I squish your head I squish your head

In the current reincarnation of my life, I am surrounded by boys.

Seth, my husband, Remy and Sky, my sons, their friends, and all the contractors and repair guys that come to fix everything that my boys try their hand at doing.  Just because Jesus was a carpenter doesn’t mean that all Jewish guys can build stuff.  Especially in my family.  Me, I can run a nonprofit.  Running pipe and wire is not in my skill set.  Most of the time, I am odd man out.

One day last summer, on an island near Seattle, there was a sound that instantly transformed me for one glorious moment into one of the boys.

It was a soft, crackly sound followed by a delighted giggle.  You hear it when a basketful of peanuts is being passed around the table and the shells are tossed on the sawdust floors of a barbeque shack known for its ribs, rowdy music and down home decor.

“You mean, I can just throw the shells on the floor?”  Sky asked excitedly, his arm ready to sweep the pile of peanut shells on to the floor.  Remy and I ate our way through the basket of peanuts laughing as we flung fistfuls of shells at our feet.  Seth caught all of the action on his Flip video.  ”This place is great!”

Was it the museums, the cultural events, the marketplace that my boys remember about Seattle? Not really.  Was it the fun we had spitting shells on the floor.  Absolutely.  We still talk about the ferry ride over to this island barbeque place with its unique menu and peanut shell policy.   For me, it was a precious point in our trip where we were all just boys, me too!  having a great time with each other.

As we were driving Remy out to Stonybrook, I thought about a day this summer that we were all together again, travelling around Queens, and I wondered if they remembered that day.  We settled into a local restaurant Remy and I discovered earlier this summer and ordered lunch.  Suddenly, all of us – Seth, Sky, Remy and I were laughing again as we ordered all kinds of combinations of bread, cheese and pasta.  Everything a lactose intolerant Asian like me should not be eating but hey, the foccacia was fabulous!  So good we ordered two.

Now I don’t pretend to understand how the universe of boys works, what makes them think one thing is stupid and another thing is legit, primo, fly, ill, wavy or crunk (Impressed?  I just learned that stuff means “cool”).

Note to self:  If you even think you know what is cool, they will cut you down to size and squish your head.

the boys – Sky, Remy & Seth

When such a moment arrives in your life, enjoy it.  I am forever grateful they let me in their world as one of the boys once in a while so we can share a few laughs and a lot of carbs together.

Get more Wow!

If you want style notes and more for people who change the world, please check out:

Getting to Wow! to feel good, do good and look good

Nonprofit Knitwear for all things knit and nonprofit

Style Notes from me, your artspy

Hoong Yee

– Subscribe and get a little Wow! every day

– Forward the link to someone you think would be interested

– Link to a post on Twitter (follow me @hylkrakauer)

– Put a link to the blog in your Facebook status update

Thanks so much! I really appreciate your help.

Word of mouth is the best way to share, don’t you agree?

]]> http://hoongyee.com/2010/08/29/how-to-be-one-of-the-boys/feed/ 0 http://hoongyee.com/2010/08/16/statements-from-sky/ http://hoongyee.com/2010/08/16/statements-from-sky/#comments Mon, 16 Aug 2010 08:29:05 +0000 hoongyee http://hoongyee.com/?p=2319 Sky

when you’re being creative, innovative, imaginative, blah blah blah, don’t let the whole world stick their stupid noses in your face. They don’t know what the hell they’re talkin about. They’re all like “yo, whatchu doing? What the hell is that? That’s not creative, what are you doing?!”. They don’t know anything. They have nothing better to do than to criticize other people and what they do. Whatever is creative in your little mind, is the only thing that matters. Those people with no lives probably live in a trailer and have a fat husband who sits on his recliner all day watching some soap opera or some crap like that. Don’t let those people rise above you! You have the potential to be something bigger than they’ll ever be! All ya need, is some creativity, innovation, and all that stuff my mom has been talkin about but i don’t know what the hell she’s talkin about, i just know it helps people so….go mom!
- Sky, The Favorite Child

I told the kids we were going out and coming back late.

I can’t believe I let him talk me into doing this.  A casual suggestion to do a little something different, something unplanned, un peu risque for a midweek date -I am intrigued and worried at the same time.  After twenty five years of marriage, three kids and a second opinions for every doctor’s appointment, for me an act of risk is going outside with my hair wet so of course, I said OK.   We were on vacation, what could be so bad?

G00d, I don’t want them to know what we’re doing.

Or throw a party.

Exactly.

The place we’re going to is known locally as the No Tell Motel and we knew a woman from the neighborhood who told us that was where she and her lover would meet and now, here we are.  Just like everybody else looking for a few private hours and just like everything in life, there is a method to this madness, a protocol of private affairs.

What better place for two exhausted nonprofit professionals to add a little zip to a relationship, to reboot a romance or simply escape into a getaway experience than your local cash only motel?  So, do you walk in together?  Do you say hello if you recognize someone – now that would be interesting!  Someone should really write a field guide for situations like this.

Where do people park?  Right in front of the place across the street from Bella Frutta?  What if all those moms waiting for their kids at Fazio’s Dance Studio look out the window?  Oh my God, they might see me and then what?!!?  They’ll think we’re sneaking around.

But we’re married and sneaking around.  That’s acceptable.

Did he really just say that?

Until you get caught.  Men… you are all alike.

So, you want to wait in the parking lot?

Yes!

Seth got out to register leaving me surrounded by other women in parked cars checking their looks in the mirror and putting on dark sunglasses.  One by one they picked up their cellphones and got out of their cars pivoting on their stilettos and disappearing into the back door of the motel.  I made up a little game trying to guess what the story was behind each tryst.  “She’s his secretary, no – his best friend’s secretary and he probably told his wife he was at a golf outing.   And that one  is thinking how clever he is, never  going for a friend of his wife or a wife of a friend. ” My observations were cut short by the ringing of my cellphone.  The woman in the car next to me smiled knowingly.  How dare she think I was a cliche, one of those Other Women Waiting In Cars?  I am a married woman, an executive director,  and clearly someone indignant about being noticed as, well, a woman waiting for a phone call.   I glared back and suddenly realized by the ring on her finger that she was married too – and probably a non profit arts administrator.  We could exchange business cards.   I barked an angry hello into my phone.

Wait til you see the room!  It’s got this huge Jacuzzi and mirrors everywhere.

I asked the guy if you need to make reservations, he just smiled and said no.  Its mostly a walk – in, short stays, bring your own champagne and cash kind of business.

You brought champagne?

Just a little something to relax us before I turn into a love machine, my darling.

Suddenly, Seth’s voice became a large growly sort of rumble.  It slowly grew into a low roar.

I could not catch a single word he was saying.

What’s going on?   Are you OK?

Sorry, that was the ice machine.

I’m doomed.

Get more Wow!

If you want style notes and more for people who change the world, please check out:

Getting to Wow! to feel good, do good and look good

Nonprofit Knitwear for all things knit and nonprofit

Style Notes from me, your artspy

Hoong Yee

– Subscribe and get a little Wow! every day

– Forward the link to someone you think would be interested

– Link to a post on Twitter (follow me @hylkrakauer)

– Put a link to the blog in your Facebook status update

Thanks so much! I really appreciate your help.

Word of mouth is the best way to share, don’t you agree?

She does tai chi and takes cha cha classes four times a week with her friends in a Buddhist temple across the street from a fabulous northern style noodle shop in Flushing, Queens.  She has a very busy social life. Mahng sz le! she sighs when I finally reach her on the phone in the evening.   So busy!

Oh, she also sings in a chorus that performs an intriguing repertoire of songs.  Here’s a little video of her latest appearance.

Check out what Wow! can look like when you’re 86.

Enjoy!

Get more Wow!

If you want style notes and more for people who change the world, please check out:

Getting to Wow! to feel good, do good and look good

Nonprofit Knitwear for all things knit and nonprofit

Style Notes from me, your artspy

Hoong Yee

I want the part of me that touches the earth to lift me closer to the sky.

I want heels to add height and romantic family history to add stature.

Oh, and there has to be a story.  A raison d’etre for me to learn the craft of handmade footwear and to release my inner shoe diva.

my grandmother, my baby aunt and my mom in Shanghai

in the 1920’s

And there is.

So many women in my family’s history had bound feet.  Tightly curled, pointed and perched in delicate silk platformed shoes, their tiny feet peeked out from under their long skirts and fitted jackets.  A sign of a privileged class of women that did not need to walk or work or do anything that could be done by their servants.

Had the world not changed, my grandfather might have been married to one or several such aristocratic women.  Luckily for me, he did not.  He met a beautiful young medical student in Tokyo who became the love of his life and a doctor as well.  She was not typical of her times, choosing to pursue a medical career and wearing western clothes.

No bound feet for her.

I suppose it is this image of her that inspires me to define by design what had for centuries defined women of a certain class.  What precious few photos I have of her depict a poised, confident and stylish young woman on the arm of my grandfather as they watched the world they knew disappear forever.

How could I not be swept off my feet knowing this to be part of me?  How strangely wonderful to be a daughter of this complex family and to choose how I want to move through this world.  The sketches I have made are all of shoes that my grandmother could have worn walking down the streets  and boulevards of Shanghai and Tokyo in the 20’s.

You can see a description of my shoe workshop here.  More to come!

Get your shoes on!

If you want style notes and more for people who change the world, please check out:

Getting to Wow! to feel good, do good and look good

Nonprofit Knitwear for all things knit and nonprofit

Style Notes from me, your handmade shoe designer

Hoong Yee

Just when I feel like giving up and allowing myself to backslide out of my diet, my blogging, my early morning run, a little rhythm runs through my head – cha, cha, cha cha cha.

Remember my mom?  She’s the one who always reminds me that I am just a speck in the universe and I should strive to be the best speck that I can be.   Well, she practices what she preaches, but she also dances.

Here is a little video of my mom’s cha cha class that I took on her 86th birthday.

Get your dancing shoes on!

If you want style notes and more for people who change the world, please check out:

Getting to Wow! to feel good, do good and look good

Nonprofit Knitwear for all things knit and nonprofit

Style Notes from me, your artspy

Hoong Yee

All of you know by now that I am passionate about all of you  Getting to Wow!  To make the most of every moment, every day.  Momentous living.

This is a journey and just like the proverbial journey of a thousand miles, this journey begins with a single step.  This is a moment to be wearing the perfect shoe.

I cannot imagine a loftier and lovelier challenge than to design shoes for my journey to Wow!  For my birthday, Seth signed me up for a workshop to learn the intricate craft of handmade footwear and to unleash “my inner shoe”.    For those of you who are curious about my class, you can read more about it here.

I will be learning how to make a pair of mules – those are shoes with no heels that you slide your feet into  – and to prepare for my class, I have been thinking a lot about where these shoes will take me.

My mom has a picture of her mother’s family in China where I can see the tiny bound feet of her great aunts and grandmother peeking out from under their long silk skirts.  My grandmother, however,  is wearing modern styled clothing which she wore after graduating from medical school in Tokyo.  She is wearing western shoes with a slender ankle strap and heels which took her far away from this vanished world of feudal Chinese aristocracy into the twentieth century.

I am fascinated by her journey, forever grateful for her courage and choices that ultimately brought my mother to America.   My shoes, will reconnect me to my fascinating grandmother, the one who walked from one world into another in style.

shoe with straps

I like all of these buckles.  The ones in the front can hold your foot which is very important since  mules do not have the back part of the shoe gripping your heel.

shoes so pretty

How sweet are these shoes!  They were in a store window perched prettily on a cake plate.  I want my shoes to elevate me like a confection.  With height and stature.

Height from my heels,  stature from my soul.

Get more Wow!

If you want style notes and more for people who change the world, please check out:

Getting to Wow! to feel good, do good and look good

Nonprofit Knitwear for all things knit and nonprofit

Style Notes from me, your artspy

Hoong Yee

]]> http://hoongyee.com/2010/03/18/designing-shoes-for-fun-and-nonprofit/feed/ 0 http://hoongyee.com/2009/10/19/gamechangerrunner-mom/ http://hoongyee.com/2009/10/19/gamechangerrunner-mom/#comments Mon, 19 Oct 2009 00:04:30 +0000 hoongyee http://hoongyee.com/?p=496

hoong yee and hoong wei

We ran the Tufts 10K on Columbus Day, my sister Hoong Wei and I.  What that really means is that we ran vigorously in front of every photographer at the beginning and at the end of the race and everywhere there was a downhill.  Since breathing is difficult for Hoong Wei, we decided to walk  the race and try to get in under 2 hours which we did.  We won!

Lung cancer is a bitch.

For all of the years when young children and messy lives prevented us from finishing a sentence, this run was the one moment in time we could have a conversation, just the two of us.  The run is still ours, but now with the uninvited and demanding presence of cancer.

Hoong Wei is a gamechanger.  If not for her sheer will and determination to beat her lung cancer, she would have been long gone according to her doctors.  Yesterday afternoon, she and Howie took us sailing.  She taught Sky how to steer the boat while yelling at the rest of us to lean and duck so we wouldn’ t get smacked in the head by the mast.

hoong wei and sky

“Gowjees port! “

“What side is that?  Oh my God, we’re tipping!”

“Coming about!”

“Now what?  Where should we gowjees go?”

Gowjees, for those of you who don’t know what the heck I am talking about, are potstickers.  We had about a thousand or so of all kinds for lunch – steamed, pan fried, microwaved, toaster ovened.  So imagine the weight shift of the boat with all of us tumbling around.

howie and hoong wei

And as if that wasn’t enough movement to digest a dynasty of gowjees, we sailed home to eat an early carbo loaded dinner and headed out to Hoong Wei’s ice hockey game.  Yes, she plays defense for Twister Sistahs!  The high point for me was when she got put in the penalty box for some overly aggressive action.

hoong wei in the penalty box

Why a gamechanger?  She thinks this way:  I can fool cancer by making it think it doesn’t belong here while I am sailing, playing ice hockey and running for photo ops in a 10K.  I have fooled it for 3 years – what an idiot!  I will continue to do so by living the fullest cancer free, happy and healthy life every day.

My sister, the gamechanger.  Me, I am a gowjee eater and her biggest fan.

Hey Mom, do you like my dress?

Yes, I like the dress. But what shoes?

Remy, Sky & Mikki

Have you ever gone out for dinner and come back from an experience?

Seth celebrated 27 birthdays before we met. On Saturday, the two of us, with our three children (21 years worth, but I digress), put on our grown up clothes and headed into Manhattan to celebrate his 27th birthday together since we met 10,000 days ago. OK, it is his 54th birthday but it is so much more fun to look at it in numbers.

Mikki, who will be 8,000 days old in a few days, and Pierre, her ami, planned a dinner party for us at Daniel that was extraordinary and wonderful. Here we are in the kitchen with the magical people who create these culinary works of art everyday. I realized that my days of planning birthday parties for my children are coming quietly to an end. Two are voting, the youngest now has a deep voice that squeaks only when the other two pin him down to be tickled. They don’t believe in Santa Claus, or Hanukah Harry. But I know they believe that some things are worth suspending your world for to celebrate, like love in its achingly precious beginnings. And love that is 10,000 days old.

dans la cuisine

Stuff Seth says

Guys say the most amazing things.  Things  that would never cross my mind in a million years.  Or my friend Andrea’s.  Here are a few examples:

1.  What David said after our run

“Softscrub in the shower works great.”  David said.  “I use it on my body, on the tiles and if I’m still in my bathing suit I wash that too.  I do three things at once.  No brainer!”

“How can something that can take mold off your bathtub be good for your skin?”  I was mystified by his disregard for the unleashed power of bleach disinfectant yet I marvelled at his logic.

“You do it once a week.  It shakes up your cleaning routine, sort of like interval training when you want to kick up your running.”

Andrea brought a plate of fresh fruit to the table and shot me a you-pick-your-battles smile.

You certainly do.

2. What Seth said after I lost 11 pounds

“I don’t get it.  I just lost all this weight on my Lemonade Diet and I still have a tummy.”

“Honey, you don’t understand.  Weight loss is based the theory of everywhereness.  You just lost the equivalent of two 5 pound bags of sugar all over your body.  Look,  let’s say this picture of a balloon around a bowlegged cowboy is you.  Now, we take away the pounds you lost by letting out some air from the balloon.  And that’s you!”

“So, you’re telling me  I look like a deflated bowlegged cowboy.”

“Yes! And you’re not fat.”

Sigh!

Anybody else with something to share with us?  Oh, and if any of you know a better way to scan sketches so they look clean, please let me know!