Speaker 1: Welcome to Bedtime Stories for grown ups in which nothing
Speaker 1: much happens, you feel good, and then you fall asleep.
Speaker 1: I'm Catherine Nikolay. Let me say a little about how
Speaker 1: to use this podcast. Just like when you were a
Speaker 1: child being tucked in for bed, I'm going to read
Speaker 1: you a story to send you off to dreamland. It's
Speaker 1: a simple story, without much action, but full of relaxing detail.
Speaker 1: The story is meant to be a soft landing place
Speaker 1: for your mind, so that instead of circling through the
Speaker 1: same thoughts you've been stuck in all day, you can
Speaker 1: rest it in a sweet, peaceful place. I'll tell our
Speaker 1: story twice, and I'll go a bit slower the second
Speaker 1: time through. If you find yourself still awake at the
Speaker 1: end of the first or second telling, don't worry. That's
Speaker 1: a good rule of thumb in general. When you're trying
Speaker 1: to fall asleep, don't worry. Relax. Take your mind back
Speaker 1: to the beginning of the story and walk yourself back
Speaker 1: through the details that you remember, especially any bit that
Speaker 1: felt particularly cozy. You're training your brain and body to
Speaker 1: wind down, and the more often you do it, the
Speaker 1: faster you will fall asleep. So have a little bit
Speaker 1: of patience at the beginning, and if you find yourself
Speaker 1: awake again later in the night, just use the story
Speaker 1: again and you'll go right back to sleep. Now it's
Speaker 1: time to turn off the light and put away anything
Speaker 1: you've been playing with or looking at. Take some time
Speaker 1: to cozy your body down into your preferred sleeping position,
Speaker 1: get the right pillow in the right spot, and let
Speaker 1: everything relax. In time, all of this becomes a signal
Speaker 1: for your brain, and the signal says it's time for sleep. Now,
Speaker 1: let's take a deep breath in through the nose and
Speaker 1: a soft sigh out of the mouth. Good, do that
Speaker 1: one more time, in and out. Our story tonight is
Speaker 1: called The Windows Were Open, and it's a story about
Speaker 1: a sunny summer day by the lake, solitude and strawberries.
Speaker 1: And it's also about the feeling of being free from
Speaker 1: a schedule and deadlines and about doing some favorite things.
Speaker 1: All the windows were open, not that the little cottage
Speaker 1: had that many to begin with. I mean, there were
Speaker 1: plenty of windows for a house its size. Because its
Speaker 1: size was small and simple. It was old and cozy
Speaker 1: and mostly white inside and out. It couldn't have been
Speaker 1: built today. The land would have cost so much that
Speaker 1: the purchaser would have felt compelled to build a bulking
Speaker 1: giant of a house in the place that the cottage stood.
Speaker 1: But it had been built at a time when it
Speaker 1: seemed like there would never not be enough shore line
Speaker 1: for the people who wanted it. The drive up went
Speaker 1: through the woods, along curving, rutted dirt roads edged with
Speaker 1: tall pines and overhanging maples. You had to know where
Speaker 1: you were going to get there, and I had known
Speaker 1: since I was a child. We came in the summers
Speaker 1: and the autumns, but rarely in cold weather. The house
Speaker 1: had a huge fireplace that opened into the kitchen on
Speaker 1: one side and the living room on the other, and
Speaker 1: another in the master bedroom, but no other heating. That
Speaker 1: always seems fun as a child to camp in front
Speaker 1: of the fire under piles of blankets, goofing off and
Speaker 1: drinking cups of cocoa. All the rules are broken. Then
Speaker 1: breaking rules makes children insanely happy. It's less fun as
Speaker 1: an adult. You mostly just get cold. So I, like
Speaker 1: mine before me, came in the summers and the autumns.
Speaker 1: To day a bright summer day, All the windows were open,
Speaker 1: and I stood in the neat little kitchen with a
Speaker 1: cup of coffee in my hands, and looked out at
Speaker 1: the water. Our cottage, with its front door hidden in
Speaker 1: the woods and lifted up on a bluff, looked out
Speaker 1: from every possible room to the water. It was about
Speaker 1: two hundred steps down an old wooden staircase to the beach.
Speaker 1: The staircase had in three places along the descent benches
Speaker 1: on jutting platforms, so the climber could have a sit
Speaker 1: and just look out. Why is it that our attention
Speaker 1: is so drawn completely to water, a lake large or small,
Speaker 1: a river or trickling stream in the woods, And of
Speaker 1: course seas and oceans are irresistible to our senses. We gape,
Speaker 1: we forget to think, some ancient program in our brains
Speaker 1: begins to run, and happily we comply look at the water.
Speaker 1: It says, yes, good idea, We say so. I was looking,
Speaker 1: scraping the last of my oats from the bowl and
Speaker 1: taking deep breaths of the water smell rolling in through
Speaker 1: the window. I'd made a bowl of oats so overloaded
Speaker 1: with bananas and berries, a cow nibs, cinnamon, walnuts, cashew, butter, dates,
Speaker 1: and jam that I'd barely been able to keep it
Speaker 1: from tumbling out each time I dipped my spoon back in.
Speaker 1: Now that it was gone, I felt a bit proud
Speaker 1: that I'd managed to eat it all and have another
Speaker 1: cup of coffee to boot. I wiped down the old
Speaker 1: wooden table. I'm got to thinking about bread. The day before,
Speaker 1: I'd picked strawberries for hours. I went by myself and
Speaker 1: picked basket after basket while listening to an old audio book,
Speaker 1: one that I loved and had heard many times before.
Speaker 1: For me, there are few things more pleasant than combining
Speaker 1: the steady movement of my hands with a story to
Speaker 1: listen to. And so I had whiled away the afternoon,
Speaker 1: and now I had a lot of strawberries, And that
Speaker 1: made me think of jam, and that made me think
Speaker 1: of bread. I started the bread first, as it would
Speaker 1: need to rise at least once, maybe twice if I
Speaker 1: could wait that long. I began pulling my ingredients together
Speaker 1: and taking bowls and measuring cups from the open shelves.
Speaker 1: I used to read a recipe and start mixing before
Speaker 1: I had all the ingredients and tools out. Soon i'd
Speaker 1: be digging through a drawer looking for something with hands
Speaker 1: covered with flour or dough, my spoon dripping on the floor.
Speaker 1: I've gotten older, I've learned. I took everything out and
Speaker 1: laid things in a logical order. I turned on my book.
Speaker 1: It was blessedly long, so much still had to happen
Speaker 1: before it would all come right in the end, and
Speaker 1: started to wake up my yeast. Yeast, water, then flour,
Speaker 1: and salt. I kneaded and looked out at the water.
Speaker 1: I added a bit of olive oil to a bowl
Speaker 1: and turned the dough over in it, laid a clean
Speaker 1: towel on it, and set it in a sunny corner
Speaker 1: of the counter. Now, I said, strawberries. I'd washed them
Speaker 1: all the night before, so now I hold them, cut
Speaker 1: them in half, and ate about one in every ten
Speaker 1: I prepared. I set a pot on the stove and
Speaker 1: added lemon juice, zest, and sugar and turned on the heat.
Speaker 1: After a bit, I added my strawberries. I cooked them
Speaker 1: down and tested the hot jam on a cold plate
Speaker 1: from the fridge. When I could draw a line through
Speaker 1: it with my finger and the line held, it was done.
Speaker 1: I don't have the patience for canning, so this jam
Speaker 1: would all have to be eaten within a week or so,
Speaker 1: and I'd made almost a dozen jars, so I'd have
Speaker 1: to drive it around to neighbors later, leaving a jar
Speaker 1: or two on doorsteps or in mailboxes. My bread was
Speaker 1: doming over the edge of its bowl, and I scattered
Speaker 1: some flour on my work surface, punched it down and
Speaker 1: tipped it out, more kneading, more rising. I cleaned up,
Speaker 1: looked at the water, paused my book, and went outside.
Speaker 1: When you step out onto a really lovely summer day,
Speaker 1: you think for a moment, well that's it. I'm never
Speaker 1: going inside again. How is anyone ever inside? So I
Speaker 1: thought that I looked at the water, I pottered around
Speaker 1: in my garden, pulled some things, talked to the tomato plants,
Speaker 1: and stuck some mint leaves in my pocket. I took
Speaker 1: this stairs down to the water and stepped out into
Speaker 1: the sand. You can walk a long way in either
Speaker 1: direction on this beach and only see more beach. The
Speaker 1: houses are all up high on the hill, and since
Speaker 1: everyone wants to walk the beach without having anyone fuss
Speaker 1: at them, we've all made a tacit agreement to simply
Speaker 1: not be jerked and let people walk as they will.
Speaker 1: It works out just fine, So I walked for a while,
Speaker 1: let the water, still cold from the night, wash over
Speaker 1: my ankles, and poked its shells with my toes. On
Speaker 1: the way back up the stairs. An hour or so later,
Speaker 1: I remembered that I was making bread. Who right, I
Speaker 1: said bread. It was a bit of a beast, and
Speaker 1: I knocked the air out of it and rolled it
Speaker 1: into a big round loaf, set it on a baking tray,
Speaker 1: and pushed it into the oven. I would need some
Speaker 1: iced tea and my book next, so I boiled a
Speaker 1: kettle and stepped into my room to fetch my book
Speaker 1: from beside my bed. It was a different book than
Speaker 1: the one I'd been listening to. There are different books
Speaker 1: for different times. The book in my hand was perfect
Speaker 1: for reading outside, and might, if done correctly, lead to napping.
Speaker 1: The master bedroom was mine now, with its whitewashed wooden
Speaker 1: walls and fireplace. It had a huge bed spread with
Speaker 1: white linens and a very puffy comforter. It naturally faced
Speaker 1: the water and had a small deck you could sit
Speaker 1: on with your coffee in the morning. Back in the kitchen,
Speaker 1: I made tea and looked at my bread. Almost not
Speaker 1: quite yet, I took an old wood tray from a
Speaker 1: cupboard and spread a tea towel over. I laid out
Speaker 1: a jam jar and a spoon, a napkin, my book,
Speaker 1: and a glass filled with ice. Remembering the mint leaves
Speaker 1: in my pocket, I tore them up and added them
Speaker 1: to the glass. At last, the bread was ready to
Speaker 1: come out. It was huge and made me laugh just
Speaker 1: to look at it. I thumped the bottom and was
Speaker 1: satisfied to hear its hollow sound. I put it along
Speaker 1: with a plate and a knife on my tray, filled
Speaker 1: my tea glass, and was ready to go out. I
Speaker 1: headed to the stone patio. It had chaise lounges and tables,
Speaker 1: a fire pit, pots of jasmine and petunias, and was
Speaker 1: strung with fairy lights for the evening. I set my
Speaker 1: tray on a table beside a lounger, kicked off my sandals,
Speaker 1: and laid my book on the wide armreast. I'd cut
Speaker 1: a slice of bread in a moment, lay jamb thickly
Speaker 1: over it and dig in. But for now I just
Speaker 1: looked out at the water. I just listened to the
Speaker 1: waves and the birds and the insects. I just sat
Speaker 1: and felt my own breath in my chest. All the
Speaker 1: windows were open, not that the little cottage had that
Speaker 1: many to begin with. I mean, there were plenty of
Speaker 1: windows for a house its size, but its size was
Speaker 1: small and simple. It was old and cozy and mostly
Speaker 1: white inside and out. It couldn't have been built to day.
Speaker 1: The land would have cost so much that the purchaser
Speaker 1: would have felt compelled to build a bulking giant of
Speaker 1: a house in the place where the cottage stood. But
Speaker 1: it had been built at a time when it seemed
Speaker 1: like there would never not be enough shoreline for the
Speaker 1: people who wanted it. The drive up went through woods,
Speaker 1: a long, curving, rutted dirt roads edged with tall pines
Speaker 1: and overhanging maples. You had to know where you were
Speaker 1: going to get there, and I had known since I
Speaker 1: was a child. We came in the summers and the autumns,
Speaker 1: but rarely in cold weather. The house had a huge
Speaker 1: fireplace that opened into the kitchen on one side and
Speaker 1: the living room on the other, and another in the
Speaker 1: master bedroom, but no other heating. That always seems fun
Speaker 1: as a child to camp in front of the fire
Speaker 1: under piles of blankets, goofing off and drinking cups of cocoa.
Speaker 1: All the rules are broken, and breaking rules makes children
Speaker 1: insanely happy. It's less fun as an adult. You mostly
Speaker 1: just get cold. So I, like mine before me, came
Speaker 1: in the summers and the autumns. To day, a bright
Speaker 1: summer day. All the windows were open, and I stood
Speaker 1: in the neat little kitchen with a cup of coffee
Speaker 1: in my hands, and looked out at the water. Our cottage,
Speaker 1: with its front door hidden in the woods and lifted
Speaker 1: up on a bluff, looked out from every possible room
Speaker 1: to the water. It was about two hundred steps down
Speaker 1: an old wooden staircase to the beach. The staircase had
Speaker 1: in three places along the descent benches on jutting platforms,
Speaker 1: the climber could have a sit and just look out.
Speaker 1: Why is it that our attention is so drawn completely
Speaker 1: to water? A lake large or small, a river or
Speaker 1: trickling stream in the woods, And of course seas and
Speaker 1: oceans are irresistible to our senses. We gape, we forget
Speaker 1: to think. Some ancient program in our brains begins to run,
Speaker 1: and happily we comply look at the water. It says, yes,
Speaker 1: good idea, We say so, I was looking, scraping the
Speaker 1: last of my oats from the bowl and taking deep
Speaker 1: breaths of the water smell rolling in through the window.
Speaker 1: I had made a bowl of oats so overloaded with
Speaker 1: bananas and berries, cocao nibs, cinnamon, walnuts, cashew, butter, dates,
Speaker 1: and jam that I'd barely been able to keep it
Speaker 1: from tumbling out each time I dipped my spoon back in.
Speaker 1: Now that it was gone, I felt a bit proud
Speaker 1: that I'd managed to eat it all and have another
Speaker 1: cup of coffee to boot. I wiped down the old
Speaker 1: wooden table. I'm got to thinking about bread. The day before,
Speaker 1: I'd picked strawberries for hours. I went by myself and
Speaker 1: picked basket after basket while listening to an old audio
Speaker 1: book that I'd loved and heard many times before. For me,
Speaker 1: there are few things more pleasant than combining the steady
Speaker 1: movement of my hands with a story to listen to.
Speaker 1: And so I had whiled away the afternoon, and now
Speaker 1: I had a lot of strawberries, and that made me
Speaker 1: think of jam, and that made me think of bread.
Speaker 1: I started the bread first, as it would need to
Speaker 1: rise at least once, maybe twice if I could wait
Speaker 1: that long. I began pulling my ingredients together and taking
Speaker 1: bowls and measuring cups from the open shelves. I used
Speaker 1: to read a recipe and start mixing before I had
Speaker 1: all the ingredients and tools out. Soon I'd be digging
Speaker 1: through a drawer looking for something, with hands covered with
Speaker 1: flour or dough, my spoon dripping on the floor. I've
Speaker 1: gotten older, I've learned. I took everything out, I'd laid
Speaker 1: things in a logical order. I turned on my book.
Speaker 1: It was blessedly long, so much still had to happen
Speaker 1: before it would all come right in the end, and
Speaker 1: started to wake up my yeast. Yeast and water, then
Speaker 1: flour and salt. I kneaded and looked out at the water.
Speaker 1: I added a bit of olive oil to a bowl
Speaker 1: and turned the dough over in it, laid a clean
Speaker 1: towel on it, and set it in a sunny corner
Speaker 1: of the counter. Now, I said, strawberries. I'd washed them
Speaker 1: all the night before, so now I hauled them, cut
Speaker 1: them in half, and ate about one in every ten
Speaker 1: I prepared. I set a pot on the stove and
Speaker 1: added lemon, juice, zest, sugar, turned on the heat. After
Speaker 1: a bit. I added my strawberries. I cooked them down
Speaker 1: and tested the hot jam on a cold plate from
Speaker 1: the fridge. When I could draw a line through it
Speaker 1: with my finger and the line held, it was done.
Speaker 1: I don't have patience for canning, so this jam would
Speaker 1: all have to be eaten within a week or so.
Speaker 1: And I'd made almost a dozen jars, so I'd have
Speaker 1: to drive it around to neighbors later, leaving a jar
Speaker 1: or two on doorsteps or in mailboxes. My bread was
Speaker 1: doming over the edge of its bowl, and I scattered
Speaker 1: some flour on my work surface, punched it down and
Speaker 1: tipped it out more kneading, more rising. I cleaned up,
Speaker 1: looked at the water, paused my book, and went outside.
Speaker 1: When you step out on to a really lovely summer day,
Speaker 1: you think for a moment, well that's it. I'm never
Speaker 1: going inside again. How was any one ever inside? So
Speaker 1: I thought that and looked at the water. I pottered
Speaker 1: around in my garden, pulled some things, talked to the
Speaker 1: tomato plants, and stuck some mint leaves in my pocket.
Speaker 1: I took the stairs down to the water and stepped
Speaker 1: out into the sand. You can walk a long way
Speaker 1: in either direction on this beach and only see more beech.
Speaker 1: The houses are all high up on the hill, and
Speaker 1: since everyone wants to walk the beach without having anyone
Speaker 1: fuss at them, we've all made a tacit agreement the
Speaker 1: simply not be jerks and let people walk as they will.
Speaker 1: It works out just fine. So I walked for a while,
Speaker 1: let the water, still very cold from the night, wash
Speaker 1: over my ankles, and poked its shells with my to
Speaker 1: on the way back up the stairs. An hour or
Speaker 1: so later, I remembered that I was making bread. Oh right,
Speaker 1: I said bread. It was a bit of a beast,
Speaker 1: and I knocked the air out of it and rolled
Speaker 1: it into a big round loaf, set it on a
Speaker 1: baking tray, and pushed it into the oven. I would
Speaker 1: need some iced tea and my book next, so I
Speaker 1: boiled a kettle and stepped into my room to fetch
Speaker 1: my book from beside my bed. It was a different
Speaker 1: book than the one I'd been listening to. There are
Speaker 1: different books for different times. The book in my hand
Speaker 1: was perfect for reading outside and, if done correctly, lead
Speaker 1: to napping. The master bedroom was mine now, with its
Speaker 1: whitewashed wooden walls, and fireplace. It had a huge bed
Speaker 1: spread with white linens and a very puffy comforter. It
Speaker 1: naturally faced the water and had a small deck you
Speaker 1: could sit on with your coffee. In the morning. Back
Speaker 1: in the kitchen, I made tea and looked at my bread.
Speaker 1: Almost not quite yet. I took an old wood tray
Speaker 1: from a cupboard and spread a tea towel over it.
Speaker 1: I laid out a jam jar and a spoon, a napkin,
Speaker 1: my book, and a glass filled with ice. Remembering the
Speaker 1: mint leaves in my pocket, I tore them up and
Speaker 1: added them to the glass. At last, the bread was
Speaker 1: ready to come out. It was huge and made me
Speaker 1: laugh just to look at it. I thumped the bottom
Speaker 1: and was satisfied to hear its hollow sound. I put
Speaker 1: it along with a plate and a knife on my tray,
Speaker 1: filled my tea glass, and was ready to go back out.
Speaker 1: I headed to the stone patio. It had chaise lounges
Speaker 1: and tables, a fire pit, pots of jasmine and petunias,
Speaker 1: and was strung with fairy lights for the evening. I
Speaker 1: set my tray on a table beside a lounger, kicked
Speaker 1: off my sandals and laid my book on the wide armrest.
Speaker 1: I'd cut a slice of bread in a moment, lay
Speaker 1: jamb thickly over it, and dig in. But for now,
Speaker 1: I just looked out at the water. I just listened
Speaker 1: to the waves and the birds and the insects. I
Speaker 1: just sat and felt my own breath in my chest.
Speaker 1: Sweet Dreams,