Hyde Park and its Art Fair

Hyde Park, Chicago is a wonderful neighborhood.  For one thing, it contains two of my grandchildren, one of my daughters and her husband, and a group of amazing and diverse people, including President Obama and his family.  It also has the Lab School, the Oriental Institute, one of my all time favorite bookstores, a farmers market just beyond the Midway Plaisance, several restaurants that I feel absolutely must be visited each time I'm in town (you know who you are), Rockefeller Chapel with one of the best pastors in the world and, of course, UC and its quad.

Once a year it also has an art fair.  My daughter and I took off into the booths of the fair, while Steve took the kids to the playground that is literally in the middle of the fair (nice planning, Art Fair).  Of course, we both found works we couldn't live without.  Amazing photos that we all liked for different reasons.  Clothing, hand made and hand dyed, perfect for small granddaughters.

For me the emphasis seemed to be on wood as a material.  I found fountain pens (when was the last time I wrote with an actual fountain pen?  tomorrow?) made of  various woods, one of which reminded me of talks with my father about different woods and their characteristics and his favorites.  Then I came across the lady from Arizona with the wooden cooking spoons and other kitchen and dining implements and accessories.   In some cases, when the wood she was using for a cutting board or lazy Susan had a crack in it, she had filled the crack with tiny bits of turquoise or malachite.  Eye catching and attention catching.  I had to ask her how she did that and tell her how much I admired the color and its effect.  Somehow that led on and on as we discussed Arizona and my recent trip there and to New Mexico.  We found that we were pretty close in age.  That both of us wanted to rent rather than buy property because we didn't want to be tied down because how could you move around and explore whatever caught your fancy if you were tied down (Good lord, there is someone else like me!).  We talked about what we knew we wanted in the place we might find and settle down in.  I was intrigued that her primary requirement was a political attitude that was congenial to her.  When I mentioned how much I had liked Savannah, she reminded me not about the heat and humidity in the summer, but about the fact that Newt Gingrich was from Georgia.  The conversation wandered all over the place, in every sense of the words.  My patient daughter went off to visit a nearby booth and came back.  We were still in animated conversation.  Finally, I was reminded that we really should go and rescue Steve from playground duty and we did.

Thinking back on the day, I realized that the pleasant conversation with the lady with the wooden kitchen items had netted me not only some presents and some additions to my own kitchen but a memory and an insight.  In our family, Bill was always the gregarious one with the gift of gab.  He could and did talk with anyone and everyone about anything and everything.  I liked this characteristic because it was something I was not good at and it meant that he was naturally cast as what I called "Secretary of State" for the family.  But it was not always one my favorite things about Bill.  I used to remind him on quite a few occasions that I did not see the need for all these conversations.  Somehow he could never see the need for that comment.

The clearest thing, though, was that this was something he did and something I most certainly did not do.  But wasn't what I had done today, just what he would have done?  His conversation would have been a different one, I'm sure, but the chat, the laughter, the fact that there was always just one more thing to say, one more point to make -- that would be Bill to the life.  Where was my "I don't know what to say", my reluctance to talk to "a perfect stranger", the idea that I should keep it to what needs to be said to accomplish a mission like buying some cool stuff?  Frankly, I have no idea.  I don't think I've changed fundamentally, but something has been going on for me.  Perhaps a little more openness and a little more willingness to risk a little embarrassment.  What does that matter anyway?  Personally I think that the curiosity that has always been there is now poking it's head up more and asking some questions and demanding some answers from me and from the world, whoever that may be.