Sitting in the office, watching cloud after cloud canter across the blue. We’ve lived here six months, our personal clocks ticking away at intervals both fast and slow, wholly dependent upon on our moods (bewildered, happy, sad), the skies, the indolent pace of emerging spring leaves. Pittsburgh is a difficult city in winter. Not for the cold and snow and ice, no, these were reasonable, expected, and largely enjoyed. Our shock was in the lack of color in our snow covered world. Though Pittsburgh’s cloudy skies are much the same as Portland’s, it is what lies beneath that is so vastly different. Our winter rolling hills sport only the occasional evergreen and nary a fern (I miss ferns!), the majority a mass of arced bare limbs and rusty fallen leaves. The resultant landscape is hued only by what man makes, houses, cars, buildings, smoke stacks and steam, a shock to our green Pacific Northwest eyes. I had to promise the hubster that it would turn and he would marvel at the change. Thank you nature for not making a liar out of me.

Pittsburgh remains a city of navigational mysteries. The myriad hills and dales (now brilliantly dressed in every shade of green!) and the impossibility of cherished grid systems leaves me in frequent wonder at which direction I am facing. Though we are finding our way, better and more accurately with each passing day, with a car ride driven by our own sense of direction and not GPS a giddy celebration! Adding to the mystery are the curious and confounding drivers. With all the hills and densely packed neighborhoods, the majority of streets are two lanes, making turn lanes a rather unfortunate impossibility. But, thanks to the politesse of the Pittsburgh left, a flash of lights, a waved hand, or a dead stare to get moving, drivers can turn without so much as a problem the majority of the time. It is marvelous, though the feeling can be quickly dashed by the angry honks while sitting at a red light, or a car tailing wildly close and at breakneck speed before zooming past.

It’s a town that doesn’t quite know how to be, and rightly so. When the steel industry collapsed, thousands of people lost their livelihoods, and nearly 200,000 residents vanished in the ensuing decades. Pittsburghers are proud. Proud to have gotten back on their feet largely without help from the outside. Proud to have such wildly successful sports teams. Proud to have fine institutions like the Carnegie Libraries, the Phipps Conservatory (where I took today’s photos!), Heinz Hall and the Cultural District, a vibrant downtown and waterfront, so many beautiful bridges. Proud to have intact small businesses, even if the service is lousy, or in the case of restaurants, the servers are super friendly, but the food is beyond anything the worst cook you know would serve. Pittsburghers are kind and friendly and welcoming despite their wonder. Why did you move HERE?

The truth is, we are still finding out…

Whoa there. I missed a whole week of blogging, wiz-bam-flash gone. The hubster was in Portland on business, and I managed to keep busy with everything under the sun that did not include logging onto a computer. It was a rather surprising turn of events, to be sure!

Life continues to roll along here, as we learn and appreciate more about our new home. I don’t know what is typical, but the weather has been quite lovely, with open windows, the most raucous thunder and lightning laden storms we’ve seen since living in Colorado, and bright sunny days to make this body grateful.

The trees are bursting and frothy with blossoms, and our sepia-hued hills will soon be green and gorgeous. We can’t wait to see full spring!

These photos, however, are the warmest welcome we can muster to a cloudy day in Lawrenceville a few weeks back. We walked our legs off and oohed and ahhed at all we hadn’t seen before. The castle-like entrance is to the Allegheny Cemetery, one of the oldest and largest in the Pittsburgh area. There’s a bakery (La Gourmandine) we must try when the line is not twenty people out the door long. We bought dreamy scented soap from a kindly lady who kept sweet kitties and a dog at the old school cool shop. That coffee is the best we have yet to find in Pittsburgh, and my heart was happy for a fancy gew-gaw on top. It’s the little things!  Frankie’s was a heady temptress, the scent of franks wafting and that terrific neon, but we were gearing up for a fabulous lunch at Marty’s. It did not disappoint.

Off I am for more learning and scheming and hoping you have a most marvelous of Tuesdays.