the chair lady
and who is the chair lady, you ask. my name is barbara mahany. for nearly 30 years, i was a reporter and feature writer at the chicago tribune. now, i’m an all-on-my-own writer. i’m married to the tribune’s pulitzer-prize-winning architecture critic, blair kamin, and the mother of two heavenly boys, will, who is 18 and away at college, and teddy, who is 10. (post-script: all these years later, will is now 26 and about to start his last year of yale law school, and young teddy, now 17, just graduated from high school is headed off to kenyon college. be still my heart….)
before all that ink got on my hands (and in my veins), i was a pediatric oncology nurse at children’s memorial hospital in chicago. i’d dreamed of opening an inner-city clinic and taking care of women and children, especially the ones who needed it most.
but a sad thing happened on my way to grad school in boston: my dad died.
at his funeral, the priest read a letter i had written to my papa the christmas right before he died. someone who was there in the very-packed pews, a bigwig at the chicago ad agency where my dad had spent nearly two decades, took me to lunch two weeks after the funeral, and said, “kid, you can write. have you ever thought of journalism?”
i walked home from that lunch, and, lo and behold, because of that one piercing question, i now have a master’s in journalism from northwestern university, nearly 30 years of filled-up tribune notebooks, a husband, two kids, and a grey-striped farm cat. some lunch, wouldn’t you say?
we used to live in an old moss-colored victorian house on chicago’s north side, until the waning days of 2002, about a year after our miracle boy was born. (both boys, of course, are miracles; one just happened to come totally unexpectedly, a few years after the doctors told me i would never ever have another baby, a few months shy of my 45th birthday.)
nowadays, we live in a grey-shingled house with a blue-grey door in a leafy suburb, just north of the city. this old house reminded me of my grandmother’s the first time i traipsed the curving stone walk, up the stone steps and through the front door. bit by bit, we have torn down walls, tucked cupboards here, crown moldings there. this old house echoes my heart nearly everywhere i look. it’s the house where i will grow old. it’s the house that stokes my dreams.
you’re welcome to send me a post…(just click the reply down below, until i can find the way to send you to email…)
or wander over to my website barbaramahany.com
these are some things that make my heart skip…
the tick tock of a clock early in the morning…
watching a flurry of birds come in for a landing at my feeder, taking turns, shooshing each other away…
studying mama bird build her nest, collect her stringed things, shop for just the right twig. learning patience in the way she spends unbroken hours on her unhatched hope-filled eggs…
a long, fat letter from a faraway friend…
snipping herbs from my windowsill in the winter, from my kitchen garden the rest of the year…
a wine-steeped stew bubbling away in the oven all afternoon…
a basket of garden bounty, char-striped and oozing juice, as it’s lifted from the grill, amid snow or rain or sun, it never really matters…
collecting children’s books as rich in story as they are in illustrations…
candy canes and marshmallows populating steamy mugs of hot cocoa after school…
pink lemonade and pretzels, ferried on an old metal tray to a screened-in porch, on a hot summer’s afternoon…
the cobalt of delphinium as it climbs to touch the heavens….
red tulips spilling from the old cracked milk pitcher that sits on my counter…
bread so thick and so packed with whole grains you need a butcher’s knife to cut it….
cranking my teenager’s tunes so loud the walls rattle, especially when he’s home to join in the madness…
my brothers, i have four of them…
the women i have collected all my life, the ones i call my sisters…
birdhouses in crayola colors, hanging from limbs, from walls, sitting on shelves…
red plaid bows. brown paper packages. all under a fir tree…
old quilts…
listening for God in everyday whisperings…
lighting candles at dinner in the middle of the week….
tea sets so tiny the cups are smaller than thimbles…
listening to my husband talk about windows, telling me they’re the source of divine animation….
old typewriters….
lists…
waking up early, making a pot of coffee for me, stirring oatmeal and a pantry full of dried fruits for my boys…
shabbat dinner every friday night; getting ready for shabbat all friday afternoon…
filling my table with friends whose ideas soar like kites, whose laughter makes the walls shake…
long walks in the winter woods…or in springtime, tiptoeing among the tender shoots as they first crack through the thawing earth…
crackling logs in the fireplace…
watching my boys, all three of them, play at the fine art of living…
tucking love notes under pillows, in lunch bags, in coat pockets…
Barbara – Just love this blog! Time for coffee on Thursday?
bless your heart, lali. thank you for pulling up one of our chairs…
Hi Barbara,
I can across your blog today after a doing a google search for “Pull Up A Chair.” More about that in just a moment. I had no idea I was about to delve into a treasure trove of beautiful writings, poems and videos. I truly believe people are brought to our attention for a reason. My name is Jessica and I’m from Atlanta. I’ve been brainstorming ways I can take concrete action in light of the protests. I’m wondering if you be interested in talking through some of my thoughts over the phone? To give you some background. I’ve been wanting to create spaces here in Atlanta and around the country where people can be seen and heard. There so much taking going on, but more listening and understanding amd empathy is needed right now. I believe every human just wants to be seen and heard and acknowledged. The reason I did a search for “Pull up a chair,” is because the idea is to literally set up chairs in neutral places and make space for eachother to have these important conversations that can move us forward towards a better way. Wondering if you might want to start this in Chicago too. I look forward to hearing from you!
Please excuse the typos. Oh dear!
Just beautiful…
Hi, I like reading your blog and have given you the ‘Reader Appreciation’ Award. Congratulations! Keep those posts coming…Peri.
Read here: http://perisspiceladle.com/2012/09/25/a-shower-of-awards-praise-and-recognition/
bless YOUR heart!!!!!
Thanks…I’m glad to have found your writing:)
[…] time for a long post today, but I do want to share some words of wisdom from Barbara, an amazing writer and long-distance friend. She just wrote a blog post about finding our passions […]
So, glad I found your blog… love all your stories 🙂
Finding my way to your words has had me smiling all day. I devoured your gorgeous piece in Nieman Storyboard, and now I’m smitten with your site and your story. I will be out there, reading and returning, time and time again.
bless your heart, dina. i felt similarly when i followed links to you. we are writing from a similar landscape. and we see how rich it is…i will be following you, too. thank you so much for following your heart to here, the old maple table where we pull up our chairs….
Barbara, just now discovering “pullupachair”. I could be in this for hours!
that melts my heart beyond measure……
I read your book when it first came out…it now sits on my nitestand and I go through it by season. I love your outlook on life and I, too, try not to get lost in pettiness, but rather look for the sacred in all.
I, just now discovered your blog and I love reading it. Merry Christmas and a blessed New Year!
Bless your heart! It is always a miracle to me that Slowing Time (and soon Motherprayer) find their way to hearts who beat to the same rhythm. Welcome to the table, a sacred quiet thoughtful place.
I’m so proud of you for your excellent blog during this time. Great job!
bless you and thank you!!!!
Hello, Barbara. I just finished reading your “King of the Road” Chicago Tribune article from December 23, 1990. Al Koole’s daughter Susan Koole Huls is a friend of mine. It is a beautifully written piece. Susan chose to post it on Facebook as a tribute to her dad.
Al Koole passed away on Thanksgiving morning after contracting COVID-19.
Dear Lee, I hardly ever go on Facebook these days, and for some reason I got a message about something else on FB, so I clicked over there and saw a note that Susan had tagged me. I clicked, curiously. And then I read her post, and my heart cracked, and tears spilled for I have never ever forgotten Al Koole, Mr. Koole, as I liked to call him. I immediately sent Susan a note, and then read the story from so long ago — 1990! — with tears and smiles intermingling. I sent the story to my boys, and pulled a quote from the story to leave on Susan’s post. I told my boys they’ve heard me tell the Mr. Koole Truck Driver of the Year story a thousand times, but surely hadn’t read it, because I hadn’t read it in forever. Oh, he was a precious and dear and adorable man, and it is unbearably sad that he died on Thanksgiving morning, from COVID, wretched COVID. I am really touched that you thought to come here, to the chair, to be sure I knew. I am so sad, and offering up this blessed day for one of the dearest souls, and one of my favorite ever Tribune stories…..bless you for being sure I knew. And please please give Susan big hugs for me….xoxoxoxo