August 10, 2014 by anexpatreturned - 3 Comments

Quite Ready for Another Adventure (a Day Trip to Fredericksburg)

I suppose it actually has been 5 months since I put up a post on this poor, neglected blog. Most of you must have thought I’d fallen right off into the “Here There Be Dragons” zone of the map while seeking out new expat adventures. That might have been pretty fun, actually… well, if I’d had my dragon-charming equipment with me when I slipped off the edge of the world, anyway. Gladly, it’s a moot point.

Today we go back to Fredericksburg, to my favorite bookshop and to take a little tour of some of my favorite goofy shop windows. Just hang in there while I explain why I've been gone so long...

Today we go back to Fredericksburg, to my favorite bookshop and to take a little tour of some of my favorite goofy shop windows. Just hang in there a minute while I explain why I’ve been gone so long…

There are a few reasons for my long hiatus. The first is, simply, that it’s a very time consuming and sleep depriving endeavor to start your own company. The second is that, limited to a bicycle-riding radius around my home, I was beginning to run out of topics and inspiration. I couldn’t always wait for some occasion or someone else’s motor power to take me to some new town or place worth telling you all about.

So, the big news is (cue drumroll) I finally got some motor power of my own. It took me almost exactly 11 months from the day my plane from Italy touched down, but it was well worth the waiting and scrimping. Perhaps you can imagine the way I felt when I first got behind that wheel and knew that I could go anywhere.

“Wait!” you might say at this juncture. “That’s an exaggeration!”

Believe you me, when you’ve grown up in pre-Schengen Zone Europe, and Eastern Europe during the Cold War especially, it is not. I grew up knowing that you could only drive so far without running into a border – probably involving barbed wire and machine guns – and, even if you got to the other side, you wouldn’t be able to get a bottle of water until you exchanged your currency or ask for directions unless you spoke a different language.

Those of you familiar with Tolkien’s oeuvre will know remember what Bilbo says to his nephew. “It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.”

When I read that line as a child, I always thought about America. We’d come back from Europe for the summer holidays and go visit the grandparents. We’d pull out of their driveway to go somewhere and I’d think of the maps I’d studied in school and I knew that, if we just kept driving, we could go anywhere. We could drive all the way to the Pacific and never have to pull out a passport or a phrasebook.

Of course, as an adult, one of the things I love best about traveling is the cultural diversity, the new sounds, smells, tastes, ways of speaking and even ways of thinking that other countries have to offer. That’s the beauty of traveling abroad. The fact remains, however, that I can reverse out of my driveway and the little road outside of my front door could sweep me off all the way to the Rocky Mountains, the Grand Canyon, the Painted Desert… all those places I’ve dreamed of and never seen. Someday I’m gonna do those things. What I can also do is return to some places I’ve loved and would like to get to know better, something I didn’t have the leisure or liberty to do until now (motor power!).

I’ve been planning this blog comeback for a couple of weeks now. I got a map and drew a 60-mile radius around my house, figuring that anything that fell within it was close enough for a stress-free day trip. Last week I even had my backpack packed and ready to go one morning. I was literally walking out the door when my clients in Italy called me up with yet another urgent job. What can you do when you have your own business? You certainly can’t say no. I was planning to go the next day, and the next…

I didn’t give up hope. The bag waited, ready with maps and camera. Yesterday I knew that today would be the day, and so it was. I set off – not for somewhere new and unexplored, but for someplace I already know and love and had been wanting to get back to for awhile: Fredericksburg, Virginia.

Those of you who have been following my blog may remember that I’ve already done a couple of posts about Fredericksburg. There was the “Sorry Mom” post and the “What to Do When It’s Raining (or Snowing) in Fredericksburg, Virginia”” post, about the Griffin Bookstore and Coffee Shop, which is where I happened to be sitting when I began writing this post (it ranks up there among my favorite places in the entire world). Not only do they have a wonderful selection of used books for pretty any much any taste, the also have some of the coziest rooms in the world and a garden that I could sit in for hours with whatever volume has decided to befriend me.

How can you not stay here until you’ve finished the chapter… and the next one… and…

A cool refuge on an August day… and you’ll never get bored in there.

It’s even pleasant underfoot.

Fredericksburg is, of course, a town with a ton of stories to tell. George Washington’s boyhood home was here, after all, not to mention the Civil War battle that took place here. On my first visit, when I’d only been back in the States about a month, I saw the historic homes, plantations and the battlefields. I took the trolley tour and explored the antique shops. Since then, I’ve been back a couple of times and, obligatory tourist stops aside, it’s also an extremely pleasant place to be. The locals are much friendlier than anyone would have any right to expect them to be in a tourist town such as this, there are more bookstores than grocery stores (Finally! A town with it’s priorities straight!) plus some really excellent restaurants. We’re not going to be serious today. Today, I’m going to show you some of my favorite shopfronts and store windows – the kind of things you spend your time looking at if you’ve already visited a couple of times before (which you have, if you’ve been following my posts). Enjoy!

Let’s start with those bookshops. Besides the Griffin, there are a couple more right on Caroline Street, the main shopping drag, whose windows I always enjoy.

What a fantastic name for a kids’ bookshop. The stuff they have in the window is enough to make any small child with a big imagination (wait… that’s all small children, isn’t it?) write a very long wish list. The window isn’t that fun today, but I’ve seen it veritably brimming with the kind of toys that make me wish I were a kid again.

Riverby Books is a little more serious. The browsing is excellent but the lack of the coffee shop aspect means I’m not inclined to stay for quite so many hours… just one or two.

Riverby also has a whiteboard in their one window that’s always worth stopping by to read. Here are a few of the things I’ve seen there over the last few months:

A tongue-in-cheek Fredericksburg architecture primer…

Anyone got any Lego to get rid of? (This was back in May, but I bet they’re still buying.)

This one was from around graduation time. I know the glare makes it hard to read, but give it a try. It’s worth it.

Alas, man (and woman) cannot live on books alone, so off I headed to find some lunch. The Virginia Deli seemed like a good choice for a quick, budget meal and indeed it was. I was tempted by the southern pulled pork BBQ sandwich but, in the end, opted for a less soporific roast beef. I did have to ask the owner about the suspicious statements on the signage:

He cleared everything up for me. Both George and Bobby have eaten there. Only, their likenesses are a little misleading: the former is the George who owns the Blarney Stone up the street, while Bobby owns an establishment a couple of blocks in the other direction. So, as you see, it’s all true.

Later on, once the Griffin had closed its doors for the day, I turned my steps toward the Hyperion, the local specialty espresso shop and hangout for the kind of people (like me) who like to plonk their computers down on a table near an outlet and not move for a few hours. They’re open a little later, even on Sundays.

A little caffeine jolt did me good for the ride home, which was rather more adventurous than the ride in. I decided to set my GPS to avoid any highways and see what would happen. What happened was rather a lot of cows, horses, deer and generally extremely windy country roads. It was a lot of fun, but I did get home quite a bit later than planned. What this means is that some of those photos I took and things I wanted to share will have to wait for another post. That’s ok, I’m sure I’ll be going to Fredericksburg again.

Let me just close with one more of my favorites for now:

Super-sophisticate handmade shoes should always be paired with silly socks. How else would you wear them, really?

Super-sophisticated handmade shoes should always be paired with silly socks. How else would you wear them, really?

Meanwhile, my new motor power should help finally have some new expat returned adventures. I look forward to sharing them here with you. Thanks for reading and see you again soon!

Jennnifer

March 19, 2014 by anexpatreturned - 1 Comment

The NYC Origins of My Love for Cafés & What to Do When It’s Raining (or Snowing) in Lexington, Virginia

Café Pick Me Up: My favorite ‘office’ in New York City, as it was back in the day (c. 2000). Since then it’s suffered a fire and changed owners at least once, but it’s still there. I check every time I visit. Its name is the
English translation of tiramisu. This is where my café obsession truly began.

Perhaps it is the years I spent living in New York that taught me to treat coffee shops as though they were an extension of my home. Anyone who has lived in that city for any length of time, and especially in their young and poor years, knows that most living situations there are far from ideal. Apartments are usually small, often cramped and quite frequently dark and crowded with variety of animals (domestic and otherwise) and roommates (domestic and otherwise). That’s why New Yorkers love their cafés. Go to any coffee shop and you’ll see the locals parked at tables strewn with books, journals, computers and tablets, sandwich wrappers and coffee cups. I remember it well. The table (preferably with a nearby power outlet) becomes a desk, the café’s sitting room your office, your fellow patrons your colleagues. Since then, I have never lost my love for whiling away the hours in a coffee shop and, when I lived in Italy, it was one of the things I missed most (nota bene: the Italians may have the world’s best coffee culture, but they have no café culture to speak of, at least not in the way we envision it).

Yesterday, my personal mission to complete my mental map of the world’s coziest and most welcoming coffee shops took us to Fredericksburg, VA. Today, it takes us to Lexington, also in Virginia, which I visited last summer, not long after I’d come back to America. It is a university town, so I expected to find a café of the sort I love. I wasn’t disappointed.

When I first walked into the Lexington Coffee Shop, I couldn’t wait to choose a mug and go up to the bar to order my coffee.

The Mug Wall at the Lexington Coffee Shop

Then, however, I looked a little closer. What a marvelous idea! As an out-of-towner, I felt a little left out of the fun. However, if I were a local, I can think of nothing better than to know my mug was waiting for me at my favorite coffee shop. After my New York café experiences, I like nothing so much as to be able to think of my neighborhood coffee shop as a kind of detached annex to my home, and having my own mug there all the time would certainly do the trick. Perhaps, if I go back there, I’ll bring one along just for the heck of it. When you find a good place somewhere in the world, even if chances are slim that you’ll return, it’s always nice to know you’ll be welcome. A mug on a hook with my name on it, so to speak, would sure do the trick.

Until next time, stay cozy and stay caffeinated!

If you take a stroll around town once the weather clears, you'll find that the Lexington shop owners have a talent for interesting window-dressing.

I’ve heard of a jackalope but never of a basset-houndalope. Strange critters they’ve got down south…

Oh, and by the way, if you take a stroll around town once the weather clears, you’ll find that the Lexington shop owners have a talent for… unusual window-dressing.

March 18, 2014 by anexpatreturned - 3 Comments

What to Do When It’s Raining (or Snowing) in Fredericksburg, Virginia

Anyone who knows me knows that two of life’s greatest pleasures for me are books and coffee – and I have a definite weak spot for any place that can combine both. Whether they be neighborhood coffee shops with shelves of second-hand books for customers or bookshops with couches and caffeine on demand, be they big or small, sophisticated or down-to-earth, it’ll be hard to drag me back out of the door once I find them. In any town I’ve ever visited or city I’ve ever lived in, I generally found them all within a matter of days or even hours. And what better and cozier thing is there to do on a snowy (or rainy) day?

Sidewalk temptation

As you can see, when I first discovered the Griffin Bookshop and Coffee Bar, we were at the tail end of summer. The trees were still cloaked in brilliant, living green and, if anything, I was looking for a place to escape the heat of the late-August sun. Still, on this snowy March day, I would love to be curled up in a corner of the Griffin with a steaming cup of coffee, surrounded by its seemingly endless shelves of books. The front room has tables devoted to subjects ranging from new fiction to local interest. In the back, behind the coffee-bar, a further two rooms are stuffed to the ceiling with shelves where books are arranged alphabetically and by subject-matter, as neatly as in any library.

Yours Truly enjoys two of her favorite things in the world: a cup of coffee and a nearly endless supply of reading material.

The feeling, however, is more as if I’d wandered into the private reading rooms of some wealthy intellectual who has, inexplicably, given me the run of his home for the day.

The smallest reading room at the Griffin looks more like a private sitting room than the back room of a coffee shop

A garden for fair-weather reading, a most excellent pastime

They also have a little, brightly colored and carpeted nook of a room off the main reading room where everything – from the decor to the size of the furniture to the choice of reading material – has been chosen for the very youngest of readers. Seeing it was enough to make we wish I’d had a chance to be a kid in Fredericksburg. And the Griffin’s not just a welcome refuge when the weather’s bad, either. Their tables out front and the marvelous back garden make this a perfect place to spend a leisurely afternoon in the springtime. A soon as this snow melts, I think I’m going to have to head back for a day. Call me strange, but I’ll drive an hour and a half for a good coffee shop any day…

Here’s wishing you all somewhere as cozy to wait out these last days of winter.

Until next time, stay warm and keep a good book close to hand!

– Jennifer

December 9, 2013 by anexpatreturned - 1 Comment

First Snowfall

Snow on red berries by my neighbor’s fence

Wrong day for scooters (Rome, winter of 2010)

Flora in the Villa Borghese park gets a rare taste of a colder sort of winter (Rome, winter of 2010)

Days ago I heard that the area of Virginia where I live was in for some winter weather yesterday: temperatures in the 20s (that’s as cold as -6 Celsius), some snow in the morning and freezing sleet and rain in the afternoon and overnight. For someone who’s lived in a clime that is relatively tropical for the last seven years (well, Rome is tropical in comparison with Moscow, Prague, Bucharest and Bavaria – places to which I am more accustomed – so bear with me), this rather bland weather report sounded very exciting.

While I was living in Rome, I was lucky enough (well, I considered it good luck, though many of my Roman friends felt it to be quite the opposite) to be there for the first snowfall the city had seen in about thirty years. It appears that was the beginning of a trend, though, for it snowed twice more in the two following years (once for each winter). Still, one meager snowfall which barely sticks to the ground long enough to take a picture of it (these are a couple I was lucky enough to snap on those occasions) doesn’t really satisfy the longing for real winter weather that resides in the heart of a girl who spent the winters of most of her formative years in Eastern Europe and Russia.

Palm trees with a light dusting of snow on them were a rather magical sight, but what such scenes mostly did was make me nostalgic for the winters and Christmas holidays of my childhood.

You can imagine, then, how I felt when I woke up this morning, opened my blinds and found these scenes awaiting me through the upstairs windows:

Snow-dusted roofs in the early morning

A hint of white and a promise of more to come

I hurried to make myself a cup of coffee, throw on some warm clothes and head outside with my trusty camera to document the first real winter snow I’d seen in a very long time:

Frosted foxglove, caught by surprise

This morning saw a pitched battle between the resident family of sparrows and some bluebird invaders. The outcome is not yet clear.

Our garden sleeps until spring

Hardy rosemary

The neighbors have strung up their Christmas lights

Wearing their holiday finest

Bare tree fingers rake the frozen sky

A little help for our friends

The snow continues until mid-afternoon when the weather report is proven right and it turns to a sort of freezing rain. Still, the snow and ice are not going anywhere. We don’t expect the temperatures to get back above freezing for several hours. Until tomorrow, at least, I can enjoy my winter wonderland.

Snowy pines

Squirrel tracks on the back porch

A tail makes a lovely umbrella

Mr. Fuzzy leaves the snow to the squirrels

I hope you enjoyed this first glimpse of a satisfyingly white winter. Be safe and stay warm. See you next time!

– Jennifer

First Snowfall (amberrosedelvalle.wordpress.com) Netherlands
雪がふてる～！It’s Snowing! (otakuvegan.wordpress.com) Japan
Winter Wonder (writingwordswithmeaning.wordpress.com) Minnesota, USA
Snow (notesofanoptimist.wordpress.com)
Winter Wonderland! (laurenlombardo22.wordpress.com)
The Breath Before Winter (frosenintime.wordpress.com)
Snow (erinlesterphoto.wordpress.com)

And here’s what everything looked like the next day: my own personal Ice Garden.

November 18, 2013 by anexpatreturned - 3 Comments

Wilder Woods Await

Wilder woods

For the first few weeks that I had my bicycle, I was content to limit myself to riding the portion of the Rocky Run Trail that runs through the woods behind my house. It’s three miles (that’s about 5 km) there and back, and that is not a short way, especially since it had been years since I’d ridden a bike with any regularity (Roman traffic was a little too scary for me to want to brave the busy streets around my house long enough to reach the cycle paths). However, I recently discovered that the trail continues on the far side of a large road about half a mile from my house – a fact I’d missed since the trailhead has been closed for construction ever since I moved here. So, I loaded my camera with fresh batteries, pumped up my tires and headed out to see what waited for me in the wilder woods on the far side of the big road.

The little stream I’d become accustomed to is no longer narrow enough to clear in one leap over on the far side of the road

What I found out was that the path I knew was twice as long as I had thought: nearly eight miles, there and back. The trailheads on the two sides of the big road were both closed, so it took me a while to find an entrance where I could pick it up on the other side. However, there were enough knowledgeable dog-walkers around to point me in the right direction, and I soon found myself in a much larger and less tame wood than the one I’ve gotten to know.

Beavers at work along the Big Rocky Run

A crimson cloak

This must be where trees from Tim Burton movies come when they retire

Detail of roots reflected

From the trail on the near side of the road, you can always see a house or two, somewhere off through the trees. However, in this new forest, there were places where I couldn’t see anything beyond woods and water. I road further on, and soon I found myself entering a place I hadn’t known existed, the Ellanor C. Lawrence Park.

This is the face of a happy explorer who’s just made a new discovery (well, new for me, anyway)

The Ellanor C. Lawrence Park's Walney Visitor Center, located inside an 18th-century farmstead

Cabell’s Mill, built circa 1753

I thought the deer I see when I’m out riding were the extent of the local wildlife. However, a sign on the board near the park’s visitor center, located in what was once the house of the miller who operated Cabell’s Mill, told me I shouldn’t be surprised to come across beavers, coyotes, foxes or copperheads (I wouldn’t mind avoiding that last one, but believe me, if I see any of them when the weather warms up again, you will be the first to know).

Here are some of the scenes from my ride back to the main road.

Dad watches our faithful steeds so I can document the moment when we arrive at destination

Of course, I had to share my discovery. Besides, I didn’t want Dad to feel left out after having seen the photos from the walk I took with Mom the other day. So, we had a weekend bike ride back to the farm a few days later.

This time, we saw some wildlife too, but of the tamer variety.

Thanks for coming along! That will be the last of the fall foliage bicycle rides, I think. The leaves are mostly brown now. I’ll keep going out – until I’d need snow tires, anyway – but I doubt there will be much to photograph. I hope you’ve enjoyed our excursions through the autumn woods, and that you’ll come back and visit soon to see what other adventures are in store.

Yes, my dad and I are happy explorers – and goofballs

Until then, here’s wishing you some glorious adventures of your own.

My faithful buddy prefers to stay home and explore the backyard

-Jennifer

The Woods Are Lovely, Golden and Deep (adventuresofanexpatreturned.com)
Deeper into the Woods (adventuresofanexpatreturned.com)
A Quick Autumn Hike Along an Extended Road Trip (autumnhiker.wordpress.com)
A Walk in the Woods (artteasemagazine.com)

November 6, 2013 by anexpatreturned - 0 comments

A Monster Bridges the Gap to Help Save a Local Business

Salezilla does his part to bridge the gap in sales while the new bridge leading to McCoy’s Furniture is under construction

Driving back from a weekend trip this summer, we passed through the town of Waynesboro, Virginia, and I snapped this photo of a sales ploy that tickled my funny bone. Now that I’ve been back from the Italy – a.k.a. the land where advertising has to be soberly refined and sexy – for a good four months, I am still not tired of the unabashedly (and proudly) silly advertising ploys I often see here. Considering the post-Halloween atmosphere that still persists during this first week of November, it seemed like a good time to use this monstrous photo (ba-dum-bum-ching).

It’s been more than a couple of months since I took this photo so, before posting, I began to wonder if this monster sales ploy had done its job to keep the business in the picture afloat. A couple clicks took me to the McCoy’s Furniture Co. website. It turns out they’re a family-owned store and they’ve been around since 1946. Since their website said the sale was still ongoing, I wondered if perhaps they hadn’t made it through the hard times, after all. So, I went ahead and called them. It turns out the problem was that the Broad Street Bridge, which led to their store, had been closed for construction since last February. However, that bridge has just recently reopened, one month ahead of schedule, and McCoy’s made it through to the other side of the hard times. Did Salezilla threaten to eat a few of the construction workers if they didn’t speed things up? I don’t speak monster, so we will probably never know.

Speaking of which, I enquired about our friend, wondering if he’d been put out to pasture (although I can’t imagine any local sheep wanting to share with him) now that the monster sale was done. Happily, it turns out he’s still waiting at the front of the store, sale or no sale.

So, if any of my faithful readers live near Waynesboro or elsewhere in the Shenandoah Valley and want to support a local family business (or just want to pay a visit to Salezilla), now you know where to go. You could even buy an armchair from Salezilla to watch Godzilla (ba-dum-bum-ching).

Ok, I’m going to stop now, before this gets any sillier.

Thanks for stopping by and I look forward to seeing you again next time!

Jennifer