to all your fellow taxpayers.

Oddly, the most contentious issue last night was a vote on a non-binding resolution with absolutely no financial impact. We zoomed through passing a $15 million budget and several hundreds of thousands of dollars in capital expenditures (looks like a couple photocopiers gave out this year). Some $4 million (only about $1.25 million of it out of Brewster coffers, thanks to state matching and other funding) was voted, with only minimal objection, to purchase 50+ acres of new conservation land. All city employees, union and non-union, will be getting 3 percent raises each year for the next 3 years (I wish I had that guarantee). But we hit a major speed bump on a vote to lend town support to an effort to develop a Cape-wide universal health plan.

The plan - really only an idea of a plan, at this point - is kind of a cool idea, and an example of the kind of creative self-reliance that makes the Cape an interesting place. It would be a county-specific (the Cape is all contained within Barnstable County) universal health program. That's about as detailed as it gets right now, and the vote was simply intended to say, "Yes, we support the effort to think about this some more, because health insurance is stupidly expensive in Massachusetts."

However, the reading of this warrant item prompted several impassioned left-y types to get up and plead the obvious point that insurance is moving out of reach of many in the state (as a self-insured person, I'm paying $1,200 more per year than I did in Illinois for health insurance), and right-y types to get up and argue about the number of Canadians who cross the border for U.S.-style medical access. (Side question: Can we somehow work out a trade of our doctors for their cheap drugs?) In the end, debate was halted, a voice vote was called - and a close majority called out their "aye"s in favor of this non-binding resolution supporting an effort to talk more about a plan to develop a plan.

I can't wait for the meeting when an actual plan for a plan is up for discussion.

well, well, well - a big hole in the ground

2006-04-24T07:00:00.000-07:00

Actually, it's my septic system that's now a big hole in the ground. The heavy equipment, which looks like it just came off the Big Dig retired list, was fired up at about 8:30 this morning and is currently digging out the old tank. I'll be very glad to have this job over and done with, so I can set about enjoying spring planting, but seeing the front yard turned into a 10-foot-deep trench is a little unsettling.

On a different note, an apology of sorts is owed to Mid-Cape Home Centers. Met with my new best friend Mike on Saturday to begin picking out bath fixtures. They don't have any more floor displays than previously noted, but Mike does seem to know his stuff. The fact that I had to make an appointment several days in advance remains somewhat annoying, but I was pleased with the service he provided.

Saturday did have its low spots, however - specifically, walking into the basement/garage to find a 5-foot-wide pool of water spread out across the floor. The hot water heater, which had been threatening failure for years, I'm sure, had decided its time had come. The plumber was responsive enough when I called, and seemed sure he could get a replacement in by sometime today (Monday), but his cost estimate - $1,000 - consumed what little wind my sails were still holding. I'm beginning to feel like I'll have rebuilt this house from the inside out by the time my renovations are complete.

Ennervating Renovating

2006-04-19T06:59:00.000-07:00

Renovating on the Cape can, indeed, be an ennervating experience. One would think, with all the money that gets poured into residential construction on this small spit of land, that the building pros and their suppliers here would have the process down to a science and that the relatively modest redo of two small bathrooms would be a piece of cake. Instead, one gets the feeling that contractors and, especially, retailers feel the need to reinvent the renovating wheel with each new project.

It all comes down to the perceived boundary of the bridges. Boston is a mere 90-minute drive away, and its wealthy, South Shore suburbs are even closer. But Cape homeowners appear to be oblivious to the world of product- and service-providers that exist just across the Bourne and Sagamore bridges - or they're just too lazy to drive the extra half hour to find some decent options. Either way, this insular thinking means residents here, though within easy reach of a major metropolitan area, might just as well be living in a Midwest rural outpost when it comes to market competition.

First off, finding a supplier with a decent, well, supply of plumbing products on the Cape is well-nigh impossible. Mid-Cape Home Centers - the local contractor resource of choice - appears to be a firm believer in the Henry Ford, any-color-so-long-as-it's-black, school of customer choice. Even their "Complete Home Center" showroom in the big city of Hyannis displays a grand total of 3 toilets, two pedestal sinks and a couple of vanities. And if you want to know what any of these products cost, you'll have to sign in and speak with a representative - keeping price tags up to date on this comprehensive inventory is, apparently, beyond the abilities of even this "Complete" retailer.

Home Depot in Hyannis is a bit more forthcoming about price, but, again, inventory leaves a bit to be desired, and when you're trying to find a sink to fit a 20-inch-wide space, selection is crucial. Even specialty plumbing "showrooms" display little more than a few obligatory fixtures alongside the bookshelves of black-and-white catalogs that are supposed to suffice in place of actual, three-dimensional products. It's like stepping back to the time of Sears & Roebuck's old Christmas "Wish Books."

The people working "customer service" are often little more than catalog pullers - come in knowing exactly what you want, and they can pull the catalogs and write up your order. But if you need a little comparative guidance, be prepared for frustration.

So, I've been spending a lot of time on the Internet - printing up spec sheets for products I've used in the past in an attempt to recreate the success of those projects. I work the phones, make repeated visits to minimally helpful "showrooms," and hope for the best. Of course, I could follow my own advice and seek out suppliers across the canal...

But, then, I'd have to cross the bridge.

Well, here I am

2006-04-18T06:34:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since I've written, and in the meantime I've found, purchased and moved to my new home in Brewster, Mass. It came together as a kind of example of kismet - my back-up offer actually being accepted after a primary offer fell through - and now this house feels like a home I've lived in for years.

Like all of my previous homes, this one needs work - both baths need gutting, the kitchen could stand a good $10k in floors, cabinets and counters and the huge yard is a huge mess. Of course, these classic Chuck's-house problems only make the place seem more familiar. They enable me to don the metaphorical rose-colored glasses, through which I generally prefer to look at the world, with abandon. I walk through rooms or across the lawn, cup of coffee or glass of wine in hand, and see visions of slate floors, soapstone counters and a fern-banked stream. (O.k., so the stream is really a drainage ditch - but that's why I like my glasses.)

Spring has really settled into these parts. On the Cape, spring appears to be a real season - instead of the three days between 35-degree weather and 80-degree weather one generally gets in Chicago. It lingers and teases a bit. Daffodils are in bloom all over town, the weeping cherry tree that I see through my office window is covered in feathery red blossoms - and traffic is picking up noticeably as snowbirds return from Florida and weekend homeowners visit to prepare their retreats for the summer. Bart and I even splashed ankle-deep through the very cold Atlantic this weekend, walking out on the sand flats that stretch almost a mile during low tide.

So, new season, new beginnings. A cliche, perhaps, if this were fiction. But this is my life, and I'm enjoying the chance to start up a new chapter.

Reality approaches

2005-10-31T06:16:00.000-08:00

I make my way to Chatham on Thursday to begin the actual process of real estate hunting. This trip is intended as a sort of get-acquainted visit, to give me a chance to see what things in my price range look like and to get to know the area a little better. But, just in case, I've started talking to a mortgage person and picked up the pace of fixing things up around my current home - if the perfect place falls in my lap over the weekend, I want the option of diving in. Rising mortgage rates are also adding a bit of perceived time pressure.

I experienced a little of what this change might mean, for good and bad, this weekend. Had a wonderful dinner with friends Saturday night, and then we all made an appearance at a Halloween party given by a former co-worker of one of my friends. The four of us are a very tight group, having enjoyed each other's company for almost 20 years, including trips across the U.S. and abroad. The hardest part of leaving Chicago will be moving that much farther away from these three wonderful people.

But the party (which was preceded by 15 minutes of block-circling before finding a parking space) emphasized how little else, besides these friends, is keeping me here. Where I once felt very tied into Chicago and all its sub-cultures, I now feel like an observing outsider. Part of it, I'm sure, is my work as a freelancer, which can be isolating. In the end, though, I think it's more a symptom of having reach the natural end of my stay in this city - and the natural beginning of something new.