Sundays

Last week I would have told you that I had three weeks worth of Sunday New York Times to catch up on. The first Sunday, January 11, I had class. The second Sunday, January 18, I was drafting my paper for Chocolates class and studying for the final exam. Last weekend, well, I had math homework for Breads class, brunch with friends, and we went to open houses. Include today, and now I have four editions to read.

Reading the newspaper is Sunday to me. I hit the Travel section first because it allows me to daydream of the great traveling future Brian and I have the potential to create. Then, I peruse the Real Estate section. I have always done this, but now that we are house-hunting, the stories are more real and I pay attention to mortgage rates and things I find quirky about rural New York living, including oil heat, septic systems, and well water.

As an aside, we were driving around south Poughkeepsie yesterday as part of a house-hunting reconnaissance mission. Poughkeepsie is our most urban environment here in the mid-Hudson Valley, and we became excited by the thought of a backyard garden, a place to nurture Brian’s beloved tomato habit. I commented that at least in the city we won’t have to worry about deer eating our garden, when, at that moment, we saw a deer. This is a bad photo of the deer running away.

The deer sighting slightly deflated my idea of home gardening, but I chalked it up to a random event. That is, until we turned the corner one block later to see a deer crossing sign, in the middle of the city!

After that, I read the Business section. There is usually a great piece written in the first person about a real-life situation. One week, the author was a woman who went from having a successful corporate career to being laid-off and becoming a dog walker. Another week, the author was a female manager discussing the workplace phenomenon of women breaking each other down rather than helping set each other up for success. I see this in the kitchen classrooms all the time since the majority of baking majors are women. One Friday, for example, when my group needed help, and I sought it from a group of girls who were in the middle of a fierce game of Paddycake, they stopped, but rather than helping me, they dispersed.

Today, I hope to dispense with the leftover sections from previous weekends as well as the current edition. Brian is off skiing, I will attend a yoga workshop later today, and we’ll reconvene at dinner over lasagna. We have an open floor plan so we look at our living room while sitting at the dining table. Hopefully, our view this evening will not be of random sections of the newspaper piled atop all available surfaces from the coffee table to the couch.

Happy Sunday and Happy February to one and all.