Morning is not the best time for me to drive, generally.  Not fully awake, I tend to get lulled by the sun and the road.  Later in the day, I’m great, and I can drive long into the night. Luckily, Mr. NewYorker is the opposite — great in the a.m., nods off as the day wears on. So we divvy up the driving and have each other’s backs.

This morning, however, I was alone. To compound matters, I was confused about the time.  Even though the resort was only about 1 hour and 20 minutes from my home, it was in another time zone. And last night was the end of daylight savings time.  I think I hit the road at 9:15, but who really knows?

I have found that the best way to ensure wakefulness, besides three cups of coffee, is to have a good soundtrack. I often play something loud that I know well from my iPod (Black 47 is a good choice), and sing along. This way, I pull a lot of oxygen into my lungs and my brain.  Sometimes, though, I like to listen closely, so I scan radio stations alert for something worth stopping on.

I turned on the radio and hit scan.  I think could scan radio stations for hours — there’s something about listening closely and pulling in bits and pieces from around the dial that intrigues me.  It drives Mr. NewYorker nuts, but today I was alone and had free rein.

And that’s when I discovered that Sunday morning in the South is not like Sunday morning in New York.  I guess the price of the airwaves in New York pretty much guarantees that your choice is either a) NPR or b) commercial entertainment radio (I’m talking FM here).

As I drove towards the Interstate on a two-lane rural highway, passing herds of cows, the occasional horse pasture, some goats and the isolated antique store, I began to notice that there was an awful lot of religious programming. Was it my imagination, or were three-quarters of the stations streaming church services?  I hit the button that returned the tuning to the beginning of the dial, 88.1, and then hit scan again.

My rules: in the five seconds before the scanner moved to the next station, I had to be sure that the programming was religious. Not just a suspicion, but dead certainty — the words “Bible, chapter, verse, Jesus, God or sin” were the kinds of clues I sought.  If I was sure, I could count it.  I kept track with the fingers of my hands on the steering wheel.

Until, that is, I ran out of fingers.  I think there were 14 stations that qualified, and maybe five that were playing music about which there was doubt.  There was no doubt at all on one station around the 101 mark.  On one scan it was playing a Springsteen song.  A little later the Stones.  And a little later, I got to hear the station identification — I was listening to something called ”boomer radio.” I guess that’s better than calling it the “golden oldies.”

There was also a Spanish language station — only one, this is, after all, the South — and I thought I heard the word “dios.” But I wasn’t certain, so it didn’t get counted.

The variety of religion was amazing.  First up, at the low-end of the dial, was a preacher whose topic for today’s sermon was lust.  “Lust,” he told us, “does not belong to God.”  Later, he riffed on how easy it was to fall prey to lust.  “You believe that you’re gonna die if you can’t have her (or him).” He seemed to know what he was talking about. But he warned again that lust was not a part of us that God created, and added that he could tell us that “from jumpstreet.” He warned about the lure of earthly power. You could be rich, you could be famous, or successful, and you might think you deserve that woman … but “Donald Trump is not God.” It seemed like he had quite a bit more to say on the topic, and every intention of saying it.

There were more than a few hell-fire preachers, some with the rolling cadences of black speakers, others with the twang of white men exhorting their listeners to accept Jesus.  But just when I thought that it was all about hearing what the good book says, there would be music.  Yes, definitely some gospel-flavored choirs with lots of call-and-response.  But then, something that sounded … distinctly Episcopalian.  An organ, and restrained.  

There was a speaker with an east Indian inflection, somewhat surprisingly, referring to a verse from Luke.  You don’t see many immigrants from the Asian subcontinent in these parts, although there is a Hindu temple about 20 miles south of here, near Pike Road.  But with the reference to Luke, I don’t imagine this was a Hindu service.

Then I hit a bluegrass station … but wait! what was that? Yes, behind the banjo were lyrics about Jesus sitting next to you on your porch.  On another station, I heard a soft-spoken calm male voice saying that when we know God, then the flip side is that he knows us.  And we know ourselves.

Sunday morning radio ran the gamut, it seemed, from evangelism to what used to be called mainline.  But when you think about it, that’s a pretty narrow gamut.  Here’s what I didn’t hear: anything remotely Catholic, anything not Christian (ok, true: it was Sunday morning, not Friday evening), or even anything that spoke to good works rather than faith. 

It was distinctly southern.  But rich, and interesting.

And it did the trick, keeping me alert and listening until I got to the Interstate.  That’s when I plugged in my iPod and hit shuffle.  The first song up? Black 47′s History of Ireland, Part I.

Oddly, I am really good at remembering death dates.  Although I never knew my maternal grandmother, I always knew that she died on Dec. 31.  We never celebrated New Year’s Eve in my house.

My father left on Friday, Sept. 13; it would be hard to forget that.  This last anniversary, a month or so ago, was the 20th.  I thought about him, exchanged some emails with my sisters, and noted happily that The Abandoned One had changed his FB profile picture to one of the two of them — one 5 years old and one 80 — squeezed into a recliner and wearing coordinating red plaid shirts.  I wished, as I always do, that I had covered more ground with him.  And then I set to work for the rest of the day.

Today, Oct. 22, is a Saturday.  Because of that, it’s harder to put aside the fact that it is the 10th anniversary of my mother’s death.  It’s a beautiful day, a better one than the day she died.  I’m determined not to drown in work this weekend, as I have for the last several (it turns out that you can take the girl out of New York, but you can’t take NY out of the girl), so I have a list of stuff to do around the house.  Store my summer shoes and get the boots out.  Organize the bathroom closet and drawers.  Wash the windows.

I finish my coffee while updating my FB status.  I make mom’s picture my profile and I wonder what she would have thought about me living in Alabama.  Silly.  If she had lived, she’d be in her late 90s.  There’s no way I would have moved to Alabama.

I summon Mr. NYer.  He joins me, but I can tell he doesn’t think there’s a pressing need to clean windows.  He doesn’t object, though, because he’s happy to see me doing something other than work.  I know the windows need  to be cleaned — we’ve been in this house over a year and have never touched them.  My mother would die … well, she would disapprove.

I know this with certainty.  When my middle sister’s first son was born — a full year after she had moved into her new house —  my mother went there to help out for a week or so.  Mom took care of household chores so my sister could take care of her new baby.  She laundered and ironed my brother-in-law’s shirts.  She dusted, vacuumed, and cleaned the refrigerator.  She made dinner.  Having taken care of the basics, she decided to wash the windows.  Taking down the curtains, she discovered manufacturer’s labels still affixed to the glass.  I don’t remember whether my mother actually told me this herself (which would have been rare — she didn’t tell tales and almost never complained about one child to another) or whether my sister did, after my mother made it clear that this wasn’t how she had been raised.

These are the kinds of things one thinks about when setting out to do those chores that you learned to do in childhood and that you do infrequently enough that they don’t become routine.  They unleash memories.  We lived in a three-story house in Brooklyn, where my mother’s bi-annual “general cleaning” included a death-defying window routine.  It required her to raise the lower sash as high as she could, poke her head and upper body out of the open window, turn around and ease herself onto the sill. There she sat, her legs inside the room and the  rest of her outside.  As if this wasn’t bad enough to the child inside the room terrified that mommy was  going to fall way way down, she then lowered the sash until it hit her  thighs, and proceeded to wash the outside.  Passersby would scold  her for doing something so dangerous.  This was  before tilt-in windows.

She liked to have the antiseptic sun streaming into the house through sparkling glass.  Her attitude towards clean windows was almost theological — it was what the moral code required, like going to church and taking communion.  Letting them get dirty was akin to avoiding confession. She was a fervent believer in the adage that cleanliness was next to godliness.

I had thought that the window cleaning, like being at work, would keep me busy enough to avoid the thoughts that percolate up every year on this day.  But they are inevitable.  As I assembled the window-cleaning supplies, I looked at the clock and thought, She was probably leaving the library now, on her way to Top Tomato.

A little later, This is around the time I got the phone call. … By now, I was in the town car I’d called and picking up my sister at her office downtown.  … By now, we were talking to the trauma doc. …

So mom was on my mind as I sprayed Windex and scrunched up the paper towels.  Rubbing in circles on a pane, I thought about the fact that I am a thousand miles away and I have not visited her grave since leaving NY.  I feel guilty and I think, “Well, I’m honoring my mother by cleaning windows today.  It’s appropriate. She’d be happy.”

And that’s when I started bawling, surprised by the emotion that hadn’t been there five minutes ago.  I realized that I didn’t want to honor  her by cleaning windows, or think that was what it meant to know her. Is that really what she wanted? 

I remembered the line from her obituary that I had thought was perfect, a bit tongue-in-cheek and yet, oh so true!  I had remarked to the reporter that mom could have written a book about cleaning.  My sister (same one) didn’t like it.  It was okay to joke privately about mom and cleaning; but not in the obit. 

Or maybe she realized that our mother’s cleaning wasn’t really the defining part of her;  maybe my sister had already decided — long ago — that she would honor mom in some way other than by cleaning windows well. (Doing it well was important — “Make sure you get in the corners, and keep turning the paper so that you’re using a clean surface. If the sun is on the window, you’ll have streaks.”)

Was this the choice?  Relive the day in my head or evoke her by doing what she did almost constantly? (I mean cleaning and chores in general, of course.  She didn’t do windows constantly.)  I never like to think about the other path — Asking myself what I would have  said to her if I’d had the chance?  What did I miss saying to her?  What did she miss telling me about herself?  That’s just pointless.

And what was it about the cleaning?  All my mother’s three sisters shared the mania to some extent.  They talked  about how well their mother — the grandmother whose too-early death ruined New Year’s Eve 15 years before I was born — did everything well.  She sewed their clothes, knitted, crocheted, did embroidery, ran the house, cooked dishes from the Old Country that they had no idea how to recreate.  And, I imagine, she had high standards of cleanliness.  They had to have picked it up somewhere.  In their narrative, none of them matched her, but each did one or two things well.  Mom cleaned, crocheted,and managed a household masterfully.  Aunt Alice cleaned well, too, and was also,  according to my mother, the better cook.  Aunt Anna knit better than mom, and cooked well too.  Aunt Phyl sewed, and was a happy soul, the way they said my grandmother had been. 

And then, for the first time in my life — can you imagine? — it occurred to me that, like me, my mother probably thought of her mother when she cleaned, cooked and knitted.  Did she do those things so fervently to connect with her mother?  With the clarity that comes only when you’ve been stupidly blind, I realized that, of course she did. 

I used  to get angry with my mother for never having time for me because she had chores to do.  After dinner, my father would take us for a summer drive while Mom stayed home, cleaned up after dinner and then took up items from her mending pile (and probably got the only peace of the day!)  One of the two vacations we took when I was a child was without Mom — my father took my his three daughters to a cottage colony in Sullivan County.  My grandfather’s failing vision meant that he could not be left alone; Mom stayed home to take care of him.

Today I realized, in a way I hadn’t before, that the care-taking was a way for her to massage her loss and be close to her mother.  It was, as well,  in her mind the best way for her to take care of us as well.  The honor and love were expressed in duty and went both ways, up to her parents and down to us. 

My mother became more human to me today.  Which means I miss her even more.

By this time, we were in her house, making phone calls. 

 In just a few more hours, it will be Oct. 23.

His son, an aspiring actor, was in the cast when the musical work-shopped in New Orleans.  According to my dentist, it was Broadway-bound. I hope it is, eventually.  Right now, it’s about to open in Chicago.

When the producer of White Noise reached out to the SPLC to partner on an educational guide, I had already heard of the play, courtesy of my dentist (his son is now on the road in Wicked).  Long story short: it touched on topics important in my work, plus I love theater.  I agreed that we would produce an educational guide.

Today I traveled to Chicago to attend the opening night, which is tomorrow, Saturday April 9 at the Royal George Theater.  I plan to write a blog about the play and our reasons for partnering, so I arranged to attend the final preview performance tonight to get some ideas.  I arrived, picked up my tickets at the Will Call window, and found my seat in the second row center. Before the show started, the producer I’d been working with found me and we chatted for a few minutes when she noticed the woman sitting two seats to my right.  Holly, the producer, greeted her — “Hi! You got here!”

I turned in time to hear, “Yes, and I’ve brought half of Brooklyn with me,” said the woman who, in profile, looked awfully familiar.  Oh, my God, I thought, it’s a former student … or is it? All I could see was her profile as they chatted for a minute;  when I had a chance I interjected, “Brooklyn?”

The woman from Brooklyn turned to me.  And that’s when it happened — the realization and shock, followed by “Ms. Costello?!”

Yes, it was indeed a former student, whose name eluded me but her face did not.  I don’t know what she remembered from what I taught, but she did tell me about the impact I had, which was good to hear, but beside the point now.  It gets stranger or more wonderful, depending I suppose on your point of view.  Colleen, my former student, now a lawyer, was there because her husband, along with his twin brother, was one of the composers.  His last name is somewhat common, so it hadn’t jogged any memories when I first read their interview in our guide, but it should have.  Turns out that Colleen (class of ’87), married the son of one of my colleagues.  And yes, that colleague, Alice Morris, was also in the audience, along with her husband.

And, folks, the small world phenomena continues:  one of the producers, whom I have yet to meet, seems to be a person from Great Kills, the town next to the one in Staten Island where I grew up.  His name will be familiar to anyone who came from the Island in that era, partly because he fronted a band that bore his name and did some wordplay with a well-known maker of semi-tractor trailers.  I mentioned it to Mr. NYer on the phone tonight, and I gathered that he (Mr. NYer) used to play Little League with the producer’s brother.

So, what do you think are the chances?

The downside for the business traveler?  It took a lot longer to rack up those frequent flyer miles or qualify for the perks they could bring when you took a different airline for every trip.

But when you live in a small city, life is simpler. Montgomery is at the end of a short radius in the hub-and-spoke air travel system that emerged in the late 70s.  Although three airlines fly into the Montgomery airport (MGM), two of them provide service that is more theoretical than actual.  American runs one flight a day to Dallas. Perhaps two U.S. Air flights take you to Charlotte.  Otherwise, you’re flying Delta, to Memphis or Atlanta. Mainly, you fly Delta.

Since virtually every trip involves two legs in each direction, and since Delta counts “segments” toward Medallion status (of which there are three levels) it only takes six flights to qualify for Silver Medallion.

And what does that get you? A special luggage tag. Zone 2 boarding, before the overhead storage is full. Seating closer to the front of the plane. Fees waived for checked baggage.

But the best perk?  When you’re a Medallion member, you are automatically put in for a first class upgrade.

Delta’s policy is to fill first class.  Keep that in mind next time you travel: those people in rows 1 through 4 most likely did not pay $1,000 for the seat.  They just paid their dues by flying.  A lot.

When you book a coach seat on Delta, there’s a bit of a thrill at the end when the message appears, in red, that an upgrade has been requested automatically.  Sometimes, a message arrives in your email a day or two before the flight that you’ve hit the jackpot: You’ve been upgraded and your new seat assignment is 2A.  Mainly, though, you get to the gate and watch the TV to see what position your name has on the upgrade list.  All those gold and platinum members are ahead of the mere silvers, so when you’re number 18, you figure you’ll be flying coach.

This week, I got the prize, an early upgrade on my return flight from Boston to Memphis.  And then the snow started.  My flight was pushed back an hour, and the risk of missing the connecting flight in Memphis was just too great.  I switched to an earlier flight to Atlanta, and saw my first class 2A seat assignment morph into 33E.  And I was cast into Zone 4.

But then, just as they began boarding, my name wafted from the PA system.  Come to the desk, it said, for “reassignment.”  In other contexts, this could be alarming, I know.  I drifted to the desk and traded in my boarding pass for one inscribed 2D.  I had scored.

On the inbound flight I’d sat in row 18, and watched as a restless three year-old, followed closely by his mom, approached the first class cabin.  He wanted to visit, but she held him back, explaining that they weren’t allowed in there.  It was weird.  I kept expecting him to hold out his hands and ask, “Why do they have food?”

Because that’s one of the things you get in first class: food, served on plates, with real metal forks and knives.  They’re dull, it’s true, but that is beside the point.  When you arrive, the flight attendant (one, just for the folks in first class) takes your coat and hangs it in a closet.  You arrive at your seat to find a bottle of water sitting on the broad armrest that has ample room for your elbow, your seatmate’s elbow, and the two bottles of water.

Almost immediately, even while the folks in steerage are jostling aboard, you’re offered a drink.  Wine and beer are part of the service.  But really, anything for you.  After all, you’re first class.  Your coffee is hot and it comes in a ceramic mug.  No styrofoam here, except perhaps in the extra-wide seat cushions that envelope your body.

The steward winks when you inquire about stowing your laptop in the seat pocket prior to takeoff.  Those rules don’t apply to you, ma’am.  She offers another drink.  Would you like that water in a bottle or in a glass with ice.  That’s right.  A glass.  Your wine comes in a stemmed glass.  Soup is served with your southwestern salad.  It’s a Thai tomato, and it’s good.

After the meal, the steward offers you a hot towel.  She picks it out of a bowl with bamboo tongs and places it directly into your hands, murmuring, “Be careful, it’s hot.”  As soon as you’ve finished removing the grime (no doubt drifting forward from the nether regions of the plane), she appears again to remove the used towel from your sight.

It’s quieter in first class, and there’s plenty of room to set up your laptop, spread out your papers, and work.  If that’s what you want.  Otherwise you can recline and burrow into the spacious seat, ask for a blanket, and doze off.

What did you do to deserve this?  Not much really, and therein lies the problem.  The absurd difference between the treatment in first class and coach is, frankly, disturbing.  I kept imagining that scene in Dr. Zhivago, when Yuri returns home from the war to find his once-aristocratic in-laws’ home transformed into a commune for the comrades.  He is welcomed by the comrade-in-chief who explains how the previous arrangement was wasteful and bourgeois.  “Yes,” Yuri stammers, “This is much more … fair and egalitarian.”  He explains to his wife as he climbs the stairs that he really means it, it is more fair, but at the same time he knows he’s being seen as a decadent aristocrat.

Which is kinda how I felt when it was time to deplane and I saw the final perk of being in first class.  This was a 757, with the boarding door located between the first class cabin and the coach seats.  As we pampered first class passengers, having been handed our coats, skipped up the aisle, I saw that the flight attendants were physically blocking the aisle in coach so we could leave the plane first.  The rabble in steerage would follow later.

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow.

Crunchy numbers

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 6,300 times in 2010. That’s about 15 full 747s.

In 2010, there were 77 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 101 posts. There were 175 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 425mb. That’s about 3 pictures per week.

The busiest day of the year was January 17th with 145 views. The most popular post that day was Landed in Montgomery.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were facebook.com, mail.yahoo.com, webmail.aol.com, statistics.bestproceed.com, and WordPress Dashboard.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for changing accents, old cemetery, lifelongnewyorker, kristine zehner, and osage orange tree in staten island.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

Landed in Montgomery January 2010
7 comments

About LifelongNewYorker November 2009

First Day on the Job January 2010
7 comments

Things I Like about Alabama July 2010
5 comments

Random observations on life in Montgomery so far January 2010
7 comments

The answer is “Not much.” 

To say that our holiday decoration is sparse would be over the top.  After Thanksgiving, we pretty quickly decided that we would travel north to see family for Christmas.

And, no, our Thanksgiving experience didn’t drive that decision, but it sure has affirmed it.  Long story short: The Abandoned One came home to his parents for the holiday.  We cheerfully suggested that he fly into Atlanta, a much cheaper flight, and a mere two-hour drive from Montgomery. 

Of course, that’s two hours times two, since it’s round trip.  And it’s only two hours if you round down generously.  It was fine on the Tuesday night when we picked him up, not so fine on the Sunday when we took him back.  Inexplicably heavy traffic (NO ONE expects a traffic jam on I-85 between Montgomery and Atlanta, especially outside of Auburn) meant it took over well over three-and-one hours to deposit him at the terminal, about 10 minutes past the absolute last minute he could successfully check in. 

Luckily, he was able to get on another flight that night.  The next day I messaged him: “You’ll visit us again someday, won’t you?”  His reply: “Of course I will.  Oh, wait … you mean in Montgomery?”

My middle sister suggested that we spend Christmas Eve with them and enjoy the traditional fish dinner.  We have yet to see dried baccala here, and although I’ve been told that it’s possible to buy frozen squid, I have yet to find it anywhere.  And then there’s the matter of rounding up a dozen people to share the feast …

So we decided to “go home” for the holidays.  Which meant there was absolutely no reason to get a fresh tree, and we don’t have the other kind.  And if we didn’t have a tree, there was no need to pull out the decorations.  Lest we begin to mutter “Bah! Humbug!” to each other, we did decide to get a wreath.

It hangs on the front door, Mr. NYer having secured one of those removable hooks advertised on TV after we realized that the door is too thick for our old over-the-door hanger.  It’s a simple wreath, without even a bow.  I think the idea was that you’d decorate it yourself. 

I remembered that I’d seen tabletop live trees at Fresh Market and convinced Mr. NYer to pick one up.  It sat, in a miniature red bowl of a tree stand, on top of an end table in the living room for several days, absorbing all the light in the room.  No balls, garland, tinsel, or lights on this little Charlie Brown specimen.

Will it surprise you to hear that our shopping hardly happened?  We’re donating to Heifer International with my sisters, decided that a trip to New York was pretty much enough of a gift to ourselves, and expect to write a check for the Abandoned One.  Finally, late last week we went online and got gifts for the nieces, nephews and their kids.

I had to stop at CVS on Monday.  Feeling guilty, I found the shortest string of lights I could, along with a box of tiny ornaments.  I smuggled them into the house, planning to surprise Mr. NYer by furtively lighting and decorating the tree after dinner. 

Walking into the house, I set the bag down inconspicuously in the dining room and glanced into the living room.  There was the tree, now trimmed in red beads and a set of cardboard angels.  Mr. NYer had succumbed, too.

It was so O. Henry.

There are no lights on our tree, and none on our house, but it all seems to fit with Montgomery.  As you pass houses a quick glance through the windows (Montgomery homes feature large windows or french doors) will reveal a lavishly lighted large tree.  But the exterior decor is rather subdued, especially by Staten Island standards.  Perhaps one or two houses on a street will have some tasteful arrangement of lights around the door or the two bushes on either side of the porch. 

The rest rely on wreaths, fresh garland and large red bows.  Many homes have every window festooned with its own wreath, and feature a very welcoming front door.  It’s all rather … tasteful.

I can’t wait to bring photos of holiday lighting excess from back home.

The woman at the counter was courteous, friendly and helpful.  Unlike the CVS in Staten Island, few of the service people here are teenagers who perhaps missed the customer service orientation when they started the job.  As she drew the lengthy receipt from the cash register, the clerk pointed out to the gentleman that he had a $4 coupon for vitamins, and that he’d need to use it by Nov. 21. 

He  thanked her and gathered his bag.  As he left, she said, “Enjoy your football!”

“Roll Tide!” he responded, and left.

The next customer, an African-American woman who looked to be in her mid-60s, had only a few items.  They chatted a bit about the weather, and as the transaction wound up the clerk said, “Enjoy your football!’

The woman smiled and said, “Oh, I’m basketball.”

“Well, enjoy your basketball, then!”

It was my turn next.  As I piled creams and cosmetics on the counter I felt obliged to explain that it was like fall cleaning: I needed to start paying attention to my skin.  She commiserated and we chatted as she looked up my CVS membership number. Finally, the moment came when she handed me my receipt.  Thank yous were exchanged.  I picked up my bag. A small void, but a definite void. 

“You’ve decided I’m not going to go home and watch football, haven’t you?” I asked.

“That’s right,” she said.  “I was just trying to decide what to say instead … Maybe enjoy your facial.”

“I will,” I said.

But I wonder how she knew?

The Capri is both a theater and a movie society, a non-profit that runs the theater.  Becoming a member means tickets are only $6 each–and that’s on Saturday nights.

For my fellow Staten Islanders, the Capri is what the Lane should have been, instead of a night club, dance hall, catering space and whatever else happened there.  The two theaters are about the same size, and look like they were built within five years of each other.

Going to the movies at the Capri is a trip, and not just back in time.  We’ve gone and had to wait for the person selling tickets to come out of the booth to sell us a bottle of water (with a cup full of ice).  You can also get bottled beer at the Capri, or a glass of wine.

You buy your tickets at the one-person booth that sits in the middle, right between two sets of doors that let you into the lobby.  On your left is the ancient popcorn machine (no butter, just the way we like it) and the refreshment counter.  On the right you can pick up the schedule for next month, or flyers for other community events.

Head up a stack of steps and enter the one theater on either the left or the right.  It’s not as intensely art deco as was the Lane, but its got an art deco vibe going on.  There are no annoying commercials running, so you don’t spend 20 minutes before the film starts getting bombarded.  Instead there’s what looks like a basic PowerPoint with posters for the coming movies.

As for the movies, there’s a mix.  Most of them are what used to be called “second-run,” movies that came out to first-run theaters perhaps a month or two before.  I think they hit the Capri, generally, sometime between theatrical release and Netflix.  Plus they’re not the blockbusters that tend to get shown at the Rave, our mall-based multiplex. 

The Capri is where you’ll see the newest Philip Seymour Hoffman film, or, as we did tonight, the Patricia Clarkson film, Cairo Time (spoiler alert: longest case of unrequited sexual tension ever filmed).  But they’ll also run oldies but goodies, like the Christmastime showing of It’s A Wonderful Life, or the special Veteran’s Day showing of Stripes  (yes, the Bill Murray vehicle).  And sometimes there will be southern films, a short festival or something else that seems to fit the town–and the bill.

So you’re in your seat, holding your drink and your popcorn, because there are no cup holders.  If you’re older than 35, you’ll know that theaters didn’t used to have cup holders.  Often, instead, they had ashtrays on the back of the seat in front of you, but this I have not seen at the Capri.  It is not stadium seating, nor do the seats recline.  None of this is necessary anyway.

As movie time approaches, the curtains close over the slide show, the lights go out, and a new image is projected just as the curtains begin to open again.  You remember this, of course — if you are old enough — from when you were a kid.  The image is distorted against the curtain, but as the curtain parts, it freezes in focus on the screen.

Before the movie comes on we’re asked to turn off our cell phones, and reminded that there’s no texting and no talking.  The next screen points out that “courtesy is contagious.”

We only see about two previews, just the right amount to whet the appetite for the film.  When it’s over, everyone stays until the credits are finished.  When you go out into the lobby, people say good night to each other.

We went there a few weeks ago for a special benefit showing of Springsteen’s Hyde Park concert film.  Before it started, the manager came to the front of the house and explained that he’d set the film sound on “normal,” but if people wanted it louder, he’d accommodate us.  The audience agreed that loud was better, and he cranked up the sound.

Anyone want to move to Montgomery?

Weather.  Is delightful, thank you.  Today, October 24, it’s 81 degrees and dry.  I’m still hanging around in shorts and t-shirts, the windows are open and a delightful breeze stirs the white linen curtains.  I will enjoy what my mother called “good sleeping weather” later at the nighttime temps drop into the 50s.  Despite the evening chill, though, we’ve decided it’s still too soon to switch to our winter bedding.  Turns out we’re in a drought, which partially explains the unending series of bright summer days.  But the reality is hard to hate: since March, it’s been warm and pleasant.  Gorgeous spring, hot summer, and lovely fall.  Expecting a few days of winter at some point.

Diet.  We’ve already discussed the fact that fears of food deprivation in the South were wildly overstated.   The fine array of foods, coupled with car reliance, led Lifelongnewyorker to gain a few (more than five) pounds since arriving in Montgomery.  With the arrival of September, Lifelongnewyorker is proud to say, she started a diet and has now lost all of the weight that was added.  Mr. NYer has been most helpful, preparing diet-friendly lunches and dinners, and sacrificing his own nightly glasses of wine in solidarity, even though he doesn’t have to.  (Actually, the diet has been even more effective for him, which was not exactly a desired outcome).  The diet led to something that I haven’t experienced since 6th grade:

Going home for lunch.  One day last week, I realized I’d left my lunch in the refrigerator at home, so I got into my car, drove home, ate lunch at my kitchen table, visited for a while with the cats, read the mail, got back into the car, and arrived back at the office 45 minutes after I’d left.  Try that in NYC.

Cat intelligence.  Harpo, our older and friendly cat, had long been in the habit of taking “constitutionals” in our Staten Island backyard.  Mr. NYer would let him out and instruct him to stay in the yard.  After a certain period of time — usually 20 minutes or so — Harpo would wander away.  Mr. NYer would fetch him and bring him inside.  More than once, though, the cat slithered under the deck or wandered farther afield and couldn’t be found, and then I’d be enlisted in the effort to get him.  Simon, the younger cat, is skittish and fast.  We have never let him out.  When we moved into the Alabama house, Harpo had spent about a month in a second-floor apartment where going out was not a possibility.  Warned about the ferocity of the local flea population, we decided that Harpo was now going to be an exclusively indoor cat.  

Now, what you need to know is that the Island excursions turned him into a howling pest.  He would stand at the sliding screen door and cry to go out.  Frequently the cry worked, and Mr. NYer would let him go.  Here in Alabama, Harpo’s voice has been raised only in anticipation of food, or when he hauls one of his toys around.  He has never asked to go outside, and has never made any kind of dash when the French door to the patio is opened. 

Until Saturday, when somehow he dislodged the window screen while sunning himself on the sill.  I was roused from bed by Mr. NYer calling me urgently; by the time I emerged from the bedroom, he already had Harpo in arms, in the living room.  But Harpo had discovered that Alabama had an outside, too, just like Staten Island.  And he’s been standing at the French doors, howling, since then.

It’s safe to go out again.  Sort of weather-related, but we’ve been striking off exploring a bit again.  Last weekend, we went to the Kentuck Folk Art festival in Northport, just across a river from Tuscaloosa, home to the University of Alabama.  We decided to avoid Saturday, the day of the Alabama game (Roll Tide!), because filling a stadium with 102,000 people leads to a certain amount of traffic.  The festival was great, with a combination of artisans (pottery, textile, jewelry, etc) and real, honest-to-goodness folk artists who often worked with found and discarded objects.  Music played from one of two stages, and it was good.  Every aging hippie, young hipster, and countercultural person in Alabama was there.  It was  a great vibe, and we bought a nice pottery vase, a pottery earring bowl, and some jewelry. 

Inspired, we took at chance at a closer-in craft fair in Prattville, the next town.  This time the entertainment was provided by a succession of dancing school troupes — one set of little girls in costume after another.  There were hula skirts, bumble bees, lady bugs, princesses.  We were astonished that Prattville had such a concentration of children to maintain this unending supply of dancers.  No boys.  They were all at peewee football practice. 

We didn’t stay too long.  Although there were a few wonderful quilters and one potter, most of the crafts were homemade and followed one of two themes: religion or football.  Seriously, I had no idea the Christian cross could be affixed to so many objects, including folk-art rustic birdhouses.  Nor that there were so many ways to wear or display your allegiance to Auburn football (Go Tigers!).

We stopped in the center of Prattville, a tidy and well maintained downtown.  The Autauga Creek runs next to Main Street, and nineteenth century mills sit just north of the downtown area.  Strolling along the beflowered Creekside walk, we saw a father and son fly-fishing in a rocky part.  Upstream just a bit was a dam with water pouring over.  Very picturesque. 

Meanwhile, an antique store/cafe beckoned on Main St, and we wandered  its aisles for a while.  Leaving, we peeked into the windows of the Red Arrow hardware store, a going concern that outdid the antique store for old-timey curiosities.  This hardware store looks like it hasn’t been in any way since perhaps 1945.  Wood floors, deep and dark, and inventory that, well, it’s hard to believe they’ll be able to restock it anytime soon.

Yes, there were modern things for sale, including an open rack with guns (“Do not handle guns”), garden hoses, screws and nails and paints.  But there was also a huge selection of cast iron cookware, galvanized steel tubs, porcelain-on-metal basins (my mother’s favorite for all sorts of chores, including washing of babies), and crockery.  Crockery like you’d put moonshine in.  There were butter  churns.  Farther along, there were replacement glass tops for coffee pots, as in stove top percolators.  Remember those?  Then there were flyswatters with whippable metal handles, not plastic.  You could buy a brand new Radio Flyer wagon, or a brand new metal Radio Flyer tricycle, just like the kind I had as a kid.  I wanted a jug, a wagon, a stove top percolator … but we left just happy to have stumbled into this place out of time.