matching tracksuits

It was not her first haircut, but what a difference it made. A bit off the back and she goes from looking like a baby

to looking like a little girl

"I try to hold on to these moments as they pass", sings Adam Duritz, and it's become my mantra. I have to cherish the rare moments that will become ever rarer. When K is vacuuming and L panics, running to me and screaming for me to pick her up, I hold her close; she clings so tightly to my neck that it's almost difficult to breath.

"Were you scared?" I ask.

"Tak," she says, relaxing her grip and simply putting her head on my shoulder.

I'll always want to hold her when she's scared; I'll only be able to for a few more years.

We took the girl to a pumpkin farm last week. She enjoyed hiding behind the pumpkins.

I enjoyed taking pictures, of her and the pumpkins.

The fields were largely empty. We'd waited too long.

We'd waited so long, in fact, that we often encountered the not-so-recently departed.

Still, we all found a pumpkin, even the Girl. "Zrob moj moj!" K suggests (Nana might have said, "Love the pumpkin!"), and L willingly complies.

Afterward, the Girl rode about a while,

and I took a few more pictures.

Pasta, yogurt, and fun.

I don't understand why the apple had to take the fall. It's not a terribly exotic fruit, and it doesn't seem to inflame the passions like, say, a mango. But perhaps that's the point: sin isn't supposed to be exotic -- it's the everyday things that get you.

But the everyday can be miraculous, and I suppose that's what Thoreau was getting at in Walden.

Maybe he had an apple orchard nearby. (I can't recall. I haven't read Walden since college. I set out to read it again, but my timing was off: I was coming back after two years in Poland and I got absorbed in the sit-coms shown during the flight and I ended up leaving my copy of Walden in the seat pocket in front of me. I'd like to think that brought some joy to the next passenger, but I know full well that the cleaning crew got it first. Hopefully someone read it.)

Apples in an orchard become out of the ordinary -- exotic even. After all, a day spent in the orchard can end with a bag of Pink Ladies in your kitchen and a feeling of satisfied exhaustion.

We spent the day at Sky Top orchard in Flat Rock, North Carolina. Our goal was simple: arrive when the Pink Ladies are ready. K called earlier in the autumn and we planned a visit for mid-October.

Pink Ladies are tough to get: they appear late in the season and disappear quickly. K and I discovered these slightly tangy, crisp apples in Asheville, and we always bought as many as we could as quickly as we could.

Today, we had our pick -- literally. We met a group of friends (I represented exactly 50% of the non-Polish delegation), had a picnic,

and then set off in search of Pink Ladies.

We passed by Golden Delicious, Fuji, Rome, Stayman, and other varities. Good apples, each and every one, but not as multidimensional as a Pink Lady.

For those of you who've never had the treat of crunching into a Pink Lady, it's an apple that starts of slightly sweet but has a tang that appears moments after the first bite and seems to grow as you eat the apple. It's sweet without having the cloying flavor of a Golden Delicious and it's tart without the alum-esque qualities of a Granny Smith.

The Pink Ladies were all the way at the back edge of the orchard. Past the newly planted grape vines and the empty McIntosh trees.

We were about the only ones out there. Does no one else know about Pink Ladies?

After walking, picking, and more walking (the second installment being more difficult carying a basketful of Ladies), we had break, led by L.

Then we had a pumpkin photo session, also led by L:

And now, finally having a bag full of coveted apples, we're all so sick of apples they are still sitting, disrespectfully, by the door, right where we put them when we came home.

And she did…