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Phoebe Sinclair Writes

Phoebe Sinclair Writes

Category Archives: Boston Moments

Phoebe’s best of Boston

{This Moment} Hibernation

24 Friday Feb 2012

Posted by Phoebe (she / hers) in Boston Moments, Green Life

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

arnold-arboretum, this-moment

{this moment} – A Friday ritual (joining Soulemama.) A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week.

Red berries

A Few of My Favorite Things: Boston’s Best Underground Events

13 Monday Feb 2012

Posted by Phoebe (she / hers) in Bike Life, Boston Moments, Learnin', Skillshare

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

bike-love, cambridge, dancing, events

Part of my intention in creating (and sustaining) this blog is to crow about my favorite Boston-area events.  The four listed below are my long-standing loves.

Boston Skillshare: I learned of the Boston Skillshare as a result of my volunteering with Boston NOW.  My first Skillshare (I’ve been attending for about seven years) was a wonderment -free learning, for real, of the most random assortment –knitting, soda brewing, spoon whittling, home schooling, time management?!  At my second skillshare, I taught a class on letter writing.  Now everyone I meet, practically, I attempt to sway to the way of the Skillshare.  I’ve won lots of folk over, including my own mother.

Boston Pride Parade: I’m not sure how I learned about the Boston Pride Parade, but I’ve rarely missed a year of standing along the route, clapping and shouting and jumping for beads.  In the time that I’ve been attending, the LGBT community worked towards and won the right to marriage equality in Massachusetts.  And it might just be my opinion/experience but I believe, the Parade has since “cleaned up” just the tiniest bit, with fewer men shaking-their-rears on the elaborately decorated beds of semi-trucks to club beats.

Cambridge Citywide Dance Party: I’m only a three-year veteran of the biggest free dance party in Cambridge, where the city closes down one of its busiest streets, pumps up the music, and sets out chairs in front of the Senior Center for folks to enjoy watching the dance mayhem.  Want to see how well your city councillor dances, conga with strangers, or steal some new moves from a four-year-old?  This is your party.

Bike By Bike, At Night: I’ve only made it to two of these all-night rides that are so underground they don’t have a website (just flyers posted around the neighborhoods.) Begun in 1989, this annual tour is organized by the Back Bay Midnight Pedalers and features stopping points at historic and architectural sites of note in Boston, Brookline, and Cambridge. I haven’t yet made it to sunrise due to the lack of bathroom breaks combined with no published route, but once I figure those two issues out, I just might!

Shrinking the Big City

03 Friday Feb 2012

Posted by Phoebe (she / hers) in Boston Moments, With Friends

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Tags

jamaica-plain, this-moment

A study in making the big city small, as illustrated by my experience in three neighborhoods:

Pretty Big

When I lived in Boston’s worst neighborhood (disclaimer: fact might be unproven), I used to see a few people a few times over.  There was that guy who sat on his cement porch playing guitar while his leashed-cat prowled.  Also, a woman with long, red ringlets -the most amazing hair!  Sometimes, as I keyed into my apartment building, I’d spot her walking down the hill towards Brighton Ave., locks carefully held in place by a headband/earmuffs. Once in a while, I’d see her on the B Line.  I wondered where she lived.

twin donuts by David Salafia, Flickr

Twin donuts, Allston, by David Salafia, Flickr

Not So Big

In the Savin Hill neighborhood of Dorchester, neighbors say hello.  It took me some time to get used to this, as it NEVER happened in Allston. One night, I saw a young man steal a Pride flag from the porch of one of my neighbors.  I stared, not exactly sure what I was seeing as he leaped past me, holding the flag high, streaming, as he raced down the street.  Additionally, at the Savin Hill T stop, I developed a family-crush on a couple and their young son, combinations of which I’d see on the Red Line in the mornings.  Sometimes we smiled at one another.

Spring Yarn

A Sagamore sight (and one of my most popular photos on Flickr)

Kind of Tiny

My friends might be tired of hearing me say it, but rarely a day goes by where, commuting from JP to Cambridge, I don’t bump into a friend, a friendly acquaintance, or my own partner walking past when I least expect him. I see community members from JP and Cambridge out of context -in Boston and Somerville- and yet I still recognize them (which is an impressive feat for me, since I tend to forget faces.)

JP winter windowbox display

Windowbox: It's always a party in JP!

Five Month Anniversary

16 Monday Jan 2012

Posted by Phoebe (she / hers) in Bike Life, Bloggin Noggin, Boston Moments, Green Life, Learnin', With Friends

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writing

Mari's Heart hands

I am five month’s happy with Whole Heart Local and, to celebrate, I’ve compiled a list of five favorite posts from 2011.

If you would like to celebrate with me, please post in the comments YOUR favorite post (or five) from your own blog!

Celebrating the elements: http://wholeheartlocal.com/2011/12/22/winter-mornings-jersey-vs-boston/

Daily richness and beauty: http://wholeheartlocal.com/2011/12/08/weekend-wonder/

Growth from opposition: http://wholeheartlocal.com/2011/09/21/wrath-on-the-bike-path/

Cherished time with friends: http://wholeheartlocal.com/2011/10/13/whole-heart-vermont/

Hanging with the gents at City Feed:
http://wholeheartlocal.com/2011/10/08/this-moment-city-feed-supply-jp/

{This Moment} With The Boys

13 Friday Jan 2012

Posted by Phoebe (she / hers) in Boston Moments

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

this-moment, trees

A Friday ritual (joining Soulemama.) Single photo – no words (not that words could explain, anyway!)

Relaxing in the Forest by Andrew Joslin

Weekend Wonder

08 Thursday Dec 2011

Posted by Phoebe (she / hers) in Bike Life, Boston Moments, Learnin', With Friends

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

bike-commuting, cambridge, craft-tastic, jamaica-plain

Some weekends are just weekends.  Others are adventures.

An adventure in poetry at the Grolier Poetry Bookshop with January Gill O’Neal and Afaa Michael Weaver. . .

January and Afaa

Notes on poems

Chill adventures in Christmas brunch hosted by my good friend, Patricia . . .
Jess Megna and Alice

Egg souffle

An adventure in meeting the important people in my friend Sidia Maricela’s life at her new co-op home (and some dancing) . . .

New friends in Somerville

Dancers

Overwhelmed adventures in shopping local and handmade Bazaar Bizarre style . . .

Bizarre bazaar

Block printing

Adventures in racing about the city on bike, trying to get to every thing on time . . .

Skate feet

Adventures and advice in proper city-cyclist etiquette at Papercut Zine Library with the ladies of Bay State Badass bike zine. . .

Bay State BadAss bike zine reception

Simulated bike and car

Adventures in connecting with old friends and new through the socially compelling and heart-warming adventure that is a gift circle . . .

Sidia Maricela is under the pigpile

{This Moment} In The Parking Lot

26 Saturday Nov 2011

Posted by Phoebe (she / hers) in Boston Moments

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Tags

this-moment

{this moment} – A Friday ritual (joining Soulemama.) A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week.

weed on brick

Looking Forward, Looking Back (And Gratitude)

24 Thursday Nov 2011

Posted by Phoebe (she / hers) in Boston Moments

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

bike-commuting, cambridge, jamaica-plain

My life in Boston continues to amaze me.  Just in this past week I:

  • Danced until 12:30 PM at the second JP vs Somerville Dance-Off in support of Boston’s own Girl’s Rock.
  • Volunteered for my ninth consecutive year at Pie Central, sorting and quality checking pies for Community Serving’s enormous and enormously profitable pie bake sale.
  • At work, hosted the 40th Annual Thanksgiving Potluck Feast, where at least two hundred community members attended and ate turkeys (purchased by my job, roasted by volunteers) and more dessert than is probably appropriate.
  • Swung by late to my friend’s pre-holiday potluck, where I successfully bombed at a game of Cranium.

The hours I’ve kept:

  • Sunday: 1:30 AM arrive home, by bike
  • Monday: 10:30 PM arrive home, by T, lugging bike
  • Tuesday: 10:30 PM arrive home, by bike
  • Wednesday: 10:30 PM arrive home, by bike

Exhausted?  Yes!  Luckily, at all the above events, I’ve been graciously accompanied by friends, whose energy and enthusiasm inspired my own.

I often compare my experience here in Boston with my younger life in Jersey. Naturally, I’ve had a lot of good times in Jersey, but when I think back to high school, it doesn’t escape me that my scheduled looked more like this:

Weekdays: Up at 7:30 AM (groggy), 8:20 AM school, 12:30 PM bus to second school (a story for another day), 2:30 PM school end/bus back to my home town, 3:00 PM work at library, 6:00 PM picked up by mother or brother, 7:00/8:00 dinner, 9:00 PM homework, 11:00 PM bed

Weekends: Hang with mother, aunt, cousin.  Knit/crochet.  Read.

I don’t mean to imply that my life in Jersey wasn’t a perfectly good life -I was safe, loved, happy, and had all the library access my little heart desired.

Still, (here comes the gratitude), how very thankful I am for strange, funny, exhausting, and beautiful Boston moments!

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Bike helmet on chair

Bike helmet in costume a la JP Halloween Bike Ride

Phoebe’s Best in Boston Favorites How-To-Say-It?

21 Monday Nov 2011

Posted by Phoebe (she / hers) in Boston Moments

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

arnold-arboretum, cambridge, jamaica-plain, trees

One of the roles I’d like this blog to fill is a written celebration of my personal Boston (and Boston-area, I’m looking at you, Cambridge) favorites. From area-events to flora and fauna to singular moments in my memory. I’m not sure what to call this collection, but I’m kicking off the series with a tree I see frequently on my excursions to Arnold Arboretum, just five minutes from my apartment.

I’m open to name suggestions for my series!

Have you ever seen such a massive, gorgeous, precarious tree? I wonder often how the nearby homeowners feel spying it each day, wondering if, someday it might crush their house.

Favorite leaning tree on way to Arboretum

{This Moment} Aboretum Autumn

18 Friday Nov 2011

Posted by Phoebe (she / hers) in Boston Moments

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

this-moment

{this moment} – A Friday ritual (joining Soulemama.) A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week.

Red maple leaves in Arboretum

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