Training Log Archive: barb

Biking: to Fresh Pond to pick up the solar measuring device, then school for parent/teacher meeting, then home. Then work, then high school for meeting with the Arabic teacher, then work, then the community center to make a shade map.

Last night we went to a lecture at the Museum of Science by Susan Orlean, author of books including "The Orchid Thief" and staff writer for the New Yorker. She wrote an excellent piece on backyard chickens that was downright eerie in how precisely it described my own experience. The lecture was about chickens, and there were live chickens onstage with a camera on them projected on an overhead screen. It was a really good talk. She said she was interested in the sociology -- how suddenly many people wanted chickens after decades of people getting rid of them. How people's associations change from chickens being a connection to a rural past and maybe to poverty and dirt, and now the desire to eat locally-grown and healthful and you-know-where-it-came-from food. And the connection between women and chickens... I must say I find it almost disturbing how similar her story is to mine. The sudden passion, brought on by a friend with chickens, to get them ourselves; the late-night googling "cool modern chicken houses"; the hesitation about getting chickens until finding the Eglu; the taking of birds to the vet...



During the Q&A I got up and said how I liked her article and talk and had similar experiences and was looking for people to join me in the fight to change the Cambridge ordinances, and asked if she had thoughts about chickens in dense urban areas. I knew this might mortify Isabel so I didn't look at her once while I was talking, and I had sat in front of her which I thought would be good to avoid her feeling associated with me if I spoke up.



Afterward we went out for drinks & dessert. Izzy's friend Eva was along. At one point we were talking about me talking at the Q&A. Isabel did an impersonation of me, standing up with the microphone, in a breathy voice: "... And, um, I am going to tell you all about myself even though this lecture isn't about me, and I am going to take over this event to get EVERYONE to help me with my problem" or something like that. She was much funnier of course; I just can't remember things. I had been worried about coming off exactly this way, so I just put my face in my hands and moaned at this point. Isabel turned on a dime: "No, Mom, I was actually very proud: Yeah, that's my mom, isn't she great!" Yeah, right.

Later Isabel was explaining to Dave how to pronounce her other friend's last name (Galyean). Dave, she said patiently, say "Horse". "Horse," said Dave. "Now say 'foal'." "Foal." OK, "Galyean". "Galyean?" said Dave. We managed to figure out that she thought "galyean" was the name for a horse -- but she was thinking of stallion. At this point we started to lose it, and she explained she had been telling people for a year how to pronounce Galyean: "just like a horse!" Anyway, we had a lot of fun.

C • Galyean 5