birthday cake

Pandemic Haircut

~ Susan Knoppow ~ 3 Comments

My first thought on removing the plastic bag and rinsing out the extra dye was “troll doll.” Not the giant eyes and round belly. But the hair. Definitely the hair – bright mermaid blue. After some challenging weeks (David’s bike accident, friends suspecting Covid – which, fortunately, turned out to be a false alarm), here was something to celebrate.

Friday afternoon, Birch cut my hair on our deck – the first clippers to touch my head since February. Yesterday, I let her dye it. Because … Why not? My children have been dying their hair for years. I’ve long wondered what it would be like to color mine.

But I don’t do that sort of thing, so I set the idea aside. Until this weekend.

These days, everything feels uncertain, ad-hoc. What difference does it make what color my hair is? And what difference does it make if that dye job is the perfectly imperfect work of my sixteen-year-old? It’s joyful. It’s fun. It’s hair, for heaven’s sake.

Last night, we celebrated David’s 53rd birthday. Birch made a chocolate peanut butter icebox cake (highly recommend; here’s the recipe). Miriam and Sammy visited from Ann Arbor, where they are each living in coops with 15 young adults. It was our first family gathering since they left home again in July.

They arrived wearing masks.

We sat on the deck, six feet apart.

They didn’t stay overnight.

I loved being with them. All week I felt excited and sad – anxious to see them, sad that we couldn’t hug, relieved that during this isolating time they are living in community.

Birch had 12 days of community at Camp Lookout too, the best part of her summer hands down. This was her fourth season at the tiny camp in Northern Michigan, the capstone session before being old enough to work there next year.

When Governor Whitmer moved our state into Phase 4, the directors figured out a way to offer tiny camp experiences for kids from the same region of the state. Camp was back, albeit with masks and distance and pre-arrival Covid tests.

And now they’re even offering a semester school option, which my kid is anxious to join – seven weeks of online school with your home district, while engaged in a camp-like community up north.

So, things are looking up in unexpected ways.

And I have turquoise hair, which I love.

My children are finding their way during this odd time. Birch is settling into communities that embrace and celebrate her trans identity – folks who don’t question her name, her pronouns or her politics.

Sammy’s friends are returning to Ann Arbor after scattering when school shut down in March. They are walking and talking together-but-apart, sitting on the porch, sharing meals as best they can.

Miriam is working at a farm a couple days each week, figuring out what the fall of senior year looks like, navigating uncertainty like a pro.

No, it’s not what I expected. But it’s what we’ve got, and I’ll take it.

How Are You Doing?

~ Susan Knoppow ~ 3 Comments

I am drawing blobby shapes on my sketch pad, filling them in with colored pencils while listening to Haydn piano sonatas.

I am advising my youngest baker on what to do with the over-cooked marshmallow concoction that was supposed to become a buttercream icing base. (Start again. Can we substitute dark corn syrup for light? Not sure, but what the heck?)

I am deciding whether butter is an emergency supply and needs to be purchased right this minute from a nearby gas station. (No.)

I receive texts with photos of baking projects from my cousin in Chicago. Last week, challah; this week, bagels. They are gorgeous. He says they’re a bit doughy. He’ll try again.

My children are making dinner, one night each: red lentil & sweet potato curry, pad thai, tempeh-cauliflower stew, lemon-ricotta pasta. I am relieved not to be cooking so much.

I run through grocery lists and meal plans in my head multiple times a day. I fill virtual grocery carts, only to find that the food can’t be delivered till … till never. Try again later. Or tomorrow. Or the day after that.

I realize I don’t have parsley or horseradish for next week’s seder. A friend says she’ll share if I can’t buy my own before then.

I connect with a Covid-infected friend daily. She is in New York. I am in Detroit. I feel like we are only a week behind them. I am scared.

A friend leaves five heads of garlic on my front porch. I will buy flour for her with my next grocery delivery.

I help my children move furniture. They are swapping dressers, clearing out closets, moving books to the basement or to the giveaway pile in my room, which is growing, and which I cannot deliver to the charity thrift shop until who knows when.

I don’t know what to do with the overdue library books. Where should I put them so I’ll remember to return them when it’s time?

I do online yoga on my bedroom floor. I use two mats because hardwood is not that forgiving.

We sing Happy Birthday to my mother on Zoom, all of us in silly hats, huddled around the laptop camera.

Today we will deliver her chocolate birthday cake covered in buttercream. Once she’s seen it whole, we’ll cut the cake in half and take a portion back home. Maybe we’ll set up the computer on the dining room table and eat it together.