Just had to share this photo I snapped of Tracie P last week. Isn’t she lovely? :)
The day after Thanksgiving, we recycled her scalloped potatoes as a spuntino for out-of-town guests who came over for a visit…
Did I mention that the girl can cook? ;)
A little bubbly helped to wash it down…
I always love the focus and precision of Jacquesson… one of our favorite houses (among those that we can afford!)…
Vita servare is the motto of the Austin-Travis County EMS department. Vita means life in Latin and servare means to make safe, save, keep unharmed, preserve, guard, keep, protect, deliver, rescue (isn’t Latin awesome?).
Yesterday I completed my Pediatric and Adult CPR training at their main office.
I was the only layperson in the class: all the other participants were professional health care providers who were obtaining or renewing their certification (nurses, paramedics, etc.).
After 3 hours of performing CPR on manikins, man, I was exhausted! G-d bless all the folks who do this for living. We’re lucky to have them…
My heart filled with emotion and my blood with adrenaline when I held the infant manikin in my arms for the first time. I hope I never have to perform CPR on Baby P but I’m glad that I’m ready.
We’re just a few weeks away from our due date at this point. The discomfort is not easy to deal with but we’re hanging in there. I’m doing my best to make Tracie P as comfortable as possible. And, every day, I love her all the more for carrying our little one… My Italian friends call her la piccola Parzen…
And, btw, I passed! :)
I highly recommend the class. Here’s the info.
Buona domenica, yall…
Baby P, the image above is your first “close up” from an early ultrasound. Someday we’ll tell you about what it felt like to “see” you for the first time.
Dear Baby P,
Mom is going to have a laugh when she reads this and discovers that I am at a loss for words… since I’m generally the one who talks too much!
She and I talk to you all the time and sometimes — especially in the morning when we say goodbye before the workday — I put my lips to her belly and I tell you I love you.
I’ve finally sat down to write you the letter I’ve been meaning to write you. But today I don’t know what to say.
I thought I’d have some nuggets of wisdom to share or some insights about becoming a parent. But I don’t.
When folks find out that you’re pregnant, they always ask the same three questions: is it a boy or a girl? do you have a name? are you excited? Sometimes I think they ask you those questions because they want to say something but, like me, they don’t know what to say.
There are plenty of people who offer advice about being a parent and much of it is sound and some of it has been useful. But most of it is their way of sharing the experience with you. As one Italian friend of our wrote, having a child is the most normal thing in life and it is also the most extraordinary.
But then there are the grandparents. They don’t offer advice. But nearly all of them say the same thing: having a child will change your life in ways that you can’t imagine.
Baby P, that’s a photo of your beautiful mom! And it’s also a photo of you. Some folks say she’s the most beautiful mother-to-be they’ve ever seen. I have to say that I agree! She’s been such a good mother to you and I love her so much.
Becoming a parent sure does change your life: your rhythms and daily routines change; your lifestyle changes; your body changes. Every time mom and I go to the doctor for your checkup, we marvel at the miracle of life. Even with all the science of the twenty first century, the great brains of the world still can’t figure out how it all works. (And it’s probably better that way.)
But it also changes how you see the world: from the milk that I buy for mom at the store to the way a line from the poet Virgil scans; from the car seats that I installed last week to the financial challenges that we and our friends in Europe are facing every day; from your baby clothes neatly folded in your nursery to the sadness in a best friend’s voice when he talks about missing his child. Everything looks, tastes, smells, feels, and appears differently to me. But it’s not because everything is different. It’s because I’m different.
Baby P, that’s my silver milk cup from when I was born. Your grandmother, Mamma Judy, had your name engraved on the other side of the cup.
Baby P, there’s so much I want to tell you. About the world and its great cities, about music and poetry, about philosophy and art…
But today, the words just won’t come.
And so I think I’ll just put my lips to mom’s belly and tell you I love you…
Sincerely,
Dad
Thanksgiving Day, 2011
As of today, we’re exactly four weeks away from our due date (did you know that pregnancy is now measured in ten months? So we are technically “nine months” pregnant).
But that didn’t stop Tracie P from making her famous Chicken and Dumplings (from scratch, including the stock) for Sunday supper with the Johnson Family. That’s Donkey & Goat Untended Chardonnay in my glass, btw.
We are all healthy and our obstetrician is very happy with Baby P’s development. Her weight is just below the 50th percentile, “right where we want baby to be” said our doctor. But we are feeling a lot of fatigue and discomfort these days with the final “growth spurts.” Tracie P’s belly is getting BIG!
Aunt Holly brought delicious cornbread and brownies…
We are so lucky to be surrounded by people who love us and want to help and support us as we head into the last month of our pregnancy…
Stay tuned! :)
It’s a very special moment in our lives right now: putting the final touches on the nursery, making weekly visits to our OB/GYN, installing the car seats…
We are all happy and healthy and despite the discomfort in the final weeks of our pregnancy (we’re about 5 weeks away from the due date), we’ve been enjoying this special time of grace for us.
Tracie P is so beautiful and words cannot express the joy of watching her carefully fold all the baby clothes and arrange each little sock in the drawers of Baby P’s new dresser…
There’s gas in the car and extra toothbrushes are packed for our trip to the hospital. We don’t expect to be heading there anytime soon… but we’ll be ready when the moment arrives…
Tracie P, I love you so much… You are such a beautiful mamma…
When my buddies Yelenosky, Erickson, and I tasted this wine together last week at Jaynes Gastropub, the three of us were simply floored by how friggin’ delicious it is.
Donkey & Goat 2010 Untended Chardonnay, made from a 30-plus-year-old abandoned and “un-grafted” vineyard in Anderson Valley, California.
As you can see from the image, the wine — the product of spontaneous fermentation — is unfiltered. Beautiful, bright acidity, 12.7% alcohol (YES!), brilliant citrus notes, and a freshness and drinkability (as the Italians say) that made this wine disappear with extreme celerity.
But the thing I loved the most about this wine was how pure it is — ideologically and sensorially.
In a world where “California Chard” is a brand created through aggressive manipulation of the grape variety, this wine’s purity spoke to the true nature of Chardonnay as a relatively neutral medium for expressing the place where it is grown and the winemaker’s interpretation. In this case, the winemaker’s transparency — literal and figurative — allows the wine to express everything that has gone into it: just place and grapes. I can’t recommend it highly enough (especially for wine lovers and trade who are trying to wrap their mind around what Chardonnay really is).
Thank you Donkey & Goat for this wine and thank you Amy Atwood for turning me on to it. Love it…
The folks at Jaynes had flown me in for one night last week (my last plane ride of the year! yeah!) to lead a guided tasting of Italian wines for a corporate client. (I’ll post about an interesting experiment I conducted during the nearly 4-hour long tasting next week.)
Jayne shared her excellent mozzarella-stuffed arancini with me. And their newborn daughter Romy shared her contagious smile…
Tracie P and I are in the final weeks of our pregnancy and I’m very happily grounded, with no more travel scheduled until 2012.
We’re so lucky to have so many friends and relatives who have recently had kids: the hand-me-downs are great and more than anything else, it’s wonderfully reassuring to share the experience with our friends as we deal with the discomforts and the anxiety that the last weeks of pregnancy can bring.
I’m so proud of my beautiful Mamma P: she’s such a great mother to Baby P and she’s so courageous (in our birthing classes, they give us a taste of what’s in store).
It’s so true what people say: having a child will change your perspectives in ways that you cannot imagine until it happens to you. We’re living that every day.
And just when I thought I couldn’t love Tracie (Mamma) P anymore, I find that my love continues to grow as she bravely and so graciously carries our little girl.
I wish yall could see her… she’s just so beautiful…
Reading about “Prime Minister George Papandreou’s surprise plan to hold a popular vote on the Greek bailout” this morning in The New York Times, I couldn’t stop thinking about the above photo I took on the island of Santorini this summer.
The next night, I was in Crete and the Greek parliament was about to vote on whether or not to adopt austerity measures imposed by the European Union. At dusk before dinner, you could still see the silhouette of the village where the modern Greek philosopher Kazantzakis was born.
The next day, the Greek parliament voted to adopt the measures. Today, I read in the Times that there’s a strong possibility that austerity won’t be embraced, that Greece will default on its debts, possibly going bankrupt and possibly leaving the Euro zone.
I’ll never forget how the folks I met on Santorini kept telling me the same thing: “It’s as if the Germans were invading us again, with these austerity measures and the bailout,” they said lugubriously.
I remember when dissertation advisor, Luigi Ballerini, told me for the first time (the first of many) how his father, an Italian soldier in the fascist army, was executed by German soldiers on the Greek island of Cephalonia after the liberation of Italy by the Allies in 1943 (Luigi wrote a cycle of poems about Cefalonia, published by Mondadori in 2005).
No matter who’s right or wrong, no matter how this mess will be resolved… has the post-war dream of self-governance and individual liberty come to a bitter end? It won’t be long before the focus of the international community shifts from Greece to Italy…
Where will this leave the farmer in the photo above? And how will explain all of this to Baby P when she arrives in December?
Someday, we’ll take her to Santorini…
From the department of “that’s what friends are for”…
Lots of good folks came out last night to share well wishes and good thoughts on my last visit to Los Angeles and Sotto for the year.
Schachter pulled out all the stops, reaching deep into his cellar for his last bottle of 1996 Bruno Giacosa Barbaresco Rabajà (white label) — honestly one of the best bottle of wine I’ve ever had. True to the legacy of the Rabajà cru, this mighty wine — from what many believe to be the greatest vintage of that decade — delivered aromas of mint and tar and earthy, savory flavors before revealing delicate, sublime fruit…
Keep smiling, keep shining, knowing you can always count on me, for sure.
Later in the evening, Anthony, Lars (who was in from Chicago), and Dan came in for a late-night dinner at the end of my shift.
Dan brought a number of incredible bottles, including the 1990 Taurasi Riserva by Struzziero (classic blended Aglianico with no vineyard designation). I’d only ever tasted Struzziero back to 1993 (which we have on the list at Sotto) and I was blown away by the elegance and the balance of this wine, still so fresh and with the vibrant acidity that traditional Aglianico can deliver. Another best-ever wine, with gorgeous ripe red fruit and an ethereal earthiness that prompted Lars and me to call this top wine in the flight.
And now there’s so much more I see, And so by the way I thank you.
Although no show-stopper like the Struzziero Taurasi, the 1982 Chianti Classico Riserva by Antinori was fantastic — a wine, we all agreed, from a time before America, California, and Parker, a wine from a time when Antinori still made wine. Classic Sangiovese, with impressive acidity for a wine this old and delicious plum and red stone fruit flavor. It was a fantastic pairing for the sous-vide Wagyū tongue that chef Steve sent over to our table. Loved this wine and the now forgotten era of Tuscan winemaking for which it spoke to me.
My goodness… From my baby shower to all the hugs that the staff gave me before we said good-bye, from the camaraderie, solidarity, and thrilling wines to the wishes that our friends shared with me on this last trip to Los Angeles… I know that I never would have emerged from the darkness of my life before to reach this magical, blessed moment… what a year it’s been… someday I’ll tell Baby P all about it…
Oh and then for the times when we’re apart, well then close your eyes and know, the words are coming from my heart.
Made all my connections today and looks like I’ll be home tonight. It’s always so crazy getting back to the river city from europe and man, am I glad I’m gonna be able to wrap my arms around tracie p and tell her how much I love her!
It’s looking good but wish me luck anyways!
Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
My friend Stefano Spigariol and I have known each other for more than 20 years, since I first came to Italy to study Italian philology in Padua where he studied Latin. Like many of my friends from university days, he works in the publishing industry in Milan, as a publicist for a top scholastic publishing house.
He’s one of my best friends in Italy and our confabulatio always ranges from the erudite to the rock ‘n’ roll, from the sacred to the profane.
He, his wife Anna (a lawyer), and daughter Matilde live in a one-bedroom apartment near the center of Milan.
Last night, they had me over for dinner: cheese and charcuterie, bread and taralli, roast chicken legs, Veneto-style braised cabbage, and a caponata, paired with a bottle of 2009 Sordo Dolcetto — an old-school expression of the grape variety that Stefano picked up for less than Euro 10 at his local wine shop.
I can’t think of a better meal for my last night in Italy…
Thanks again, Anna, Matilde, and Stefano… I love you guys!
Do Bianchi 