Checking in

Lately it's been quiet here because I've been thinking through some things that take all my energy and don't translate well into blogging. But it's time for a little Monday morning "hello," I think.

Yesterday was my 45th birthday.  I told C.Z. that I felt like an angle, very half-way to ninety. She pointed out that since time seems to pass faster as you get older, it's really more like I'm 2/3 of the way there. That's my dear, honest child!  

(And thanks, Marie, for the greetings!)

Since it was my birthday, I could make whatever cake I wanted, and I had a plethora of beets in the refrigerator, C.Z. and I made the beet chocolate cake from Simply in Season.  (I don't own this cookbook yet, but it's on my list of ones to get once I've made good use of what I have.)  C.Z. gets credit for making most of the cake, because relatives kept calling with birthday greetings and I kept going off to the bedroom to talk.  Bob was skeptical of any cake made of beets, but in the end it got a thumbs up.  C.Z. said it smelled like marionberry* muffins while it cooked.  But we made chocolate icing instead of the chocolate chips and nuts the recipe recommends.  I know my family's limits, and while they'll tolerate a cake with beets in it, they want their icing!

Our beet chocolate cake.  Our family of three didn't make much of a dent in it last night, but I'm sure we will eventually!

Bob and I went out to Spiga (see list to the right), because we really needed some time to talk, and it wasn't until we got back at 9:30 that we lit the cake and sang.  I guess because it was late and my sister-in-law happened to call, Bob and C.Z. sang while she was on the speakerphone.  C.Z. played violin and Bob sang solo.  Bob sang like Frankenstein, on purpose.  We were all standing in our tiny kitchen (except for my sister-in-law in Georgia, of course).  In retrospect, it probably would have looked pretty strange to any outside party, but there weren't any, so it didn't matter!  

Tonight we are going to hear the Kirov Orchestra play Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet, in its entirety, I hope.  This has been one of my favorite pieces of music ever since I picked a tape of it out of a bargain bin twenty-four years ago in Milan.  Although it was composed in Russia in the 1930s, I used to imagine the young Romanov girls going to hear it at the ballet, I think because it conveyed to my mind a sense of something gone dreadfully awry, and that made for effective foreshadowing in my theatrical mind.  I love every mood that weaves in and out of the whole two hours or so of music, but my absolute favorite theme has to be the Knights' Dance.

C.Z. has been playing excerpts from Romeo and Juliet this morning from a huge conductor's score that her teacher loaned her for the semester.  She's liked this music for a long time, too. One day not long after we moved to this apartment, I heard something unusual as I was drying my hair, turned off the hair dryer, and found her in the bathroom with me, sitting on the toilet (lid down, thankfully!), playing long, dissonant passages by ear on her violin.  

On Saturday, we also went to hear this young man play Liszt at C.Z.'s music school. (Sorry, Susan, it's a video link, but at least you can read the bio.)  I played just a little baby Liszt at one time, so when I watched the pianist's hands I got some idea of the difficulty.  He was stunning, and played with seemingly effortless feeling--at fourteen. 

And now I've sat here too long and it's time to help C.Z. with some schoolwork, so off I go.   It's still lovely fall here, and there are still some leaves.  The trees outside my window are very considerate to turn color in stages.  My favorite one has lost its leaves already, but there's still this one just starting to change.

Happy Monday!

*Marionberries are a kind of blueberry from Oregon, and, contrary to my husband's initial suspicion, have nothing to do with the former mayor of Washington, D.C.