Julia Park Tracey

Yes, you know you want to…you all who write and ask for more. Why don’t you write, you ask? Really want to know? The list is too long, but in general, and in the briefest of tidy-whitey briefs, the holidays kicked my booty. Too many to-dos and hoo-has. Parties and gift lists and cookies and guests. Mothers-in-law and all the sibs. Homemade gifts and knitting by the light of the moon. I made scarves for each of the kids, plus both the moms (mine and his), made photo albums for all the kids plus both the moms, a variety of cookie for each member of the family to include in…

Just like the Roach Motel…So very many things going on right now. As. We. Speak. Trying to braid together all the bits and pieces of my life, I was at the Encinal Market the other day, first traipsing around the chi-chi grocery store in search of Advent calendars to chocolatize my children. But someone had purchased their entire stock (how selfish is that?), and we are left sans little chocky-windows to open and feast upon. How sad. I was on my way to meet with the newbie editor of the Sun and since I had just come from the dentist and had not yet had coffee or food, I stopped…

Posting some new work here, from my new writing. I’d like to dedicate this to my friend, writer/historian Woody Minor, with whom I was speaking on the phone the day this actual event happened, and I commented to him in some awe that the pelicans looked exactly like great pterodactyls, and we talked about them for a few moments, while I pocketed the check and wondered what to do with my life, about whether to cry or drive off a cliff or just keep swimming. Thanks, Woody. Remind me, friends, to tell you about the time Woody came to my place for a Christmas party, and caught on fire. Wood…

I am baking a pumpkin pie. Because it is very chilly out and nothing smells better than cloves and cinnamon (pace Jorge Amado…) on a chilly day. Nothing much smells better than cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice, in whatever combination. In fruitcake, gingerbread, apple pie, mulled wine, ginger cookies, winter fruit compote, Good Earth tea. In pot pourri, for heaven’s sake. It smells good, it smells like winter. And the oven warms the kitchen. The heart of the home, you know. Warm and spicy. And all that. We’re heading out for a concert shortly: another of his gifts to me for no reason other than just because — two tickets…

The house is still, except for the click and tumble in the dryer, a load of towels and one sweatshirt whose zipper is clanking lightly against the drum. It’s a comforting sound. My hands are cold — of course, it is November. And December, in another week. Thanksgiving Day is tomorrow, and the house is empty. My girls have gone to their dad’s and P’s kids have gone to visit their mother, and Mia is not home for the holiday, since we just saw her off a month ago and she’ll be home Dec. 16 for Christmas. She is planning to sit on the curb tomorrow and watch the Macy’s…