My bluebonnet girl

[I posted a version of this entry two years ago. It’s bluebonnet season and a special day, a very special day at our house, so here’s an ever so slightly updated version. This may become an annual tradition!]

Another baby!  Yea! And, maybe, maybe this time a girl? Not that I really cared, but for several months all liquid that entered my body, even at parties, came via my pink mug. I got a handbag big enough to carry it everywhere.

            Boy or girl, didn’t really matter, no, what bothered me was that we lived in Oklahoma. This wouldn’t do. I might have a girl (I hope, I hope, I hope) or a boy (fine by me) but by gosh or by golly, I was going to have a Texan. My plan? About a month ahead, visit my mother in Amarillo and refuse to leave.

            Then, a bolt from the blue! Bob was transferred to Houston. Off we went in the big Chevy wagon—Daddy, Mother, the four-year-old, Mr. 17-months, and Daffodil the part-cocker.  That was in March.

            April 8—we welcomed our bluebonnet baby, our bluebonnet girl, born in the peak of bluebonnet season! Katy joined the clan. (Aptly named Daffy didn't make the picture.)

            She was a joy then, and a joy (and lots of laughs) along the way. She became a lovely young woman.

            

 

And a fantastic daughter. And  now a good Montrose neighbor—on her way over right now to do the NYT crossword. Thank goodness it’s Monday! 

            Guess what! We unearthed that long ago pink mug, and it is now Katy’s exclusively,  A pink mug of coffee goes well with a puzzle.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY KATY P, MY BLUEBONNET GIRL.

Dancing toward spring

I had so much fun with the spring reading entry, and inspired by my friend Linda who blogs every week about her quilting (http://lindadrawingtime.blogspot.com/). That I’m aiming to give it another try.

I’ve just made a romp through this blog and maybe I’ll get the momentum back from more than seven years ago when I first posted. I found lots and lots of cat stuff—that a constant in my life. Surely an update is due? When I started this blog I was in a little, I mean little, southern town—beautiful but this city girl thought about home in Houston just about all the time. Gradually we’ve been making the transition back to the city. I’m still loving it--most of the time.

Now as Easter approaches spring is all over the city. or nearly spring.  Flowers everywhere, beautiful spring flowers.

BUT

 March doesn’t give up that easily—when I walked across a neighboring parking lot I got to watch a

Lift Off

Brown leaves, leftover leaves,

abandoned leaves scattered

across gray pavement.

Lonely leaves.

Suddenly

rising, swirling

high on the frisky March wind

spiraling, turning

Dancing toward spring.

Primavera—First things first

Thanks, Primavera!

Welcome Spring! She arrived Wednesday morning, very early; now we're two days in. In this household she brought her fever with her. Happens every year, and of course, it involves reading—for a couple of reasons.

                For many folks and cultures, Spring’s arrival—the vernal equinox—is the start of a new year—try peoples as diverse as the Persians and the Celts. Certainly the flowers in my urban garden will vote for that. Okay, flowers and Spring, I’ll go along and join you by doing what I always do with a new year. Make a resolution. That’s easy as well. I always make the same one. Read more!

A book, a friend, a dog-pal, the
sunshine. Life is good.

Many, in a little while,
a nap.

                Spring makes it easy. The best antidote for Spring’s fever is a trip to the front porch or the nearby park with a couple of books from the stack or maybe the magazine (ah, yes, another one) that came with the morning mail.

                I’ve been doing lots of that lately. Sometimes I take a picnic and spend the afternoon. And I’m not alone. Lots of folks manage to free up a little time for eating, reading, even napping on Primavera’s best afternoon. But, you don’t have to have a park or a front porch to fight Spring’s fever. In my neighborhood you might hit the Black Hole Coffee House or maybe even the Post Office if there’s a line.

Where ever you are, enjoy Spring and grab a good book.

Easy livin', good readin'

"It's ok, Daddy. I don't
mind waiting, I always bring
a book to the Post Office.

Saturday morning at
the Black Hole fun.

(A slightly different version of this entry is at http://storycirclenetwork.wordpress.com/2013/03/22/primavera-first-things-first/)

Reading! Always! Wherever I Am--

I been around a bit since the last time I hit these pages. Half way around the world, if fact, right at 8,000 miles—straight from Bush Intercontinental in Houston to Dubai, ‘way over in the United Arab Emirates about 60 miles from Iran.

                Let me answer the question everyone asks before you can get it out. Why was I headed for Dubai?  As I came to find out, it is a tourist destination—but not usually for Americans. And no, it’s not on my list of “places I must go.” But there is a family there that is on my list to visit any time, every time that I can. My son and his wonderful family—‘especially seven-year-old Dasha. This was my first trip since they’d moved from London, and yes I was as, well almost as, excited about visiting this faraway place as I was about seeing my extended gang.

The screen was as fascinating as the Kindle.

                A bit wary of the 15 hour flight , I told myself, Be prepared. So I prepared and over-prepared. That Kindle was so loaded you’d have thought I was going to Dubai aboard the Nina or the Pinta, not a fancy airliner.   Then the flight: Yes, I did read some, but I was mesmerized by the screen that unfolded those 8,000 miles one mile at a time. The overhead camera let me look down on London and Istanbul. Very heady, and I did catch a Katherine Hepburn flick. Yes, I read, but don’t worry. I won’t run out of e-reading material for several months.

                Now, let me answer the second question everyone asks. What is Dubai like? Like nothing I’ve ever seen—or expect to. It’s a Muslim/Arab country, but more—a nation and a city of contrasts. From the tallest building in the world and the world’s largest shopping center (you’ll get lost, I promise) to camels wandering in the desert just a few miles away.  My head went into permanent wagging from trying to take it all in.

On the Arabian Desert not far from the bustle of Dubai.

Burj Khalifa--the world's tallest building

                Final question: the best part? That’s easy spending time around the house with the guys. And of course that always means reading. My son wisely married as big or (if that’s possible) bigger reader than he is. I don’t have to tell you about their daughter. This is the family that between travel and a major move have disposed of their ‘real’ books and gone largely electronic. I told part of their story in my October 25, 2012 entry on this blog.  There's no lack of chances to read with a couple of computers, two Kindles and three I-pads in the house. Even the little one does most of her reading electronically.

Great way to spend the afternoon.

                This isn’t an absolutely no-book household. No, not by any means. Each of the three brought quite a few that couldn’t, just couldn’t, be left behind or given away.  My daughter-in-law is a lot like me. She loves to cook. So, it’s no surprise that a good many of the books she brought are cook books. Pretty wonderful ones, as I discovered.

                After a few days, I got ‘real book’ browsing fever and hit the bookcase just before bedtime. I promptly felt in love with on a book full of whole grain recipes aptly named “The Book of Whole Grains” by Marlene Anne Bumgarner. No I didn’t quick-like order it for my Kindle. I couldn’t. It has a 1976 publication date. But I had to have it! Had to.  And so, the next morning at breakfast in Dubai, UAE, I went online on my Kindle and ordered a copy of the book from a dealer in New York to be delivered to my home in Texas. It arrived about the same time I did, and I’m still in love. It’s got a great recipe for gingerbread from Muleshoe, Texas, up in the Panhandle near where I was born.

                This old world gets smaller and smaller.

                Now one final question for you about cookbooks and e-readers. Even if my wonderful new-to-me book had been e-available, I don’t think I’d have ordered. I can’t yet see myself cooking from a Kindle. Where would I write my doubling numbers, or my yeas or nays? And what about those messy smudges that become dear memories. Can’t see it. I have one buddy who says she slips hers in to a plastic bag and cooks away, but I can’t see it. At least not yet. How about you? Oh, and awful thought! What about reading in the bathtub?

A version of this entry appears a http://storycirclenetwork.wordpress.com

How do you vote?

A Different Kind of Reading

 

“Come to bed! It’s after midnight.”

“Soon. I promise! I’ve only got fifty more pages.”

Maybe you can guess. I have book club in the morning and no way, no way I’m going to sleep before I’ve finished the book. Happens almost every month.

I’m a big reader. Such a big reader that when I made a New Year’s resolution to read more, my daughter smiled. No, she didn’t laugh at me, but almost. “Mom, you already read more than anyone I know. How can you want to read more?”

I don’t know. But I do.

There are different kinds of reading. There’s fun reading snuggled now under the down comforter on a cold night or stretched out on the couch on a rainy day. There’s serious research reading; I keep my notebook by my hand (or my notepad). I underline. I reread. And don’t bother me. There are magazines—the ever growing stack of magazines—and the two newspapers a day. Lots of reading. But nothing quite like book club reading.

First off, often it’s something I’d never chose to read if I were making the calls, but I’m not. It’s on the list; I read the book. Second, I read carefully, after all, I’m going to have to talk about this. Third, I finish—nothing like deadline.

It’s not just book club reading that I relish. I like the book club itself. No matter how meticulously I’ve read, someone catches something I’ve missed entirely. Occasionally, I’m the catcher and amaze someone with what I’ve picked up. Other times, I’ve read something one way and, to my amazement, others take it quite another way. Exhilarating! I don’t need the coffee and cookies.

I’d been missing the book club experience. I was lonely for book club buddies. About four years ago we moved back to Houston after a ‘temporary’ stay of over twenty years in a small town in Georgia. Some things I badly missed about city life, something I liked about small town living, and one thing I loved—my book club. It was an old (founded in 1929), somewhat tradition-bound organization. (Great controversy when someone served refreshments ‘after’ instead of before.) But twenty-five intelligent, thoughtful women gathered every two weeks. The best two days of the month!

I miss my Georgia book club--always will, but
I'm relishing my three new ones. Count 'em, 3!

            When we gave Houston a probationary year, I went on leave. But when we put the house on the market, sadly, I put my resignation in the mail. It wasn’t fair to keep another woman from enjoying what I had loved. But now here I was in Houston, and no book club. I missed it, missed it, missed it.

            So in 2012, when I resolved to read more, I also resolved to find a book club. No one was going to call me up and invite me aboard, so I’d better find my own. Resolution fulfilled! I have three, and I’m thinking about a fourth.  They couldn’t be more different. Once a month I go to my nearby indy mystery book store, Murder by the Book, we read to a theme. This month we’ll read two first novels, both set in England but very different, one is cozy beyond cozy (Wicked Autumn) while the other is dark, dark, dark (The Hollow Man). Every Sunday morning—my family doesn’t believe I’m doing this—I hike over to the nearby Unitarian Church where they welcome new readers—church member or not—into their book discussion group of serious philosophical and historical works. In fact,  next month I’m the leader for the over 800-page From Dawn to Decadence: 1500 to the Present by Jacques Barzun. I’ll be reading very carefully; you can bet on it. (It’s going to take us several weeks to do this one.)

            Finally and where I think I’ve found my book club ‘home’ is at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston where I am a volunteer. The Guild book club takes on a book a month and then we go to lunch. Last we discussed Carvaggio: A Life Sacred and Profane. It’s the book that gave rise to the “Come to bed!” conversation. I thought it interesting but difficult going in, but I came out so excited that I returned to the museum after lunch to look at some familiar works in a whole new way.

            I’ll remember 2012 as a banner year—I kept two resolutions. That may be a record. I’m in three book clubs and, smile if you will, Daughter, I’m reading more.

             (A version of this entry appears at http://storycirclenetwork.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=2983&action=edit&message=1)

Almost there, I'm almost there

Whew! I’m done. That’s what I thought as I drifted off last night. I did the mental list in my head—yep! A book for everyone. (And you can just guess what I’m giving myself.) Then, this morning after my walk and before I got to work, I checked out Amazon . Suddenly, I remembered my (hope my kids aren’t reading this) tradition of giving them The Best American Short Stories and The Best American Essays of the year. I’d totally forgotten, and I’d already bought them (they are all grown after all) ‘way too much. So I compromised and ordered copies of The Best American Nonrequired Reading of 2012. They both have enough things they have to do, and this sounds like fun. So I’m lurking around the front door waiting for the mail carrier—again. 

You'll never guess what's in every package!

            Now my big question. Do I dare go to Murder by the Book (one of the best indie bookstores I’ve ever set foot in) this Saturday for the Christmas Party? Surely, I can listen to good music, share some holiday goodie and not buy a book. (Has anyone read Louise Penny? I haven’t but I’ve been thinking. . .) Nope think I’ll stay home.

            I’ve wrapped all the books I have to give, and they’re under the Christmas poinsettia (no tree at the Pandos this year—we’re going to my daughter’s.) Time to bake and maybe make some decadent chocolate truffles. They’re as tempting as a new mystery.

BUT wait! I’m not through. I was book shopping again this morning. I got an appeal from one of my favorite local charities. Yes, I’m a soft-touch. It offers housing to families in transition. Translation—going from homeless to somewhere permanent. There are lots of these families in the big city of Houston. Besides offering temporary housing, they do all they can to make the children’s lives happy like kids’ lives ought to be. One thing they are developing is a library of children’s books, and yes, they need donations. Moreover, they want donations to give as Christmas books. What can I do?

            When we did the great book purge I told you about last spring, I gave away most of my kiddo books. So now, I’m off for books. I picked up three this morning when I bought gift wrap at the dollar store, but soon as I finish this, I’m off for Half-Price Books and maybe a couple of the nearby resale shops.

            See if there’s a project like this near you. There’s nothing like Christmas, a child and a book.

            Remember the wise Sherlock Holmes. “It is a great thing to start life with a small number of really good books which are your very own.”

Soon, someone's going to love each of these!

(Another version of this entry appears at http://storycirclenetwork.wordpress.com/)

No, no, no

No, no, no, no!

No, no, no, no! It hasn’t been almost a year!

Yes, yes, yes, yes! It has.

I’ll avoid the trite time flies and simply accept that I let other things get in the way. Blogging has been for me an ‘after I do this’ and ‘after I do that’ activity.

Supposing we live tomorrow after whatever it is that is supposed to happen tonight does or doesn’t happen, then there will be a new entry tomorrow and every two and maybe one weeks thereafter until the next apocalypse or something else comes up.

Sorta promise. 

February 14--years ago

Valentine Day—oh, that brings back school day memories. Mother was a procrastinator, so we’d spend the afternoon of the thirteenth dashing from H&Y Drugstore ownered by those cute Hansard twins' daddy, to Goeslin’s (later TG&Y) on a frantic search for Valentines. Then, after supper, we’d sit around the breakfast table and address them. I was a scrawly writer, so she helped. One for each kid in the class. That was the rule. Miss Copeland had sent home the list two weeks ago, and the rule, “one for everyone or none at all.”

            This followed the first grade disaster. It was Miss Harper’s (name disguised to protect the guilty) first year to teach. She later swore they didn’t teach her this at Texas Women’s. We spent a couple of days of our art period (ahh, we did have art every day in those good old days) building and decorating our “Valentine Post Office.” Then the big day came. One at a time, we went and played postman filling the boxes. Then in reverse order we took the sack we’d brought our Valentines in and collected our mail.

            Disaster. Jerry, who couldn’t learn to read and nobody liked didn’t get but two and the one Miss Harper gave him. Thank goodness for my sweet mother, mine was one of the two. Several other kids only got a few. And Julia W. and Betty A. got one from everyone and two from some of the boys. I did okay. But I can still remember some of the kids I didn’t get one from. Never again.

            One for all and all for one!

            That’s not my biggest February 14^th memory though. That one has nothing to do with Valentines other than the date. We lived in Amarillo, in the middle of the wind-swept Panhandle of Texas. Often we got the gift (?) of ‘blue northers’ from the icy Rocky Mountains, swept across the plains by a ferocious North wind, the blizzards could be blinding. Mother hated them. February was usually the worst month. Dorothy, the eternal optimist, declared that because spring was around the corner, on February 14 it was appropriate to wear a new spring cotton dress. She spent much of January and early February making dress for my sister and me. (Sewing was not her long suite, but she hung in and did it.) No more heavy jumpers and sweaters.

One year we were mid-snow storm. I despaired about my new dress. I certainly couldn’t wear it in the snow. Not a problem. After I put it on, Mother pulled my Sunday wool jumper over my head, declaring that the green in the jumper matched the green in the leaves of the daisies she’d embroidered around the neck. Off I went to Wolflin School through the snow with my bag of Valentines feeling smart, stylish and very springish. 

Slam! Bam! The garbage can! Our Trashy Story

Crash! Bam! The garbage can!

Not out! Run! Run! No time! Damn!

We missed the truck—again.

I posted this haiku on Facebook this morning. But there’s more to the story.

The community cans.

We live in an involuntary garbage commune, sharing the three garbage cans behind our rented house with the two guys who live in the garage apartments over the garage. (We share that as well.)  We’ve never discussed garbage rules, we all three just do it. Somehow the full cans get down to the street late Sunday night (usually Michael) or early, early Monday morning (usually either Bob or me). After the truck comes, and we must be the first stop, someone goes down and fetches them. Works well.

Except yesterday. Sunday night both the apartment fellows were gone. We had dinner guests. Certainly, no can down before they came. After they left, two sleepy people did most of the clean-up—lots of trips out to the cans, but not to the curb.

I've rooted celery.
Why not a turnip?

Monday morning, as usual I was up at dawn. Cans, thought I, must get them down to the curb—in a little while. I read the thin-as-usual Houston Chronicle, picked up a little more, got the dinner linens into the washer, and was contemplating rooting a left-over turnip when I heard the truck gobbling garbage down the street and heading our way. Now!

The can next door---
they made it.

“Bob, the trash! Hurry! They’re coming! Now!” I yelled at Bob who was at his computer waking up as I headed for the back door. I’m glad we don’t have a picture of that. I was in my fuzzy black house shoes, my pando, excuse me, panda pajamas, and a University of Houston Cougar sweatshirt. Bob was similarly stylishly clad. We ran. We did not make it. We stood and surveyed our neighbors’ empty cans. It was going to be an interesting (and smelly) week behind our house.

But clever Bob. Clever, clever Bob saved the day. Later in the morning when we headed out for our walk and a stop at the grocery store (I’m lucky—four in walking distance.) Bob noticed the truck hadn’t been across the street yet. He also noticed that the supposed-to-open-soon yoga studio across the street had failed to put out their can as well. Frisky as a squirrel, Bob fetched our can, rolled it across the street and saved the day.

MY HERO! 

Mission accomplished.

Not Just Any Day, January 20

Look at the calendar—it’s January 20, Friday—just another day with a long to-do list and a party tonight. But wait, January 20, the date rings a bell. Think. Yes. It’s Inaugural Day. Well, some years it’s Inaugural Day, and suddenly a couple of quick snapshots pop into my mind as I regard the calendar.

            In 2008 I lived deep in the south of a deeper than Deep South state so red (Georgia) that you might consider it a pre-primary color. While, even there, a few others shared our feelings, we mostly headed the 40 or so miles south to the friendlier environs of Tallahassee. After all, Tally is a state capital and has two major universities—what else would you expect? We had a women’s (we didn’t ask if they were ladies—didn’t matter) lunch group that could grow quite rabid. One of my good friends and fellow club members gave me a call a few days before Inauguration Day. Come on down for lunch and a glass of wine to watch the ceremonies. I got there early.

            When the time came we gathered around the huge screen, silent. Picture the group—all women of a “certain age.” Some of them certainly of a “certain age.” Except for me, all were native north Floridians, most from families of substance, families who had settled the land in the early 1820s, doubtless slaveholders. These women had grown up accustomed to African American servants, the traditional southern way of living.

            And now they clustered around the huge screen, glasses of red wine clutched in their hands, ready for the moment. The President-elect, soon to be President, strode up the steps. One woman burst into tears. She stood up, glass in hand.

            “I never thought I’d see the day!” She raised her glass. The rest of us rose and joined the toast to our new leader. Certainly a day to be proud!

            Go back, way back, 49 years to a young housewife/part-time student thinking about cleaning the kitchen. She was always thinking about cleaning the kitchen; lots more than she ever cleaned the kitchen. She poured another cup from the electric peculator and settled down at the kitchen table—really just the table, in this tiny house, there was no dining room. Her barely-two-year-old thundered up and down the hallway on the tiny tricycle he’d gotten for his birthday a couple of weeks before. It was too cold on the blustery plains of the Texas Panhandle for him to go outside. Why not? She asked herself. It’s a historic day. She flipped on the TV, and as she would so many more times began to watch a President-elect with a lovely family mount to the platform.

Sometimes he rode
a pony instead of
a trike.

            “Ask not what you can do for your country. . .”

            She grabbed the child as he whirled by and held him fast on her lap. “You are watching history!”

            During the campaign she’d been a vocal campaigner, even if she didn’t vote for Jack Kennedy—she was too young, wouldn’t hit 21 until that July. But that didn’t hold her back. When Kennedy made a five minute layover at the Amarillo Airport she’d gone with her equally ardent granddad and had been at the front of the handshaking line, child in her arms. She sported a bumper sticker on the clunker of the white Studebaker Scotsman that the young family tried to get around in. (Sometimes it preferred to take a nap.) That sticker had gotten her in trouble.

            The family usually joined her mother for services at the First Presbyterian Church and then, along with a chunk of the congregation, for dinner at the Silver Grill. As they stood in line one of the church dowagers came up to her.

            “Honey, I know you’re young and probably haven’t thought about it, but you really shouldn’t have that sticker on your car and park in the church parking lot. Really, dear, you shouldn’t have that sticker at all. You know,” she lowered her voice, “that man’s a Catholic.” In case the point was missed, she said it again. “A Catholic.”

            The young woman (you know who she is) almost bit a hole in her lower lip. She was too good a daughter to be rude in front of her mother. But the next day, the Studebaker had two bumper stickers.

Birthdays and Diapers

Earlier this week my older son celebrated his birthday. . Well did I remember, just as most mothers do, that January morning many (for both my son’s and my sake, we’ll leave it at many) years ago. The joy of my husband and parents, and the panic this nineteen-year-old new mom felt when the nurse plopped him in my arms. What next? I asked myself. I don’t know anything about babies. He was the first new baby I’d ever held.

The brave littlest cowboy. His mom
is the "bush" under the pony.

ur            A picture I found when I was sorting through old photographs reminded me of what next. The brave littlest cowboy perched on the back of a door-to-door pony. “Lady,” the fellow at the door had asked, “you got a kid who’d like a picture on my pony?” You don’t say no to an opportunity like that. After all, we lived high in the Texas Panhandle in Amarillo. Cowboying was part of our culture.

I asked how little a kid could be, mine was still not too steady a sitter. “Not a problem. You get behind the pony and hold him on.”

            “But I’ll be in the picture too,” I protested. “No’m, you won’t. I’ll scratch you out of the negative. You’ll look like a bush.”  He sounded slightly desperate. Chris and I were spending the afternoon at my mother’s house that was in an older neighborhood with very few children. The poor chap hadn’t had many takers that day, but he was in luck now, Mother and I bought a bundle.

            Now, looking at the picture I remember more. I remember that the cowboy hat and bandana made him look like a little man, but the rest of the outfit didn’t—diapers. Ah, I remember the diapers. Mostly I remember washing the diapers, and I remember drying them.

            We were student-poor. Bob was still in college, days and working the 4 to midnight shift at the telephone company. I’d stopped going to classes when I began to “show.” In those long-ago days we tried to hide the coming event—thank goodness, not the case now! I stayed home day and night with the baby and took one evening class on Tuesday while the entranced grandparents watched the baby.

            Not much money, translated to not many diapers—cloth naturally. Almost every day I washed diapers. My mother assured me how lucky I was to have a washer; she remembered doing them in the bathtub and stirring them around with a plumber’s helper. But I was not all that lucky; I didn’t have a dryer. I was the dryer. I lugged the laundry basket into the back yard and pinned the diapers (and all the other family laundry) on the seemingly endless clothes line. Then I lugged them back in. Okay. No big deal, and in windy Amarillo they dried so quickly in the summer that usually I could go back and start the take down as soon as I’d finished hanging them.

\           Not so in the winter when frigid air swept down across the plains straight from the Rocky Mountains. The first time I tried hanging them out—this would have been when the baby was about a week old—I ran into the house and called my mother after I went out and discovered that the diapers were frozen. Had I ruined them? We didn’t have money for more. Should I put them in the bathtub to thaw and then hang them a couple at a time on a chair near the floor furnace (my usual emergency drying spot)? I couldn’t hang them on the shower rod. This tiny house didn’t have a shower in its one bathroom. She calmed me down.

            “Lay them on the bed and forget about them for an hour or so, they are dry; they’re just frozen.”            I followed her instructions except for two I put by the floor furnace, because there were no more clean ones and the babe was begging for a change. As usual, Mother was right.  The next time we went to visit her, she had a surprise for me—a rack that fit over the furnace. I thought I was in the lap of luxury. I didn’t own a dryer until the third child was almost a year old—I didn’t know anything could make me so happy.

            Not only did the picture of the little cowboy remind me of these memories. I recently read a fine book Just Beyond Harmony by Gaydell Collier. (I’ll post a review soon.) She recounts her family’s adventure in the 1960’s when they lived in a log cabin in Wyoming for several years—Collier, her husband, and their four children. They had limited electricity and only enough running water for a tiny stream from the kitchen sink. For this time not only did she hang out the wash—she did it in a washtub with water she’d dragged from the nearby Big Laramie River. All year, and Wyoming winters are mighty cold. More than cold. Cold and snowy, and windy. When she told of bringing in the frozen laundry, I smiled and remembered my little cowboy’s diapers again. How lucky I had been with just one babe and a Panhandle winter, not  Wyoming one. And I hadn’t known it.

Great minds

Sure, we had blackeyed peas yesterday. Along with a fine coleslaw. I didn’t make mustard greens—their color supposedly guarantees a prosperous New Year, but I did toss some bright green cilantro in the slaw—I trust that’ll count.

            We almost didn’t get the blackeyes—well, we almost didn’t get the blackeyes on New Year’s Eve. No way was I going without, even if I bought canned ones at the 24-hour Walgreen’s. That afternoon our cooking son and his wife invited us last minute to their house for beef tenderloin if we’d bring our own potatoes and lobster tails.  Happily we complied and stopped off, at their suggestion, at Central Market, our upscale, upscale store (like Whole Foods with more cheese). Lobster tails, no problem. Baking potatoes, right there. Blackeyed peas, a problem. The produce department had a huge display of fresh hulled peas, but they were purple hulls not blackeyes. I ask an employee; she grinned. They’d run out by noon; “but these taste just like them.” Clearly, she didn’t understand blackeyes. Up in the all organic department they had some little bitty cartons—looked like about four ounces for $4. Good luck or not, I wasn’t going to spend $12 to get one good bowl of blackeyes, and since the clock was ticking toward dinner time and those potatoes had to bake, I wasn’t about the venture into the maze of aisles to look for dry ones.

            We arrived, greeted, I played “Bobba” with our grandson, and Bob headed around the corner to Foodarama, a supermarket at the other end of the spectrum from Central Market where he snagged a bag of dried peas. Disaster averted. I even remembered to put them in to soak before I went to bed in the early hours of 2012.

            Now, while they simmered nicely over a low gas flame and the coleslaw soaked up its tangy dressing, I got ready for our last traditional dish—the cornbread. For many years I made cornbread from scratch using my farmer Grandmother Nordyke’s recipe—only cornmeal, no sugar, lots of bacon fat, but lately I’ve gotten lazy and reached for the cornbread mix. Which I did now. Oops. No cornbread mix. No! I was not going to the store on New Year’s Day for cornbread mix; I would make it from scratch. But how? The cookbook with her recipe is back in Georgia. Quick, to the computer to search. I couldn’t find a recipe with only cornmeal; so I adapted one. I did use the cooking oil it called for instead of bacon fat. I remembered to oil the cast iron skillet and put it in my hot oven for a couple of minutes before pouring in the batter.

            It worked, but the creative cook in me began the critique. Too crumbly; next time I’ll put a little flour in next time to get it to hold together, and clearly it need bacon fat. It really needs bacon fat. One thing was totally clear though—no more cornbread mix. Not that much trouble and so very, very good.

            Here’s my amended recipe:

1 egg

1 cup milk (Grandmother N. would have used buttermilk)

1 tablespoon cooking oil

1 1/2  tablespoon bacon drippings

2 cups yellow cornmeal

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

So good! The cast iron gives a gorgeous golden crust.

            Beat egg milk and cooking oil together, and then add the meal, baking powder and salt. Melt the drippings in an 8 inch cast iron skillet. Pour the hot grease into the batter, stir, and immediately put batter into the hot skillet (Grandmother N’s technique). Bake (check often) for about 30 minutes at 350 degrees.

           

            Not the end of the story! Here’s the great minds part. I don’t take the daily New York Times, but I do get it online. I also get lots of notices about subjects I’m interested in—like cooking. So I sit down at the computer this morning and check out “My Alerts: recipes.” What’s there?  A recipe for cornbread using only cornmeal, lots (more than I would) of bacon fat, and heating the cast iron skillet. It’s almost my recipe! It even goes on to say that if you are not using fresh rough ground cornmeal (Grandmother N. ground her own [or had one of the seven kids do it] in the barn behind the Texas farmhouse), then substitute a bit of flour for some of the cornmeal.

            Great minds!

            If you’d like to check out the NYTimes recipe, here’s the link.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/28/dining/husk-cornbread-recipe.html?_r=1&emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

Tradition! Tradition! Meow!

Fresh, free-range turkey
right from the oven.

The hit of Thanksgiving Dinner--home
made butter.

I’m beginning to think it’s a family Thanksgiving tradition. Not having turkey (yes, we did that with son Chris as chef and mighty good it was, not to mention the homemade butter). No, taking in lonely cats threatens to become a habit.

Ginger--once upon a time

            Almost five years ago a cat appeared on our porch in Southwest Georgia. For months I told him, “Shoo, scat, cat.” He didn’t. He told me firmly speaking in a squeaky cat-ese, that this was his home and we are (yes, are) his family. Finally, on Thanksgiving day, 2007 I gave him a handful of cat food. The rest—history. I wrote about it in this blog in January, 2008 Gentling Ginger I. I’ve updated now and again, and now it’s history repeats herself.

            Ginger, named for his ginger coat, quickly managed to make himself the lead family cat. He even made the move with us to Houston where he now feels right at home.

Ginger now--surveying
his domain,

New cat on the block

            But last March, complications. Douglas appeared. Now Douglas wears a tag that says he lives a block away. That’s what they think. Douglas thinks he lives right in my yard where we’re sharing him with our neighbor Michael.  

Mac and Arthur, or is it Arthur and Mac?

(Check out my March 15 and 17, 2011 entries here.) Not only did Douglas appear. He brought two “nephews,” Mac and Arthur. The boys remain happy to eat outside and run. But Douglas? Douglas tells us plaintively (he tells Michael the same thing, and he’s as soft a touch as I am.), "I'm a house cat. I love you."

            And now—instant replay. Thanksgiving morning, I felt mellow, generous, loving and one more time—I opened the door. Immediately, Douglas accepted. That was a week ago. Now Douglas has made himself right at home—and with Ginger’s grudging permission. When will this end?

            No, Mac!

            No, Arthur!

Well, not until next Thanksgiving. Maybe.

Maybe too much at home!

Douglas makes himself at home.

            

 .

Once upon a time

I know where I was 53 years ago today—in my family backyard, renamed ‘the garden’ for the occasion. At precisely 9:30 in the morning, my friend Carol Brown started working her way through Handel’s Largo, I took my father’s arm and all of eighteen (for a whole month) I floated down the stairs into married life.

            Bob stood at the alter shifting from one foot to the other; such a mature man. He was nineteen. The garden alter was lovely draped in ivy and white chrysanthemums. Forty-eight hours earlier, it had still been the big swing set made of three-inch pipe and set in concrete. Mother didn’t want any tipping over. Swings down, flowers up. Instant alter. Years later, I watched my children hang by their knees on the spot where we made our vows. That’s the side of the ‘alter’ to my right in the picture.

            I didn’t feel nervous. I didn’t think I was nervous, but the minute we got to where Bob, our fine and understanding minister, Burnette Dowler, stood waiting and Daddy released my arm, I started shaking. It was the first time. It was the last time. I felt and probably looked like a fern in the water. The something deep in me was yelling, “Watch out.”

            We proceeded. When the time came to take Bob’s hand, I was fine. The fern found her roots. Rings changed, cake eaten, clothes changed, hop in my folks car (they later drove ‘our’ well-decorated Plymouth down Polk Street, Amarillo’s main drag) and off for our romantic honeymoon.

           

August 30, 1958

            Been a long, long road with ups, downs, curves and even a few detours, but we’re still on it looking for new adventures, old books, and fun. 

Bob and Trilla, 2011

Fun: When Bob saw the  wedding picture for the first time in a few years, he asked why I was holding hands with Buddy Holly. What do you think?