Love and great buildings will survive

Today I am thankful for Andrew McMahon in general, and his song “Fire Escape” in particular. 

Not a whole lot to say about this one, but here goes. 

When I was 19 years old and first getting into Something Corporate, Andrew McMahon seemed impossibly older than me. Now, in my 30s, I realize we’re about the same age. We got married around the same time, and had babies relatively close together. I think it’s because of this that I have always been able to relate to his music so well, despite being an east coast girl listening to his music about being a west coast guy. And while it’s true that, to my mind, nothing will ever beat Something Corporate’s “Leaving Through the Window,” and that Jacks Mannequin’s “Everything in Transit” is a perfect pop album, I have enjoyed all of his work and felt like each album has been just right for what I’m gong through at the age at which the newest work came out. “Fire Escape” is about New York City but it’s also about being a new parent. I don’t actually know if that’s 100% true, but tell me this isn’t about a new baby:

So let’s hang an anchor from the sun

There’s a million city lights, but you’re number one

You’re the reason I’m still up at dawn 

Just to see your face, we’ll be goin’ strong 

With the vampires, baby, we belong awake

Swinging from the fire escape 

Anyway, it doesn’t matter why this song speaks to me so much right now, all that matters is that it does, and if you’re reading this, I hope it speaks to you, too. Until next time...

Today I am thankful

Today, I am thankful for my big, yellow umbrella. 

When I was in college, back in the heyday of AIM, I had a daily practice of putting one thing I was thankful for in my profile, under the heading, “Today, I am thankful.” I can’t claim credit for the idea. My best friend Maggie and I both had huge friend crushes on the girlfriend of a friend of ours. His name was Steve, and we knew him through a better, long-distance friend named Craig. Craig called him “Steve-o,” and we never actually met or learned the name of the latter’s girlfriend, so she became “Mrs. Steve-o.” Somehow, we learned of her screen name and would each periodically check her profile and away messages (guys, the days of AIM made us all into major creeps). She would occasionally post her own “today, I am thankful,” and so I took it on thanks to her lead. For more on the subject, see here.

I was walking home from dropping Liam off at school today and I couldn’t stop thinking about this. It was misting out when  he and I left the house and so I almost left it behind but thought better of it and brought my big umbrella. I am something of an umbrella enthusiast, I have several and really appreciate one with a nice wooden handle or an interesting design. This one features neither, it’s got a big plastic handle and is only one solid color, but you’d be surprised how much a yellow umbrella can alter your mood for the better on a rainy day. It’s a bit of sunshine in the gloom. And because it’s a giant golf umbrella, it really does it’s job keeping you dry. After years of collapsible umbrellas that fit in your purse, I am so pleased with this monstrosity that is a complete nuisance to its carrier when closed. I could write poems about it. In fact, here’s a little haiku for you: 

Yellow umbrella 

You keep me so safe and dry

On my rainy walk 

Guys, I know it’s a little silly to rhapsodize about an umbrella, but that’s what being thankful is about. It’s about the little stuff as much as the big stuff. More than the big stuff, really. Walking uphill on a rainy day in January in New England sucks, but my umbrella makes it...not fun, exactly, but a lot less awful. And today it made me feel super happy, in a way that only a silly little thing can. 

I hope to post more things in here this year, more things I’m thankful for. We’ll see how it goes. For now, I hope anybody reading this has their own big, yellow umbrella in whatever kind of rainy day you’re experiencing. I’ll see you next time.