Week in Seven Words #583

This covers the week of 3/21/21 - 3/27/21.

biota

The season begins with crocuses, progresses to turtles.

fending

Spiky seed balls plinking on car windshields and roofs, as if the trees are defending against an invasion.

observing

Interesting to see who comments on the new glasses and who seems not to notice.

skateboarders

Two skateboards. On one, a young man holding a leash. On the other, a bulldog at the end of the leash. They skim along at a relaxed pace, both of them looking cool and poised.

substitutes

Her brain is largely hijacked by alternate realities, other versions of herself that command her thoughts.

superstore

The superstore is a comforting place because it never seems to run out of anything. It promises abundance.

uniformity

They all look like they go to the same hairdresser. Their hair is in the same ponytail, some threaded through a cap. They all wear yoga pants, short jackets, and big sunglasses, and they clutch a coffee in one hand, a phone in the other.

Week in Seven Words #567

This covers the week of 11/29/20 – 12/5/20.

crusty

The basin has been drained. It's encrusted in dirt and leaves like diseased skin.

diving

Wake up in a low, grubby mood. Getting to work immediately helps.

radiance

I love the tree that's still bright yellow, a flame awaiting winter with confidence.

reversal

Waisting, sleeting – two seven-letter words, both last minute, that win her the game.

spying

A drone hovers outside the window. Is it filming us? Where is this boundary-wrecking insectile contraption from?

stomping

They stomp around on a lawn caked in wet fallen leaves. They're ecstatic at the crunching, the crumpling.

wafting

Sometimes, what connects people in these socially distanced times, is the smell of Frosted Coconut Snowball hand sanitizer.

Week in Seven Words #562

This covers the week of 10/25/20 - 10/31/20.

deadlines

The assignment drags into the night. At one point I picture myself shutting the laptop, sliding into bed, and forgetting about deadlines. A peaceful thought, but not a realistic possibility.

initiative

On vacant private land, a homeless man is assembling a home. It won't be long before it's torn down. In the meantime, he's brought in materials from other neighborhoods and set up an unsteady shack with tarp. Several feet from it are a barrel and a bucket, some canvas bags and a shopping cart.

nemesis

During two weeks of staying shut up in her apartment, her most exciting moment, she reports, was arming herself with bug spray and a Marble notebook to hunt down a large roach.

profuse

The leaves on the thornless honey locust trees are a vivid yellow. One fountaining yellow tree after another, the pavement spattered in bright leaves.

realism

"For Halloween," he tells me over Skype, "I'm pretending to be an alcoholic." He has a mostly finished bottle of whiskey on his desk, in full view of the camera.

transporting

The idea of buying a house appeals to him much more than the reality of living in one, maintaining it, and cleaning it. So he goes on Redfin and stares longingly at a ranch house in Lancaster, PA that he'll never buy. Because the floor plan is online, he pictures what he would put in each room and wonders whether two recliner chairs would fit in the tiny screened porch.

virion

I spot a kid dressed up as COVID-19, what the virus looks like under a microscope. It's a costume both funny and depressing.

Week in Seven Words #556

This covers the week of 9/13/20 - 9/19/20.

analyses

We get into a deep conversation about writing, and I savor it, because we rarely speak to each other. Not because of animosity, but because we're uncommitted to regular phone calls. Maybe we should call each other more.

blew

If someone had told him a year ago that he'd be trying to learn how to blow a shofar in the midst of a pandemic, he would have been skeptical, to say the least. As for the sounds he can produce – so far we've got crackling air and elephant squeaks. 

donuts

The new donut store has opened. Its electronic banner, streaming donuts 24/7, has become the liveliest feature in a withered neighborhood.

gladsome

The park is brimming with people. With picnics, parties, sports. One quiet spot is tucked near the entrance to a garden. It has a semi-circular seat shaded by lush trees.

honeyed

Sunlight sticks to the pine trees like honey.

pounding

Along every street there's construction noise, and the groaning of trucks and buses. At one corner, a man is raving, trying maybe to hear himself.

restraint

I'm aggrieved, and I need to deal with that emotion before I become deliciously aggrieved.

Week in Seven Words #551

This covers the week of 8/9/20 - 8/15/20.

beware

The moment has arrived: We're getting pizza from a restaurant. A milestone during a year like this. As we wait outside the pizza place for our order, we stare into a neighboring window display with a sign that advertises psychic readings. A woman comes up to us and warns us not to see the psychic. "They went to jail for stealing people's fortunes!" Her voice is harsh, her eyes hard and bright. I wonder if she's one of the psychic's victims. Or maybe the pandemic has pushed her into the borderlands between sanity and madness.

crowns

From our bench on a high point in the park, the view is only tree canopies, thick with summer growth. Layers of leaves, subtly shifting shades of green.

nescient

The less I'm exposed to the contents of their brains, the more faith I have in humanity. 

pouring

After a morning of heavy rain and thunder, the sun emerges like yolk from a cracked shell.

rassle

They snipe at each other, sometimes viciously, but I think it's a strange comfort to them, to get tangled up together in long text threads.

 

starkly

On one side of the street, there's a stretch of restaurants with lively outdoor seating, people crammed around tables on the sidewalk as pedestrians and dogs ease past them. On the other side of the street, there's a stretch of shuttered businesses and homeless people asleep under construction scaffolding.

streamlet

On its way to the lake, the stream tumbles over rocks. Dogs dip into the running water and shake the droplets away.

Week in Seven Words #544

This covers the week of 6/21/20 - 6/27/20.

covidiot

Now a regular part of our vocabulary.

pillowing

The geese are fat brown pillows softening a rocky slope. 

pinetum

Picnic tables, mulch paths, and rail fences. The scent of pine trees, heavy and delicious.

reluctance

The dog is slow to warm up to the stranger but then reluctant to leave. He begins to welcome the goodness of those pats and scritches just as his owner starts tugging him away.

standout

Among the many colors in the garden, the loveliest is the cerulean of the hydrangeas.

summoning

With only a slice of bread, a young boy brings a frothing mass of turtles to the side of the pond.

sunset

The sunset shifts colors. At one point, a bar of bright blue appears among duskier blues and oranges. The underside of the clouds are blushing.

Week in Seven Words #540

This covers the week of 5/24/20 - 5/30/20.

arboreal

Trees heavy with leaves cast silky shadows.

disclosed

There's a story behind each name on the monument, and sometimes you stand next to someone who knows one or two of those names and stories.

divertissement

A man is making giant bubbles with two big sticks and a cord. The wind conditions aren't favorable, and the bubbles don't float for long. Beside him, another man is meditating in a standing pose with two dogs curled at his feet.

helplessly

A metal plank rises from the river and rests against the boardwalk. A mother duck and her ducklings are scrambling up it, headed for land. Only one duckling remains in the water, swimming back and forth beneath the slope of the plank. It hears its family above, but doesn't know how to get to them.

reminded

We meet up for the first time in months and sit several feet apart on benches in the park. After the expected conversation about the pandemic, we try to switch to another topic. At that moment, a golf cart covered with roses passes us, a speaker mounted on its roof playing a looped message about how important it is to wash your hands. 

scrapes

The Scrabble board has seen rough use. Many of its colors are rubbed out, and some of the letter tiles have almost turned into blanks. And you can't have more than two blanks.

unthinkingly

It's perverse the way people cheer on or excuse the looting from the safety of their comfortable homes. Their own livelihood and years of labor aren't threatened. To them, the looting is a spectacle, a show they're enjoying before they get bored and switch channels.

Week in Seven Words #532

This covers the week of 3/29/20 - 4/4/20.

attending

The convenience store is a cube of white light on a dark street. A masked cashier listens to 80s rock while staring out the window.

clanging

In every building on the block, people are at their windows cheering on healthcare workers. They shout, clap, whoop, bang on pots, and blow on trumpets and recorders. Overall, it's a cheerful sound, but I can't help thinking of jail inmates banging their metal cups against the bars.

distant

This feels like a lost springtime. There are blossoming trees and other kinds of loveliness, but it all seems out of reach, as if it's in a parallel world.

emergencies

Streets emptier and sirens more prevalent.

prettiness

A magnolia blossom cradled in the split trunk of a tree.

restlessness

I don't know where I want to walk. I just walk.

undermines

He wears gloves every time he needs to open a door. With a gloved hand he also pulls down his mask and scratches his face. 

Week in Seven Words #495

cacophonous
We sit across from each other in a tiny office. Construction noise shatters our conversation.

fountain
The water in the fountain is dark and murky. Lily pads float in the basin. Partly a fountain, partly a pond, presided over by the statue of an angel.

models
The planes, which have been used for war, now look like painted toys displayed in unrelenting sunlight.

petrological
Anxiety: small, sharp stones on a stream bed churning in a powerful current. Regret: boulders thundering down a hillside.

plaza
Metal chairs beneath branches delicate as bones. Many people are reading, scrolling through websites, or sharing silence with friends. One man is alone and insane. He's ranting about $10 and listening to Elton John and Phil Collins on a small radio.

sweatiness
We push our way through the stuffy, narrow corridors of a ship. What must it have felt and smelled like, powering through the Tropics in days of no deodorant or A/C?

wistfully
The dog leaps at me and puts her paws up on my legs for a neck massage and chest rub. One guy looking on says that he could use a massage to his neck too.

Week in Seven Words #494

cooling
The branches are flapping in a strong wind, as if the trees are fanning themselves.

employing
The kids are inexperienced executives; the parents are zealous secretaries and social directors.

evacuations
The male and female hikers break up to urinate in the woods. They're yards apart, forming protective circles around each pee-er.

fitness
Because the elevators aren't working, the stairwell echoes with dreadful gasps.

head-on
Unresolved trauma will ruin your life, she says.

old-fashioned
Their home is Colonial style with a broad, pale face. An American flag is draped over the porch railing. The front door opens to small rooms stuffed with comfortable furniture. Rectangles of light cast by the windows fall short of the photos on the shelves and walls.

outage
Aside from a radio blatting from behind a door, the hallway is silent. Shadows are ganging up on the feeble emergency lights.

Week in Seven Words #481

fed
The baby is replete with slices of banana. He reclines on his dad's lap and accepts the mushy offerings from his mom.

fuzziness
What does my health insurance plan cover? The customer service representatives don't always seem to know. They offer optimistic but uncertain responses.

glowing
A lumpy black tree - it glows with dark warmth like a coal.

nightfall
A peach gray sunset over the river. Blossoms imprinted on it like stars.

pleaser
They exclaim over a Portuguese water dog, which flutters at their attention and seeks their patting hands.

roughhouse
Two girls roughhousing. Shoves, handstands, shouts, laughter.

undermined
"I don't get it," she says. Then, as I explain, her eyes seek the ceiling, the surface of the desk, her phone, her nails. "I don't get it," she says.

Week in Seven Words #478

fallen
They used to like her. Now they just humor her. It's painful to see.

kittenish
She looks like a ball of satin. Her puffy clothes have a pink sheen.

menacing
A stroller abandoned beside the statue of a warrior, its swords upraised.

merriment
We're clumped around tables on the second floor, the room warm, the liquor poured liberally, one girl dressed as a pirate blurting, "Arrgh, arrr!" to muffled laughter.

pine
Pine needles look like cascades of silver-green water.

pots
On a cramped balcony they've lined up clay pots painted light blue, lavender, and ochre. An outdoor garden where nothing grows yet. It's all prettiness and possibility.

unmarried
They announce his single status to the room. When he blushes and lowers his eyes, they laugh.

Week in Seven Words #472

corporate
She prefers working for a smaller company. The larger corporations demand too much conformity.

doe-eyed
The room has deep red wallpaper and animal heads mounted on the walls. Nothing else.

gerunds
I'm looking through picture books for a gift, and it amazes me how skinny books with simple illustrations and one word per page ("Running," "Flying,") have double-digit price tags.

illumination
He returns to the topic of his anger, and how he wishes he had learned earlier in life a whole vocabulary of emotions. To be able to put words to his feelings would have helped him stave off the outbursts that derailed his career. It's never just about words; it's about understanding yourself, the source of your feelings, and the options for how to act.

net
The branches of the bare trees form a diaphanous net that catches the sunlight.

opens
I overcome my own self-consciousness to talk to him, which helps him overcome his self-consciousness. We have a lovely chat.

uniform
From many windows, the same game is flickering. One large TV after another, mounted to a wall and dominating a room with the same shots.

Week in Seven Words #459

burnishing
The leaves by the lake light up in a shade of gold seen in Medieval art.

eyelids
The western-facing windows look like eyelids in the fading sunset. Some are peach in color. Others are grayish, creamy, or dusky.

ginkgo
The leaves stamped to the ground are like the handprints of trees. One of them I can immediately identify: the ginkgo, its leaves fan-shaped.

gluttonous
The sleek, rustling zippiness of ducks. They tear after chunks of English muffin on the south shore of the lake. Along the northern shore, people are feeding geese. The geese are impatient and aggressive. They barge out of the water for more food and honk their indignation when their demands aren't quickly satisfied.

relational
In front of a narrow house, in a yard as small as a cardboard box, an old woman tells a young girl, "You're a sister, a granddaughter, a daughter, a cousin..." She spells out the relationships that help the child define herself.

similarity
A man who used to be in the Chinese air force and a musician dressed in military garb from the American Revolutionary War both have daughters enrolled in the University of Pittsburgh.

symphonic
The colors of the leaves are lush and bold. They've erupted against the backdrop of a broad river with cliffs on the other shore. By my waist and feet are delicate purple flowers, a gentle counterpoint to the trees that burst like fireworks.

Week in Seven Words #457

differentiation
The advice you give someone may have worked for you, but won't work for them. They don't have to live your choices.

expressive
Some trees look like they have eyes, mouths, and, at times, whole faces imprinted on the bark. On one tree, what looks like multiple faces are emerging, their expressions stunned.

guarding
One motif that stands out in our walk: aggressive yellow jackets who are territorial about public garbage cans.

gullet
He eats out of a tub of ice cream while watching his favorite basketball team lose.

ocular
Walking along with two heavy grocery bags and one eye scrunched shut, after something has lodged against my eyeball on a windy day.

precarious
Holding the wine glass over my head as the kids kick a soccer ball around the room.

sensory
She prepares a strange tangerine tea. It smells good but tastes like a bitter oil.

First Hike of Spring (Bronxville to Valhalla, NY)

Two Sundays ago (3/24), I joined a group for a hike along the Bronx River Parkway in Westchester from Bronxville to Valhalla (where there are no dead Vikings feasting).

The border between winter in spring is very brown. Though even with few leaves and flowers, the landscape can still be beautiful.






Our lunch stop was in Scarsdale, which is a pretty town.



We walked through some of the residential neighborhoods where the homes have a variety of architectural styles.





However, the most impressive structure wasn't in Scarsdale but in Valhalla: the Kensico Dam.




In total, it was about 12 miles on a day when the temperature climbed from the low 30s in the morning to the mid 50s in the afternoon and stayed sunny, for the most part. A satisfying walk.

Week in Seven Words #438

conducting
A tourist family clumps beside me on the subway. When they hear my reassurance that they're on the right train, and that we're all going to the same place – the Staten Island Ferry – they follow me like baby ducklings until they're safely on the boat.

enlivening
He apologizes for talking too much, but there's no need. He's funny, clever, and down-to-earth. His brain is an old bookshop of anecdotes you'd actually want to listen to and historic trivia made more interesting by his theatrical retellings.

goggle-eyed
Two daycare workers push a large mini-van type of stroller with six babies, who stare at us in fascination, as if they're taking a tour of a zoo stocked with strange adults.

padding
A silent, muddy path in the woods. Something is watching me from the undergrowth. A cat.

snuffle
The dog hops onto the couch, where I'm working on some editing. She presses against me and sniffs at the small pile of pages balanced on my thigh. There's a chance that she'll try eating one of them. (She doesn't. Maybe the kind of ink I'm using isn't appetizing.)

unchanging
There's a timeless quality to the park's headquarters. The main room is small and smells of sawdust. The lighting is cozy and dim. Maps are scattered across the table, and posters and diagrams that largely go unread make the walls colorful. I can see the room being preserved this exact way for decades.

vista
The field is shaped like a bowl. It's screened by trees all around, and on one side it's bordered by a broad river.

Week in Seven Words #435

appearances
They're a young couple, boyfriend and girlfriend, looking like they've stepped hand-in-hand out of an ad for chewing gum or smartphone accessories. They're also deep in conversation. As they pass us by, I overhear a part of it. They're discussing whether it's possible to stab someone to death with a pencil.

enthuse
Most of the people in the group are men, and tough-looking men at that, but never mind the stereotypes, because they enjoy making the flower arrangements and giving each other (and the women) supportive comments over the creation of lovely little bouquets inserted into small silver-colored vases.

figurative
In the subway car, a young boy shimmies up one of the poles, shouts, "I'm a Tetris piece!" and slides down.

impressions
The room is dim, and incense burns by a small statue of Buddha. When asked if he's Buddhist, he replies that he isn't but was just trying to create a certain ambiance. A shoeless, quiet-voiced, spicy-smelling atmosphere of meditation.

murmurings
Leaf patting leaf, and one branch rustling to another.

sliced
She thrusts her hand into the soil and jerks it out with a gasp. Her finger is bleeding. She's been cut through her glove. Her first worry is that she's gotten nicked by a piece of glass or, worse, a discarded needle, but it turns out to be a thorn.

split
Pretending that mind and body are disconnected is terrible for one's health. Referring to the body as a mere "sack of meat" – to be disregarded or modified in whatever way you imagine – is profoundly damaging.

Week in Seven Words #426

blueness
Beyond the whirring tools and the dentist's graceful hands, an episode of Blue Planet plays on a small screen. I have no idea what's going on, aside from seeing great quantities of fish, but the general blueness is relaxing.

brightness
Sometimes a brilliant moment is made of sunlight falling on the white planks of a house and on the spruce that has sprung up beside it.

directing
The toddler stumble-walks with his finger out pointing.

inspiring
Art can be an antidote to oversimplification, smooth and quick explanations, cowardice, and brutality.

mawkish
She tries to entice me to watch the movie by showing me a YouTube clip, but all I see is syrup and little substance and actors who talk as if the dialogue is sticking to their teeth.

oof
The dog gets so excited that her owner has come home that she launches herself at my stomach from several feet away.

roofing
A writing assignment of many words that makes me realize just how important it is to have the right roof over one's head.

Week in Seven Words #424

clunking
The rhythm of our conversations is two people kicking a ball around aimlessly.

encompassing
Her shawl has rippling shades of blue, light and dark, as if a small ocean has settled around her shoulders.

purposeless
He stares in bemusement at his useless homework that his inebriated teacher won't bother to read.

replications
Along one avenue, each block seems to be copy and pasted, one to another. A succession of groceries, nail salons, pizzerias, and chain restaurants on repeat. (But there are some variations. A community bank, now and then. And sometimes the grocery store specializes in a certain cuisine.) Along another avenue, this one primarily residential, homes with their own small lawns give way to chains of homes with a flight of front steps and no lawn, followed by a block of project houses, then back to the homes with the front steps.

shedding
The park is all bare trees pawing at the sky, and leaves that have settled in rustling folds on the grass.

single-minded
The dog pants ferociously during the game of fetch. She darts, gasping and growling, down the hallway as if the tennis ball is an escaped criminal she alone can bring to justice.

sorcerous
Three cats emerge from a salt marsh. First a pair, then a lone one with a black mustache and thick white fur. None of them have collars.