All In A Day

Lists

2012-01-16T19:14:00.000-08:00

It seems that these days I need a list just to function in a nominally productive manner. To be honest, maybe “a list” is an understatement; I need many lists to successfully get through any given day - grocery list, chore list, reading list, to-do list for school, home maintenance list, errand list - and the lists go on . . . Without my lists, something gets forgotten. It’s OK if that overlooked item is something like dusting the door jambs or sweeping the garage; but if it is forgetting the dog food, cat food, or toilet paper at the grocery store life can be pretty miserable on many different levels!

I mentioned my “bucket list” a few posts ago. I have never written this list down. This allows for it to ebb and flow as life goes on. Some of the items that made the list at age 25 have fallen off while others have been added only recently. (Getting stoned has been there a while and will probably remain for the foreseeable future.)

Another list that has become important in my life is the “We List”. A year and a half ago while Weber and I were in Vermont on our honeymoon, we sat down one afternoon and made a list of things that we wanted to do. We arbitrarily began our list by numbering a page from 1 to 50. We managed to get 30 things written down before deciding that the list was long enough. Revisiting this list several times in the last eighteen months, I have realized that our “We List” is not a bucket list; it is not a list of things that we want to do at least once before we die. Rather, it is a list of things that we want to do in an effort to create our life together.

Some of the things on our list include:

drink more tea
read more
keep the house clean
go for walks with the dogs
write and draw regularly (lesson plans and doodling don’t count)
take advantage of local attractions, festivals, concerts, etc.
buy and eat locally
try at least one new recipe a week

As you can see, most of these items are ongoing; the truth is that they require creating and establishing new habits. Since so much was new in our world when we married, new habits were fairly easy to create because there were not a lot of old ones that needed to be broken. We have been successful in adopting many of the practices on our list. Some we have not yet managed to incorporate into our daily lives and a few seem not so important at this point.

Since for nearly a year we have had neither a complete nor a functional kitchen, the list’s items that centered around food and meals were virtually ignored. Now, though the kitchen is still not complete, it is fully functional with regard to appliances, countertops, and running water. (We still have no usable storage space under the counters.) We can now work on No. 21 on our list, “try at least one new recipe a week.”

Right now, as of January 16, 2012, I am way ahead of the game on this one because a) I have not started school yet and have time to cook and b) I got several cookbooks for Christmas. This is one of them -

Last night I made Heidi Swanson’s yogurt biscuits. These are the best biscuits I have ever had. That is saying a lot considering biscuits are a food group in and of themselves here in Texas. Though there are many other awesome recipes in this cookbook, it is worth the cost just for the biscuit recipe!

Tonight we had quinoa patties. I may never eat hash browns again.

If you want to peruse some of Heidi Swanson’s recipes before you buy this cookbook, which I know you will want to do, check out her “recipe journal” at www.101cookbooks.com. You can start your own list of recipes to try.

Happy cooking and healthy eating to each of you!

Cracker Control

2012-01-05T20:59:00.000-08:00

As far as I am concerned, crackers are the perfect food. First of all, they are a carbohydrate; that propels them way up there in the direction of perfection. Secondly, they are tasty by themselves and they serve as a luxury vehicle for the delivery of other delicious stuff like peanut butter, cheese, hummus, fruit . . .

The one thing that has kept the crackers in my world from reaching absolute perfection is that I buy them pre-packaged. I hate to buy pre-packaged food because you just don’t know what really comes in those packages. There should be nothing in the ingredient list on a box of crackers, or most any other edible product for that matter, that I can’t attain at my local grocery store or that I can’t pronounce. I am really not a control freak with regard to most things, but I do want ultimate control over what I put in my body. The only way to accomplish this is to make it yourself.

Today I set out to create perfection in my cracker world. Nabisco Wheat Thins are my favorite store-bought cracker. I began a search for a comparable recipe. I did not have to look too far. I found one called Wheat Thins in the King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking cookbook. Just a few simple ingredients - all easily pronounced kitchen staples.

I must say that I was surprised that the flavor comes from vanilla and paprika. (The newspaper on the counter in the background contains the New York Times crossword puzzle, a necessary kitchen staple for all recipes.)

Here is the complete recipe:

1 1/4 cups whole wheat flour

1 1/2 tablespoons sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon paprika

4 tablespoons butter

1/4 cup water

1/4 teaspoon vanilla

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Mix the dry ingredients. Cut in the butter. Mix water and vanilla then add to other ingredients. Mix well either by hand or using some electric device such as a mixer or food processor. (I mixed mine with my hands.) Divide the dough into four pieces. Working with one piece at a time and keeping the others covered, roll the dough on a floured board to 1/8 inch thickness or less if you can. Using a pizza cutter, cut into 1 1/2 squares. Place on a “prepared” baking sheet. (I used a cookie sheet with a Silpat liner.) You can sprinkle the tops with additional salt or not. Bake for 5-7 minutes. Keep a good eye on these crackers as they bake because they cook quickly.

Having been successful with the made-from-scratch Wheat Thins, Brooke and I decided to push our luck a little further.

Offspring No. 2 really likes Nut-Thins, another store-bought cracker. Coincidentally, there was an article in yesterday’s Dallas Morning News touting the health benefits of almond flour - high fiber, high protein, high nutrients. Surely if we can make Wheat Thins, we can make Nut-Thins using almond flour.

The first order of business was getting the almond flour. We made it using blanched almonds that we had in the freezer and a food processor. The trick here is that you want almond flour, not almond butter. So, use the pulse setting on the food processor. Pulse the nuts until you have something that resembles flour.

2 cups almond flour

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 egg

1/2 teaspoon salt

You can add the paprika and vanilla if you want to replicate the Wheat Thin flavor. We instead chose to add garlic salt and black pepper to the dough. (cayenne pepper would probably be really good too. Maybe next time . . .) The rolling and cutting process for these is the same as the previous cracker;the big difference is that they cook at 350 degrees for 12-14 minutes, or until brown and crispy.

This was a very wet dough. Brooke suspects that this was because the almonds had been in the freezer. She suggested that next time I spread the almond flour on a baking sheet and put it in the oven for a few minutes to draw off some of the added moisture before mixing all of the ingredients. We ended up rolling the dough between two sheets of parchment paper. This worked fine.

Since I have not eaten the Nut-Thins from the store, I don’t know how closely our crackers come to the taste or texture of their store-bought counterparts. Taken as they were, I thought they were good crackers. We did use wheat flour to roll them so our process was not gluten-free. If you are trying to avoid wheat, you could flour your board with rice flour or corn starch.

I am happy to be in absolute cracker control with regard to my Wheat Thins. Next on my list of things to conquer and over which to gain control . . .graham crackers.

Brooke and I did have one unexpected incident during our cracker making extravaganza. At one point the dogs ran to the back door barking hysterically. This was not their “barking to get attention” bark; it was their “there’s something out there and we’re going to protect you” bark. As we looked out the kitchen window, this is what we saw.

Actually s/he was much closer when we first looked but quickly moved further down the fence in the time that it took me to get my camera. I think someone forget to mention to this critter that possums are nocturnal. But hey, I like a non-conformist.

Beauty

2012-01-02T11:58:00.000-08:00

What does one do for entertainment in Texas over the Christmas holidays? According to the media, most people shopped until they dropped. Then they got up and did it again. Sports fans got the best Christmas gift they could imagine when the NBA began its season on Christmas Day. The Dallas Mavericks, however, unwrapped a disappointing opener for their fans. And football games are aplenty. We were neither at the mall or at the arena. We went to the Dallas Arboretum.

Despite being December 29th, it was a beautiful and sunny sixty plus degree day, a perfect opportunity to be outside walking off those holiday cookies and cinnamon rolls. Also, Offspring #1 got a macro lens for Christmas ostensibly to take pictures for her food portfolio but a trip to the Arboretum to photograph plants seemed like a reasonably low stress way to familiarize one’s self with the new lens. Weber and I enjoy taking pictures as well so with our shoulders loaded with camera bags off we went unsure of what we may find to be picture-worthy at the Arboretum at this time of year.

When all was said and done, Brooke had taken over 300 pictures. I asked her to give me her favorite. This is was she sent.

The camellias were one of the few flowering plants.

In the spring and summer when the flower beds are bursting with blooms and all the foliage is thick green and thriving, it is easy to find beauty; it is perhaps even possible to attain beauty overload. The potential for stunning photographs during the peak growing season is almost overwhelming. However, in the midst of winter, when almost nothing is flowering and many plants lay dormant, beauty puts on a different face. It is much more subtle and does truly lie in the eye of the beholder. It is up to each of us to look closely enough to see the beauty in the barren trees or the mulch covered flower beds. It is up to us to see that much beauty exists in the lulls of the life cycle.

I had a somewhat strange feeling when I saw this next image. It reminds me of the pictures of the veteran's cemeteries where all of the markers are uniform and, when photographed, are often adorned with similarly uniform American flags. The irony here is that these are the plants that are the most hardy, the ones that have survived the Texas weather extremes.

I like all of the different colors and textures of the trees in this picture.
I can't remember what this shrub is but the orange leaves seem so full of life. Orange is one of my favorite colors probably because it just exudes energy.
I love this next picture. It may be the one that best exhibits that sense of a different kind of beauty. Here is a leaf that was probably bright green and firmly attached to a tree not too long ago. It is now donning its winter colors as it meanders alone amidst some ornamental grass. It will probably be blown or swept into a compost bin soon. Right now, to me, it is dancing along full of life and with its own personality. Though I know that the two holes in its middle are really signs of decay, they look like eyes. This little leaf standing upright with the sun shining through it is beautiful. I think this my favorite of the pictures that I took.

As many of the trees are shedding their final leaves of 2011 and flowers are dropping their last petals, new life is emerging as the gardeners are beginning the early plantings of 2012.
I am looking forward to visiting the Arboretum in the spring with my camera again in hand.

The Best Day

2012-01-01T19:37:00.000-08:00

So here it is, New Year’s Day, the beginning of 2012. Funny, but nothing really seems new to me. (Possibly because I haven’t yet written the date on anything and had to change that last digit from “1” to “2” by tracing over it eight or ten times.) Another reason that I don’t have a feeling of newness today is because my life is structured by the academic rather than the calendar year: so my “new year” begins at the end of August not on January 1st. Even our health insurance year runs from September through August so we are not even looking at having to meet new deductibles beginning today.

I have spent some time this afternoon considering what I can do to make this day the beginning of something new. Traditionally people make “new year’s resolutions.” As I pondered this possibility, I learned something about myself. I don’t believe in new year’s resolutions as a positive way to begin another year. You are probably thinking that I have this somewhat bizarre belief because I am weak and know that I can’t keep a resolution more than twenty two hours. Or, that I am so ego-centric that I don’t think I need to make any changes in myself. Neither is the case. Basically, I find new year’s resolutions kind of depressing.

Making an effective resolution requires us to take stock of all the places in our lives that we perceive ourselves to be unhappy, unhealthy, ungrateful, unproductive, etc. We then vow to change. This is not necessarily a bad exercise in and of itself; what seems to me to be negative and thus depressing is that we have to continually return to these less than positive feelings as a means to measure the success or failure of our new year’s resolutions. And let’s face it, the truth is that most people never attain the goals that they set for themselves on January 1. Most often this is because the goals themselves are unrealistic, unattainable, and possibly even unnecessary. Therefore rather than improving our lives, things actually seem worse.

It seems to me that lots of people spend too much time focusing on the past and others worrying about the future. What about today? What about right now? What if I resolve not to wallow in the pains of yesterday or the uncertainty of tomorrow. What if I simply resolve that today I will be the best I can possibly be? That may mean that today I am ten pounds overweight; that I am grouchy; that I have Oreos for breakfast; that I disappoint my husband; that I fail to reach that student in the back corner. Or it may mean that I need to buy my pants a size smaller; that I smiled at everyone I met even if they were less than cheerful with me; that I prepared and ate three healthy meals by anyone’s standard; that all my students were challenged and invigorated by the learning process. Whatever the day brings, if I can honestly say that I was the best person that I could be today then it is a good day. If I have been the best that I can be today then I should have no regrets. And having regrets is what leads to those feelings of unhappiness that burden so many people.

I guess what I have learned through today’s musings about January 1 and new year’s resolutions is that what we really need to do is look at each new day as a beginning and resolve to be the very best we can be on that one day keeping in mind that “best” is not relative. Best simply means that given what we are facing today, we do the best we can with what we have or don't have and, most importantly, at the end of the we have no regrets. If we can crawl in to bed each night and not be cbombarded by a list of “I wish I hads” and “I wish I had nots” racing around in our minds then it was a good day. Tomorrow will most certainly be a different day but if taken for what it is, it too will be the best it can be.

Here are a few thoughts to help make every day the best it can be:

Smile.

“Thank you.” is so much more than two words.

Time is the best gift you can give to anyone.

Sometimes it is necessary to be late.

Everyone is grouchy and unhappy at one time or another.

How you look is not nearly as important as how you act.

Words are not always necessary.

Sometimes cookies are a meal.

A clean heart feels better than a clean home.

Everyone deserves to have a friend.

You don’t know what anyone else is really thinking or feeling.

Never pass up an opportunity to say “I love you.”

Feel free to add to this list by posting a comment.

As we greet each new day of this new year, let’s each resolve that today I will be the best I can be leaving yesterday behind and not worrying about tomorrow until it becomes today.

It's A Girl, It's A Girl, It's A Boy, It's A Girl, It's Almost 2012

2011-12-30T19:29:00.000-08:00

As I write this, we have survived the celebration of four birthdays in the last week - my two girls, me, and Jesus. That is a lot of celebrating even when you do it all rather simply.

Our season of celebration began with the arrival of Offspring No. 1 from Chicago. She is home with us for three weeks. For me, this alone is reason to celebrate; she has not been home for an extended stay in a while. This being our first holiday season in “our home”, everything was new - starting with creating a space for Brooke when she got here. She is staying in our craft room, a room that is furnished with the bunk beds (no longer bunked) and book cases that were in her room as a child. The room itself is Weber’s childhood bedroom. So as I put fresh linens on the bed that I first made twenty years ago, he was watching the room that was his first man cave be transformed for a twenty-two year old woman. For different reasons, it was an odd feeling for both of us. We were all further transported back to childhood days when Brooke asked for, and we gave her, a Lite Brite for her birthday. I believe that she got her first Lite Brite for her third Christmas. The 2011 version of this perennial childhood favorite now sits on the desk in Weber’s room . . .no, the craft room . . .or is it Brooke’s room.

Once home, the first order of business for Brooke was a trip to the grocery store. The most pressings items on her list were those necessary to make Offspring No’ 2’s birthday cake, an Arnold Palmer Cake. This was a time consuming endeavor but resulted in a magnificent cake.

The first piece even came out clean and upright!

As an aside I must add here that Brooke and Weber went to Central Market without me. When I inquired to the success of their trip the response I got was, ‘we only spent ten percent of our total grocery bill on beer.” No, the beer had nothing to do with the impending birthday cake and everything to do with a holiday bonding experience for the two of them.

Erin, who was celebrating her nineteenth birthday, is a little more mature than her older sibling; no likes of Lite Brite for her. Also no ice cream for her birthday cake - unless she makes it herself with her new ice cream maker attachment for her Kitchen-Aide mixer.

We also had a nice celebration of Jesus’ birthday. The whole gang was at our house - both girls, one boyfriend, Mike (my ex) and his partner, Jason. (Maybe thats two boyfriends . . ) Anyway, we had all of our family together for food, gifts, games, and fun. It was great watching everyone open their gifts. Now that the girls are old enough to do their own shopping, there are more surprises on Christmas morning. The day was all that I had hoped for and more. And for those of you who are wondering, I was indeed stoned, but not grouted, for Christmas. Paul did get all of the stonework on the fireplace done and even put up a temporary mantel so we could hang our stockings!

Mine was the last of the birthdays. Though it was a “monumental” birthday, I did not want any overdone celebration. Weber, being a smart guy, honored my wishes. We had a nice family lunch at one of my favorite restaurants, Cotton Patch, nothing fancy. The feeding frenzy continued that evening with a pancake dinner with a couple of my knitting buddies. Brooke also made me a birthday cake - complete with a marzipan rose atop.

(She had us buy her some Play-doh presumably so that she could practice making the rose. Personally, I think it was all just a ploy to get some Play-doh. Remember, this is the 22 year old kid who wanted a Lite-Brite for her birthday!)

I also received many cards and text messages with birthday wishes from friends far and near. Turning 50 was not so bad. I am grateful for and blessed by all of my family and friends. who helped to make this a special birthday for me.

With all of the birthdays behind us, we are left with one last party - the ushering in of 2012. We will celebrate the dawning of the new year much like we did the beginning of the next year of each of our lives - with family, friends, food and fun. What better way to begin a new year?

May each of you be surrounded by those things that bring you joy in the year to come.

I'll Be Stoned For Christmas

2011-12-19T19:59:00.000-08:00

Up until this moment, only a very few people know that one of the things on my bucket list is to get stoned. Well really, I just want to smoke pot. I’m not sure whether to be embarrassed by or proud of the fact that to this day, roughly one week shy of my fiftieth birthday, despite having spent nearly a decade on college campuses as a music major, I have never been stoned.

Now that it is about time for Santa Claus to come to town people are asking me what’s on my Christmas list. I am careful not confuse items on my Christmas list with those on my bucket list. I am also reminded of the song lyrics. “He sees you when your sleeping. He knows when you’re awake. He knows if you’ve been good or bad.” And, I have learned that he also knows if you secretly desire to get stoned. It’s kind of creepy, but true. Imagine my surprise when Santa decided to grant my wishes a little before Christmas and left me this!

OK. So Santa was a little confused. Or maybe he knows that I am a nice girl and couldn’t possibly have meant that I wanted to do anything as naughty as to get stoned smoking pot.

So now what do I do with a pile of stones?

The truth is that these stones were on my Christmas wish list. One of the last big things to be done in our seemingly unending home remodeling project is to add stone facing to both the kitchen island and the fireplace. I am happy that this may be done before Christmas. Right now, we have no place to hang our stockings. I’m not worried about the fact that they may not be filled by the scary guy in the red suit but rather I was disappointed because I hand knit all of our stockings, finishing the last two this year, and there may be no place to display them. We have five days to remedy this situation; I have faith that indeed our stockings will be hung by the chimney with care ( not necessarily with any hope of St. Nick soon being there) come Christmas Eve. Paul, one of Santa’s lesser known elves, arrived early this morning to work on getting us stoned.

As always, he was supervised by Frankie, who thought the pan of mortar sort of resembled a large and poorly maintained litter box.

Adidas spent the day wondering why he gets in trouble when he forages in the litter box but Paul spent all day playing in it and nobody yelled at him and said he was gross.

By the end of the day, The entire island was stoned. (I was not not.) Tomorrow it will be grouted and the fireplace will get stoned. ( I will not.)

For now I will cross off nothing from my bucket list. I will be happy with our stoned island and fireplace and will find joy in simply being high on life.

Thanksgiving 2011

2011-11-25T21:45:00.000-08:00

It is hard to believe that Thanksgiving and Black Friday are over and we have started the official countdown to Christmas.

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving despite a few obstacles. It was perfect in that both girls were here with us. The obstacles were, in hindsight, minor - the kitchen is still not finished and Wednesday morning the dishwasher decided that it would cease to function properly and thus would be unavailable until addressed by a repairman on Monday. Neither of these things was enough to keep us from enjoying our time together.

Another thing that made it a great Thanksgiving, at least for me, is that I was responsible for very little of the actual meal preparation., I made one pie, the dressing, and green bean casserole for Erin; with these tasks completed, my cooking responsibilities were fulfilled. Weber smoked the turkey. Brooke did everything else! It sure is nice to have a kid in culinary school! She made roasted brussel sprouts, leek bread pudding, a cauliflower tart, bread, and two pies - and no mess! She has always been a pretty exceptional cook. It seems that greatest skill that culinary school has taught her how to clean up as she goes - quite a valuable skill considering our non-functional dishwasher and the somewhat compromised kitchen accommodations.

Weber and Brooke spent Wednesday morning grocery shopping. (I spent the day at the yarn shop knitting. Have I mentioned how great it is to have a kid who cooks?) Brooke had been planning her menu for some time. She then made her shopping list and checked it twice and off they went to conquer Central Market on one of the busiest grocery shopping days of the year.

Once home, she began cooking . . .and didn't stop for about twenty four hours.

Her sister thought that maybe she should have checked her list another time or two. Leeks and cauliflower? For real? There are mashed potatoes and green beans, right?
Even thought Erin did not want leeks or cauliflower, she, and the rest of us, managed to have more than enough to eat.

We let our meal settle for a few hours before having pie and then heading out at midnight to mark the beginning to our Christmas shopping season. Yes, we were some of the crazies who went to Target for their midnight opening. We weren't looking for anything in particular so the outing was one of low stress. (It was one of no stress for Weber; he was in bed by 11:30.) The rest of us had a fun time wandering around Target and people watching. There is probably a great sociology or economics dissertation in studying this kind of shopping environment.

We got home about two and all settled in for good night's sleep.

Still stuffed from the night before, the kids began the day with a game of Clue rather than breakfast. Having been left out of the previous day's feast, Frankie was not going to be left out of the game playing also.

About the time they had figured out that it was "Mr. Plum in the kitchen with poison," Paul arrived with the missing kitchen cabinets. Installing them took most of the afternoon. Frankie was not going to be left out of that process either.
Though it was a little weird, we had a fun holiday with much for which to be thankful.

Enlightenment

2011-11-21T17:34:00.000-08:00

Do you read the instruction manuals for all of your household items? If not, you should. Not necessarily because they may enlighten you on how to properly use whatever it is that they came with . . .though they might; but rather because they are often a great source of entertainment and hysterical laughter.

The following is from such a manual.

"11. Do not touch the parts that are not intended for manipulation."

I kid you not. Any guesses as to the product whose instructions offer such guidance?

HINT: It did not come in a discreetly marked box intended to protect us from embarrassing assumptions by the mailman.

Visiting Hours

2011-11-20T18:50:00.000-08:00

How is it that two dogs, one neutered and one spayed, and two cats, also one neutered and one spayed, can spawn litters of offspring all over the house? And how can they do so at the same rate as rabbits? Oh, wait. those aren’t whole puppies and kittens; it is just huge balls of fur shed by the aforementioned spayed and neutered dogs and cats that have collected in every corner. What a relief. No more mouths to feed. Only vacuum cleaner bags to fill.

Looking around at the fur balls that occupied every corner when I got home from school Thursday night made me glad that I was not expecting any company that evening. It was not a pretty sight around here. This scenario made me start thinking about what night is a good not for unexpected guests.

Thursday is definitely not a good night. By Thursday night, a week’s worth of fur has collected all around the house as has a week’s layer of dust. The laundry basket is overflowing with a week’s worth of dirty work clothes (not that you would see this if you stopped by). My desk is covered with a week’s worth of papers to be graded. And, I am pretty tired and grouchy by this time of the week; that in and of itself makes Thursday night an undesirable time to visit.

Friday is cleaning day. So, on the surface, it is a much better day to visit than Thursday because the dirt is gone. However, don’t come by expecting dinner or even an after-school snack. By Friday, the only things in the refrigerator are leftovers. And, because I have spent the day cleaning, I am often grouchier and more tired than I was Thursday evening. Enough said.

Saturday is grocery shopping day. The leftovers from the previous week are replaced by many choices of fresh food. Sometimes we get distracted while we are ostensibly out grocery shopping and find ourselves embarking on other Saturday projects. Some of these projects cause there to be big boxes, or multiple pieces of unassembled objects such as bar stools and shelving, or rain barrels and decking to be strewn about from one end of the den to the other and sometimes beyond. This is just temporary clutter, but it makes for a less than welcoming environment for unsuspecting guests.

By Sunday, Saturday’s projects have been completed and any evidence of the previous day’s clutter and chaos has been erased. The gestation period of the next litter of puppies and kittens has just started and usually is not visible to the naked eye. We often eat out on Saturday evenings so the refrigerator is still well stocked. And sometime between Thursday evening and Sunday the laundry gets done. This is sounding like a good time to stop by. Oh wait, the school week starts the next day. we are busy grading those papers that have been sitting on the desk since Thursday or Friday and making sure the week’s lesson plans are in order. You can stop by anyway if you’d like. Make yourself at home and help yourself to whatever is in the fridge but try not to make too much noise. We are kind of busy.

Dinner on Monday evenings is usually pretty good. You are welcome to join us. Don’t trip over the backpacks right inside the door. And I promise that I will wash the dishes from the lunch boxes that are sitting on the counter when I do the dinner dishes. I’ll have all that done by 7:30 or so. That would be a good time to come by. There is usually hot coffee brewing by then too. If you are one of those people who doesn’t drink coffee at night, maybe you should stop by at another time. We don’t believe in decaf ...ever!

Tuesday and Wednesday nights are rehearsal and book study nights. If you time it right, you can join us for a quick dinner or a late night dessert and cup of coffee. Remember, no decaf! I suspect the litters of puppies and kittens are noticeable at this point, but we aren’t home long enough to be aware of them. This is probably a good thing because if I noticed them, I would feel obligated to do something about them right then which would require staying up even later than usual which would in turn necessitate more coffee. Now you know why we don’t believe in decaf.

Wow! . . .we are already back to Thursday and it all starts over.

The moral of the story . . .we are always willing to extend hospitality to anyone who wants to come visit. And, we will always offer the very best that we can to our guests Just keep in mind that the specific details of this agreement are subject to change without notice.

Birthday Boy

2011-11-02T20:19:00.000-07:00

Today is my four-legged boy’s seventh birthday.

"The Birthday Boy"

"The Birthday Boy almost 7 years ago"

If you subscribe to the belief that a dog year is roughly seven human years, then Adidas is forty-nine. That means that for the next fifty six days he and I are the same age. I thought it might be interesting to see how much age 49 in a dog and age 49 in a human actually have in common.

We are both a little stiff in the morning but it is nothing that can’t be remedied by a good stretch.
We both appreciate a hearty meal. I am a little more discriminating than Adidas. He enjoys any meal he can find - one from his bowl, Harley’s bowl, the cats’ bowl or any available trash can.
We both drink a lot of water and thus never pass up a potty stop.

We enjoy the same spot on the couch. Not simultaneously. We both don’t fit in said spot so there is often a power struggle for which one of us gets it. Adidas is more assertive than I am. He usually wins
We are both carrying around a few extra pounds. I worry about that. He doesn’t.
We both enjoy a late afternoon round of frisbee - me on the throwing end, Adidas on the receiving. I don’t mind being on the receiving end but he has a little trouble throwing.

We both know the importance of a good night’s sleep and an afternoon nap.
We both know the value of a pat on the head, a rub on the belly, and a scratch behind the ears.
Neither of us has a Facebook page.
Neither of us needs a Facebook page.
Neither of us wants a Facebook page.
We both believe that every day should start with a cookie.
And, we both know that you can never show too much love.

To 49 . . .or 7! Happy Birthday Adidas.

A Fair Day

2011-10-17T19:41:00.000-07:00

For some reason, I seem to be exhausted by the end of the school week. It’s not like I am over-extending myself. In fact, there are several things that I want and need to do that just haven’t gotten done because I run out of steam by the time I have accomplished all the things that have to be done.

Despite being tired and wishing for a day that didn’t start before 10 am, we decided to go to the Texas State Fair on Saturday. I think I wanted a funnel cake more than I wanted a morning to sleep late! Aside from the funnel cakes, the fair is the epitome of something I loathe - big crowds. I don’t like controlled crowds of well-behaved people; and, I really don’t like huge crowds of rowdy people hyped up on sugar and alcohol. I also don’t like crowds where the number of strollers equals the number of mobile people and those strollers are being pushed by mobile people under three feet tall. In my opinion, the State Fair has great potential for providing a miserable experience. But, it never has.

We rode the DART train, Dallas’ fledgling mass transit system, to the fair. Many other people chose this option as well. It is much cheaper than parking and much less stressful than driving. We got on the train at one of the earliest stops on this particular route and, to my surprise, it was already standing room only. We stood for a few stops. As the train slowed at the next station, we could see that a large crowd was about to board. It was clear that my personal space was about to be no more. At this point we were about half way to the fair; the trip would be another 20-25 minutes. We were standing by a seated family that consisted of grandparents, two of their children and spouses, and four grandchildren. As we scrunched to make room for the onslaught of new riders, the grandmother tapped me on the shoulder and pointed to an empty seat. Her family had doubled up the children so that three of them were sharing a seat intended for two and the fourth was on dad’s lap. This was a welcome but certainly unnecessary gesture on this family’s part. I will gladly admit that we were ever so grateful to arrive at the fair grounds with our legs and feet not already tired from having stood for forty-five minutes.

As the massive crowd disembarked from the train, everyone took their turn. There was no pushing or shoving. This controlled atmosphere continued all the way into the fairgrounds despite the slowdown as we all went through the narrow gates and past the metal detectors.

Next it was on to purchase a ticket. The fair employees did their best to direct people to the shortest lines, keeping everyone’s frustration levels at a minimum. During our brief time in the line, people were sharing extra discount coupons and even a few tickets with others . It was a bright spot for me to see a mass of strangers from all walks of life doing what they could to help others to save a few dollars and enjoy a good day at the fair.

We stood in a few more lines throughout the day in order to get drinks and the coveted funnel cake. Everyone was polite. People were quick to ask if you were in line before they took their place or to point to the fact that there were multiple lines being served. I observed as a patron shared food coupons with someone who had stood in line and was two tickets short for what they wanted. As the day went on, my faith in humanity was refreshed.

And, I was not hit by a single stroller powered by someone who could not see over the handles - or, for that matter, any other strollers.

Our fair day was a fun day. It was a good day.

Spending a day at the Texas State Fair is not an inexpensive outing. Admission tickets are reasonable, but bottles of soda that are 79 cents at a gas station are nearly four dollars at the fair. Funnel cakes are close to $5.00 (but worth every penny!). The rides average around $5.00. It doesn’t take long for these things to add up to a pretty pricy day, especially for a family.

I wonder if people were so pleasant and in such good moods because this year going to the fair was a big treat for themselves and their family. Did a day at the fair represent several weeks or months of saving? Is this a family’s vacation for the year? Are people so worried and stressed about the economic conditions that they vowed to leave that all behind for a day and enjoy themselves whatever the cost.

I don’t really know why all of the fair-goers were on their best behavior last Saturday. I do know, however, that I am grateful that they were. It made for quite an enjoyable day.

In a later post I will share how our memories of the fair will live on. That’s what souvenirs are for, Right?

That Crazy Little Thing Called . . .

2011-10-02T20:22:00.000-07:00

I have written before about how I believe it really is the small things in life that are the most important. I am not talking necessarily about things that we might take for granted, but more about things we just don’t think about on a daily basis - like your thyroid gland. How many of you have thought about your thyroid gland today? This week? This month? This year? I hadn’t either until about a month or so ago.

When I had my physical last month the doctor said that everything was great but he did notice that I had a goiter on the right side of my thyroid. Goiter? An enlargement, swelling, a lump. In this day and age anything that is described as a lump strikes fear in our hearts and minds. So I began the journey to get to know this goiter, this enlargement, this lump a little better. I started by learning about “its relatives” on the Internet. This is never really a good thing. There is much conflicting and even more just plain wrong information out there. I remembered from writing research papers in high school that if you find the same information in three sources it is assumed to be common knowledge. I went with that. If I read the same thing on three or more different websites I deemed it reputable.

Then, at the request of my primary care doctor, I sought information from the specialists.

First I had a radioactive scan. This cut into two of my days. On day one I had to go swallow a radioactive iodine pill. It didn’t take long; it was simply an inconvenience. The good part was that I got to go out for breakfast with a friend afterwards, something I don’t normally get to do during the school week.

The next day I went back for the actual scan. I wasn’t too worried about the procedure until they had me lay down on a table and then started sliding me into one of those machines whose entire persona is a big, black claustrophobic hole. Sensing my panic, the tech told me to relax, that it was not entirely closed in. She also told me not to turn my head. Well, the part that I could see was closed in. The part on the sides of my head, where I was instructed not to look was open. With a few mind games I was able to survive without embarrassing myself or my friend who went with me. And, for being a pretty good girl, I got to go out for breakfast again on a school day!

A healthy functioning thyroid absorbs iodine. By swallowing a radioactive iodine pill, the doctor was able to see how my thyroid was functioning. The scan revealed that I have a “cold nodule” on the right side of my thyroid. Though my general thyroid hormone levels are normal, this cold nodule means that a portion of my thyroid is not functioning. A “hot nodule” is one where the thyroid is overactive. Hot nodules are almost always benign. Cold nodules can be cancerous. Armed with my cold nodule in the right side of my thyroid, I went next to see an endocrinologist.

As an aside, I had this procedure done right around the tenth anniversary of 9/11. We were watching a television special about the various commemorative activities being held in New York City and the security measures surrounding them. One of the segments talked about how they had technology that could spot radioactivity - including people who had had any time of medical procedure using radioactive materials during the past two weeks. Fortunately we weren’t going to New York City.

The endocrinologist looked at the scan results and told me that it was great that I had the scan, but that we were still at square one because what we really needed to know was whether or not the nodule was cancerous and there is no way to tell that from a radioactive scan.

He then said that he wanted to do a sonogram to determine the actual size of the nodule, another piece of information that seemingly was not shown by the first scan. Nodules of one centimeter or less are rarely cancerous and do not require any further attention unless they grow larger. Those nodules that are larger than a centimeter require more “getting to know you.” Mine is 3.2 centimeters, which the doctor classified as “kind of big.” Surprisingly, I hadn’t felt it. Thyroid nodules can interfere with breathing, swallowing and can cause hoarseness, none of which have I incurred. I am a visual person so I had to find something that was 3.2 centimeters. The end joint of my own thumb is about that size. It is hard for me to believe that I have something the size of almost half of my thumb in my throat and I didn’t even know it was there. Sometimes now I think I can feel it but that just may be like that tiny spot on your shirt - once you are made aware of it that is all you can see or, in this case, feel.

After assessing the nodule’s size the doctor said that he would need to do a needle biopsy. He stuck a needle into the goiter, the enlargement, the lump, the nodule - four samples he took. It didn’t hurt but it was a very strange sensation. This was the first time that I actually felt like there was something in my throat. As the needle penetrated the nodule, it pushed against my trachea and esophagus. Like I said, this was a very weird sensation. The entire procedure took only about ten minutes. He then told me that it would take a week before he had any results.

How is it that nearly everything in this world seems to take only seconds and this was going to take a week? I can order almost anything I want from Amazon.com and have it tomorrow. And Amazon seems to have a hand in just about everything. Can’t they branch out into medical testing?

The doctor told me that though thyroid cancer is out there, only about 5-10% of all nodules are cancerous. He also said that thyroid cancer is treatable. (Both of these things I knew from my research on the Internet but it was nice to hear them from a medical professional.)

As it turned out, it took only six days to get the biopsy results and they showed that the nodule is benign. So for the time being it and I will remain constant companions. The whole relationship will be re-examined in a few months. If the nodule becomes too needy with regard to space, he will be surgically evicted: we’ll have to wait and see if such harsh measures are warranted.

In conclusion, in the past month I have learned a lot about that little thing called the thyroid gland. Here are a few more facts (collected from my conversations with the doctor, not from my own travels on the Internet).

About 50% of the adult population has thyroid nodules. Most people have no idea that they have them.

Modules in general are more common in women but cancerous nodules are more common in men.

Only 5-10% of all thyroid nodules are malignant.

Most thyroid cancer is curable.

This little gland has a big job. Its primary function is to regulate metabolism

This may be more information than you wanted to know about the thyroid, but if you are ever told that you have a goiter, an enlarged thyroid, a lump, or a nodule you will know exactly what that means.

Contracting Friendship

2011-09-18T19:11:00.000-07:00

Time flies when you're having fun, at least that is what "they" (whoever "they" is) say. The reality here is that time flies whether you are having fun or not. I have had a crazy start to the school year - lots of little things that have kept me just enough off-balance that writing here has not happened. I have written a little for other things and I want to share that here.

Earlier in the summer I came across an essay contest that asked the question, "Who are you most surprised to be friends with?" Finding an appropriate subject was not the difficult part; limiting the essay to no more than 300 words was however quite challenging for me. I wrote and edited and wrote and edited. Once I had something that I thought made me happy, I had several of my closest friends (the ones that I did not write about in the essay) read it and offer constructive criticism. I made some changes and then submitted it.

My entry did not make it into the group of finalists. That's OK. I enjoyed telling my story and just entering was a positive step for me. I could not publish it any place else until the contest finalists had been announced. Since that has now happened, here is my story about a surprising friendship.

CONTRACTING FRIENDSHIP

A year ago my husband and I were married – “take two” for both of us. The biggest decision facing us as we planned for our life together was where to live. The choices were my country house, requiring a hundred mile a day commute, or his city house, much nearer to work for both of us but holding unhappy memories and needing considerable updating.

The economy made the decision. With gas prices,

commuting was a poor option for us and the environment.

We searched newspapers, considered fliers taped to the front door, and checked bulletin boards at home improvement stores for a contractor. Nothing felt “right.” Then a friend suggested Paul.

Paul carefully listened as we explained that we needed him to make the house “different” enough to ease my husband’s ill feelings and restore the happy memories from his childhood. This was the house in which he grew up. Paul said, “I can do it.” Work began.

The morning after our wedding we received an email from Paul that said, “Congratulations and thank you for letting me take part in creating your new home.” We were deeply touched and knew we had definitely chosen the perfect contractor.

During this time Paul was caring for his aging mother and his only sibling, who was fighting a losing battle with cancer. Each day we checked on the house and Paul’s brother. On a September evening I suddenly felt a nudge to check my email. “Marc is gone.” read Paul’s words sent only moments before. This is not the kind of thing that happens between contractors and clients, but between friends.

Through our remodeling experience we have grieved together, healed together, reminisced together, laughed together (often about pink paint and glow in the dark stars) and grown together into true friends.

Summer Wrap Up

2011-08-20T19:22:00.000-07:00

Despite the fact that it is still 107 degrees and we are a month away from the autumnal equinox, for those of us who work in education, summer is officially over. School is starting either in earnest with children arriving on Monday morning or with preparations for college classes that begin the following week. As is always the case, the ten or so weeks that we had off over the summer went quickly; looking back it is hard to account for where all those days have gone. In an attempt to begin the school year with a clean slate, I thought I would I follow up on some of my summer posts.

At the beginning of June I began with a post of pictures of a promising garden. Through the last three months we have had an abundance of basil, a respectable crop of okra and jalapenos and, well, that was it. Though we had five 4 foot high tomato plants with lots of blossoms we never saw even one tomato. The squash and cucumbers tried very hard to produce but when all was said and done we only had a few of each to eat. As the hundred degree plus days mounted and days of rain became something only of dreams, the garden became a pretty bleak sight. It was costing more to water than we would spend buying produce. I know that we lost most of our squash and cucumbers to rabbits. It was hard to get angry; the little guys were so hungry and thirsty. First they ate all the tiny fruit from the vines. Then they ate the vines. They were so desperate for food that they did not even scamper away when I went out to water in the evenings. I think they were just waiting for this time each day. I finally began taking a handful of purchased vegetables out to them. For me this scenario makes clear the intensity of relation we have with all of the creatures of the earth.

Also in June we attended Offspring No. 1’s graduation from the University of Chicago. She is now following her bliss and chasing her dreams. Less than a month after graduation she had been accepted to and began her studies at Le Cordon Bleu to become a pastry chef. We are looking forward to checking her homework and helping her study for tests!

All of the four-legged members of our family have loved having someone home with them almost all the time. Us going back to school may be a bigger shock to their canine and feline systems that it is to ours. Hopefully they will not choose to display their unhappiness. The potential for disaster is great when disgruntled dogs and cats have the entire house to themselves for eight uninterrupted hours! We’ll hope that they opt for eight-hour naps during the day.

June’s giant step on the kitchen is the only step that has been made this summer. Lots of other things have been accomplished around the house but we are still minus a fully functional kitchen. Hopefully that issue will be addressed this week. Having Paul around working on the kitchen will also make the animals happy and thwart any plans of mass destruction. This sounds like a Win-Win situation!

Weber has now had his second cataract surgery and I still like the eye doctor. Since he had been so amused by Weber’s patch adornment at his first post-op checkup, we felt obligated not to disappoint with the second.

Again he was amused. Mission accomplished!

The eye doctor also recommended an internist to us since neither of us had a primary care physician We have both now had physicals with the new doctor and I have to say that he too meets my criteria for a doctor - he does have a sense of humor. Unfortunately I was the victim of his wit. As is to be expected he reminded me that it was time for my annual mammogram. In our discussion of scheduling this procedure the doctor allowed that perhaps the nurse could call the mammography center and they might be able to SQUEEZE ME IN right then. My beloved husband started laughing followed almost immediately by the doctor. If my beloved hadn’t already been equally discomforted by a prostate exam I might have been a little more upset. Despite laughing at my plight as a woman, I do really like this doctor. And, he gets a “two thumbs up” because his nurse also has a sense of humor!

We happened to be in the doctor’s office on the nurse’s 12^th wedding anniversary. She asked us how long we had been married. I told her that we had been married a year. She got this rather shocked look on her face. Then I clarified for her. I told her that we had been married forty-six years but only one year to each other. She got a good laugh from that.

As part of the routine physical, the nurse took me for a chest e-ray. When I got back to the exam room I said to Weber, “I now know when the staff of the doctor’s office thinks you are old.” The nurse got this terrified look on her face because she had been nothing but friendly and polite to me. When Weber asked, “How?” I told him that they no longer ask if you are or could be pregnant before they do an x-ray. The nurse got a chuckle from that as well.

So here we are at the beginning of a new school year. I spent several days this week helping Weber get his classroom ready; he is still not allowed to lift anything because of his surgery. I had a fun time arranging tables in his room and creating his bulletin boards. You don’t get to do much of that at the college level .I think now we are both ready to go back to school Monday morning!

If only the weather would now decide that it is fall!

TV or Not TV

2011-08-08T18:51:00.000-07:00

On August 3 Steve Blow, columnists with the Dallas Morning News, wrote a column titled, “Free at Last from the Grasp of Bad TV.” This is a nice thought.If only it was true. Steve Blow was rejoicing in the fact that The Bachelorette and all of its drama are finally over. I second his “Hallelujah” to that. Unfortunately, I am sure that there is more bad TV out there. In fact, a quick trip through the TV guide reveals that there may actually be TV that is even worse!! Scary, but true. I’m not even going to list the possible candidates for this distinction here because I don’t want anyone to actually put my assertion that there is TV worse than The Bachelorette to the test by watching these other “shows.”

Steve Blow also refers to an article in a recent issue of Time magazine in which historian David McCullough is asked, “We often can’t understand how people in the past could have owned slaves or not educated girls. What do you think people will wonder about us? McCullough’s response was, “How we could have spent so much time watching TV.”

Ouch!

Why do we as a society spend so much time watching television? And more importantly, why do we seem to enjoy it so much? I have several thoughts on these questions.

One of the reasons we spend so much time watching television is because TVs are everywhere. They are like a great big germ that has caused a national epidemic. Nearly everyone is exposed to the numerous strains of this infection - LED, LCD, HD, 3D, Plasma -many times a day and nearly all of us have been infected by this chronic, if not terminal, dis-ease.. There are televisions in restaurants, doctor’s office waiting rooms, train stations, our cars, and nearly every room of some people’s homes. It seems that there are more televisions than there are those fancy hand sanitizing stations. H1-N1 has nothing on HD TV with regard to epidemic status.

Why are there TVs everywhere? Are we not capable of sitting quietly while we wait for a doctor? Do we have nothing of interest to talk about with those with whom we are dining? Can kids not play license plate bingo or color or sleep in the car like we did before cars came standard with TVs and DVD players? What has changed? What is at the root of the TV epidemic?

I believe that what has changed is that, generally speaking, we are an unhappy society. We watch TV to escape our own lives. We fantasize about being the next American Idol, or The Bachelorette, or the winner of an extreme home makeover. Or, we feel powerful because we are not as fat as the people on the Biggest Loser or as pathetic as those on Hoarders. For the hour that we are enthralled in these shows we think we are happy. Unfortunately, as Steve Blow points out in his article, research shows that watching television actually causes depression. Really? Who knew? And I’m not even talking about the news.

I am not trying to pound the TV industry into the ground here. TV is a business. Like any business the producers are out to make money. Money comes from advertisers buying time on shows that people watch. People watch crappy shows. Crappy shows then make the money. Producers like the money. They make more crappy shows. People watch them. Business booms. As you can see, it is a vicious cycle.

As with many things, I suspect that I am in the minority with my perception of the quality of television these days. That’s OK. I’m content with not knowing who the latest Idol winner is. I may be culturally illiterate by current standards, but I’m happy.

Oh, and FYI, Desperate Housewives is going off the air. I suspect that depression will be on the rise!

What's Missing?

2011-07-31T18:56:00.000-07:00

When I was redesigned my blog, I debated with myself as to whether I should change the description of what I do here from “musing on the life of a teacher, mother, writer, knitter, human being.” My role as a mother has changed since I began writing my blog, but I am still a mother. Fortunately for my children, they have moved on to college and beyond and no longer serve as an unending source of material for posts.

Though I don’t write about it much, I love being a teacher. One of the reasons that I steer away from this topic is because so many teachers have gotten in trouble for posting comments about their students and their jobs on various public forums. Granted, many of these comments have been less than complimentary. That is not an issue I would have. I love my job and love my students. Enough said.

Being worn down by the dreadful heat here, having a list of things I need to do, and worrying about various people and situations and knowing that I have no control over either, is making me feel pretty human right now so I guess I still can claim human being. I am not going to speak one way or the other about whether or not I can call myself a writer.

That leaves knitter.

I am still a knitter though admittedly I don’t knit as much as I used to. In and of itself, that is not necessarily a bad thing; it is the result of having more (good) things to do - one of which is a heavier teaching load at school. Did I mention that I love my job - and my students? Anyway, the responsibilities of such cut into my knitting time. For the record, let me state here that it’s not watching Clean House and Happily Divorced on TV, or doing crossword puzzles, or writing blog posts, or playing Angry Birds that is compromising my knitting time; It is definitely my school/job related activities. Really. It is!

I have knit. I do knit. I am knitting. The problem is that I have not finished much lately so there isn’t really anything to write about or to show you. My bag of unfinished items may be further confirmation of my humanity. In my own defense, I have started and finished a few baby gifts. I gave them away without photographing them so I can’t prove that. They were cute. Trust me. I also have taught a couple of knitting classes but I myself have not yet finished these projects. Does it make me a good teacher if I tell you that I have not finished my own sweaters because I have spent a goodly amount of my time at the knit shop helping others finish theirs? I did finish one of Weber’s birthday socks in time for his June birthday. Its mate is still unfinished. Well, truthfully, it is still un-started. It is 105 degrees here. He doesn’t need wool socks now anyway, right? I know that wool has a wicking effect but trust me, he is not going to wear wool socks any time soon.

Despite the fact that I have several “overdue” knitted items to finish, I am looking ahead to holiday knitting. The other day I committed one of the knitters’ deadly sins; I was looking at yarn at a “craft store” rather than at the knit shop. Not only did I look, but I bought. I bought yarn and a pattern book. (More support for my human being status.)

While we were looking at the pattern books, Weber made a disturbing discovery. Thumbing through a book he noticed that several pages had been ripped from its center. We’ve all seen this kind of thing before - the page with the recipe ripped from the magazine in the doctor’s office waiting room, which is inevitably the page that, on its other side, had the conclusion to the fascinating article that you were reading. tThen there are the coupons that have been lifted from the Sunday paper and the missing journal article that you needed to finish your research in graduate school. It’s all the same - selfish people doing selfish things.

The thing that made this whole scenario of the book with the ripped out pages at the craft store even sadder is that it was a pattern book of knitted prayer shawls, shawls that are made and given to those who are facing tough times. The intent is that the knitter “knits” prayers into the garment as they work. What kind of prayers does someone who has stolen the pages from a book knit into their prayer shawl? Maybe Knit one prayer of hope and healing for you, Purl two prayers of forgiveness for me. At least that would be a step in the right direction.

The mother, writer, teacher, knitter, and human being in me says, Please don’t steal the pages out of newspapers, magazines, journals, novels, or knitting patterns. Thank you.

What's Up, Doc?

2011-07-23T21:40:00.000-07:00

Despite the fact that my grandfather was a doctor and I loved him dearly, medical doctors are not my favorite breed of human beings. Many of them are pretentious. Most of them think that their time is more valuable than mine or yours. And, a good many of them would rather be at the country club playing golf that listening to their patients enumerate their ills. The truth is that I don’t respect doctors any more or any less than I respect teachers, food servers, cashiers, airline pilots, or you. This is both the good news and the bad news for doctors with whom I come in contact. It is bad news because I don’t put them on a pedestal and worship the ground on which they practice. It’s good news because I recognize that they are human like you and me and can’t perform miracles.

Having said all this, I do have several doctors that I like and respect. Both my dermatologist and the surgeon who removed the skin cancer on my arm a few years back are awesome. Based on my personal experience they are fine medical professionals, but this is not why I think they are awesome. They earned this praise from me because they have a great sense of humor. If a doctor has no sense of humor, he or she is not the one for me. I put them all to the test first crack out of the barrel.

When I had my pre-op visit with the surgeon regarding the removal of the skin cancer, he went through all of the possibilities - if we do this the incision will be this big; if we have to do this it will be a little bigger. I told him that I wanted the scar to look like a Smiley face. He promised me that he would do his best. When I came out of recovery he greeted me with an apology that the incision more resembled a “whatever” face so he drew a smiley face on the bandage as consolation. I was amused and he earned my respect.

Nurses are even more uptight than doctors. It is my experience that wit and a sense of humor are detrimental attributes for those applying to nursing school. Knowing this, I love to harass nurses, especially those that work for pretentious doctors. Here is an example.

When I first was diagnosed with lupus I was seeing a well respected rheumatologist in Dallas. His waiting room was always packed with people who sat for an average of three or four hours to spend fifteen minutes with him. He is one of those who thinks that his time is more valuable that mine. As is often the case, his nurse does the routine vitals when you finally get to the exam room. On my first visit she sent me to the restroom to give the obligatory urine sample. She didn’t give me the usual instructions. You all know what those are. When I looked around the bathroom I saw that there were both paper cups and plastic containers. Unsure of which to use, I stuck my head out and asked her if she would lprefer this in paper or plastic. Rolling her eyes and preceding her response with a grand sigh she muttered “plastic.” She was not amused and I was not impressed. I don’t see this doctor anymore. My choice; they actually didn’t kick me out.

I had a similar encounter with a nurse when I had my skin cancer surgery. As part of the pre-op procedures she had to do a pregnancy test. I told her that if it were positive I would be rich since I could sue the doctor who had done my tubal ligation and it would be an immaculate conception. Her only response was “the sooner you cooperate and get this done the sooner we can get you in and out of here.” Okay then. Definitely no sense of humor and possibly no personality of which to speak.

Weber had cataract surgery last week. The doctor who performed the surgery is the ophthalmologist that he has seen since he was fourteen and whom he greatly admires and respects. I had met him once, very briefly, but did not see him the morning of the surgery. I did however have my customary fun with one of the surgery center nurses.

For some reason when they took Weber into surgery they left his street shoes on rather than giving him a pair of those $99 hospital footies. So, when I met him in recovery he had on a hospital gown and his Toms. In her most serious voice the recovery nurse told me that he was awake and I could talk to him. The sight of him in the hospital gown and his shoes made me laugh. The first thing I said to him was, “Wow, if you were going to wear a dress you should have shaved your legs.” He smiled. As usual, the nurse was not amused.

He came home with a hard plastic shield taped to his eye. It was kind of an injured pirate look. I decided that we needed to have a little fun with the look so we found pictures of eyeballs on the Internet, printed them, cut one out and stuck it to the patch.

I asked Weber if he thought that his doctor had a sense of humor. He said that he thought so but wasn’t sure. You know what’s coming next. I was going to find out for sure. We left the eyeball on the patch when we went the next day for his post-op visit. As he signed in at the office the reception giggled. She passed the test. The tech who did the initial questioning in the exam room was not amused. She failed the test. The doctor got a good laugh and greatly appreciated our sense of whimsy. So much so that he had me text to him the picture that I had taken so that he could show it to his wife. It was hard for me to imagine that in forty plus years of practice that he had never had a patient do something like this; but, that seems to have been the case. This doctor moved way up on my acceptable doctor list!

New Look, Same "Stuff"

2011-07-23T14:57:00.000-07:00

I started this blog on December 27, 2006, a day before my 45th birthday. If you do the math, on December 28th of this year All In A Day will be five years old and I will be fifty. What better way to celebrate both of those monumental anniversaries than to give my blog a makeover. So, why did I do it today, July 23rd? The simplest answer is because I could. It is too hot here to do anything outside. Even getting in the car and going someplace that is air conditioned does not have much appeal. I could think of no better way to spend a hundred plus degree Saturday afternoon than ~~wasting time~~ working on the computer.

Nothing has changed here except the look. For good or for ill the content will remain the same. I wish I could tell you more specifically what that means but I really can’t. Someone asked me the other day what I write about on my blog. My response, “Stuff.” Makes me sound real smart, huh? I thought for a moment and elaborated by telling her that I write about things I find interesting, funny, sad, scary, intriguing, stupid, edifying, exciting, joyful and worthy of sharing. If you are reading this, hopefully you agree and this is why you are here.

Thanks for being here!

KEB

Cookbook Confirmation

2011-07-19T21:17:00.000-07:00

They (whoever "they" is) say that the way to a man's heart is through is stomach. I've also heard it said that men want to marry someone just like their mother. One conclusion that can be made from these two things is that men want a woman who cooks just like mom did. In this era of frozen and packaged foods and three ingredient recipes, this is a tall order for modern young women.

I am definitely not a young woman; I'm not sure about the modern part either. However, I am sure that I was nervous about the first meal that I cooked for Weber. It was somewhat impromptu and therefore had to be pulled together from ingredients that were already on hand in the pantry. I decided to grill steaks. Does the fact that I can grill a steak on an outdoor grill make me a modern woman? Anyway, steak was easy and a fairly safe bet since I knew that he was not a vegetarian. As is often the case, choosing a side dish was my big dilemma. Baked potatoes are the standard with steak but I was out of those. Maybe rice? What other kind of vegetables did I have? What kind of vegetables did he like? I debated with myself for awhile and finally decided on a favorite at our house, broccoli and rice casserole. It sounds healthy. It sounds wholesome. It sounds safe. It's made with Cheez Whiz. Cheez Whiz is neither healthy or wholesome. And I'm not really sure how safe it is. But, it is good, especially when you don't know that is what you are eating. How much of a risk was I taking to use Cheez Whiz in the first meal I prepared for this guy? I took the chance. It all worked out.

Fast forward a couple of years to today. As I was looking through Weber's mom's cookbook I came across a recipe for Rice & Broccoli. It calls for one cup of raw rice cooked. This means no Minute Rice. Did I mention that my recipe also uses Minute Rice? Another abomination in the cooking world. Her recipe involves both cooking on the stove and in the oven; mine relies solely on cooking in the microwave. As I continued to read through the recipe I suddenly felt redeemed! It calls for Cheez Whiz! Actually it calls for Jalapeno Cheez Whiz. Is that still available? It doesn't matter. I learned that Cheez Whiz had been the secret ingredient of cooks from a generation past.

Here are our two recipes.

No. 1

Rice and Broccoli

from Weber's Mom's cookbook

1 C. raw rice cooked

1 pkg. chopped broccoli thawed

Saute 1 large onion in 2 T. butter. Add 1 can of cream of chicken soup, ! C. milk, and one can of cream of mushroom soup. Add broccoli and 1 small jar of Jalapeno Cheez Whiz. Cook until it bubbles good. Pour over rice in a casserole. Heat in oven until good and hot. 350 degrees.

(This recipe was handwritten by someone other than Weber's mom.)

No. 2

Broccoli and Rice Casserole

I can cream of chicken soup

I soup can of Minute Rice

I soup can of water

I package of chopped broccoli

I small jar of Cheez Whiz

Place all ingredients in a microwave safe two quart casserole dish. Microwave on high for 14 minutes.

(This is also good with chunks of leftover chicken added. This recipe comes highly recommended by Offspring No. 2.)

In case you find yourself in a cooking bind I offer you this.

History In Recipes

2011-07-17T16:42:00.000-07:00

At Mother's Day I wrote a post lamenting the fact that I had never met my mother-in-law. As Weber remembers stories about her he shares them with me. And as we unpack more boxes at the house, things that she owned, made, and collected are surfacing. With each discovery comes another opportunity to come to know a woman whom I greatly admire and will never meet.

Today's discovery was her cookbook. You know the one; we all have one just like it. Most of us got it as a wedding present - The Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook or the Joy of Cooking or something similar. There is no doubt that the information in these cookbooks has been a lifesaver at least once in our cooking careers, but it is the recipes that have been clipped from newspapers or handwritten on now yellowed paper and stuck inside the book's cover that give us real insight into the woman behind the cookbook.

My mother in law's cookbook is titled Household Searchlight Recipe Book, published in 1938 by The Household Magazine in Topeka, Kansas. I have not yet had time to digest all that lies within the pages of this book. I am looking forward to all that it has to offer. Today I want to share one of the first clippings thatI I found when I opened the book.

Right inside the front cover, on that characteristic yellowed paper that I spoke of earlier, is a collection of favorite recipes from the First Christian Church of Carrollton, Texas. It is an example of what desktop publishing looked like in 1975. On the first page of that collection is the following:

At a time when this country is mourning the passing and celebrating the life of Betty Ford, I found this to be a synchronistic finding. If you are interested in cooking like a first lady, here is Betty Ford's recipe.

Mrs. Gerald Ford's recipe for

RUBY-RED GRAPEFRUIT CHICKEN

(Quick Cooking)

2 ruby-red grapefruit

1/2 whole cranberry sauce

1 Tbsp. honey

1/4 tsp. cloves

1/4 tsp. salt

1 fryer, disjointed

3 Tbsp. butter or margarine

Peel and section grapefruit, squeezing all juice from membranes into saucepan. Add cranberry sauce, honey, cloves and salt, mixing well, then bring to a boil. Stir in grapefruit sections. Brown chicken in butter in fryer, then place in a shallow baking dish. Baste with grapefruit sauce. Bake in 350-degree oven for about 45 minutes, basting frequently. Serve chicken with remaining grapefruit sauce. Serves 4.

I'm amazed at how many of our memories reside in food, both that we liked and disliked. How many times have you heard someone say something along the lines of "Do you remember that awful jello casserole with the cottage cheese and walnuts that Aunt Lulu made?' Or, "I have grandma's chocolate chip cookie recipe but they just don't taste the same when I make them." I remember thinking the first Christmas after my mom passed away how much I missed the jar of bread and butter pickles made from cucumbers from my dad's garden that she always gave me at Christmastime. And now I'm on the hunt for her cole slaw recipe. Cole slaw was something that I didn't care for as a child so I never asked her for her recipe. Now I love the stuff! Go figure!

To all of you cooks out there who make a family favorite that has become a tradition, make sure you write it down. Stick it in the front cover of your "work horse" cookbook. It will make someone smile once you are gone. I promise!

It's A Bird. It's a Plane. It's . . .

2011-07-11T20:57:00.000-07:00

. . .A Cloud

I thought that this one cloud that, to me at least, looks like a plane soaring across the horizon was fascinating. Thank goodness for the camera on my phone or I would miss many cool sights like this.

Our First Anniversary

2011-07-10T21:34:00.000-07:00

Today we have been married a year. Well, actually we have been married 47 years but only one to each other. A few days ago someone asked me how we were going to celebrate our first anniversary. Though both Weber and I aware of the significance of this day, neither of us had any notion that it would take on an extra-ordinary feel. After I was asked how we were planning to observe our special day and after I had to reply with the truth, that we had no special plans, I started pondering whether this was a good thing or a bad thing.

TV shows, movies, and comic strips find much material in the husband who forgets his anniversary. The opposite is the couple who plans an expensive getaway to some exotic location hoping for some fairy take adventure. I will admit that I don’t want to be the wife whose husband forgets our anniversary, but is some extreme celebration, particularly on your first anniversary, really necessary. Maybe my attitudes are coming from the fact that I am nearly 50 and not 20 something or maybe they are coming from the place where I feel loved every day and don’t need one day a year of ceremonial gestures to remind me of that. I don’t know. I do know that however we spend our day it will be perfect.

So what did we do?

We slept late and did not go to church. This was not some gift to ourselves. It had to do with the fact that the dog felt called to go outside every hour from about 12;30am to 7 am. Needless to say, when the alarm went off at 7:15 there was very little discussion about whether we were going to get up.

We went out to breakfast at one of our favorite gourmet restaurants - Waffle House. This really was a treat. At Waffle House you can get a fried egg. It takes a cooktop to fry an egg, or anything else for that matter. We still don’t have a cooktop. Well, we do but it is in the box. In fact, we just paid for the extended warranty just in case it doesn’t work when we finally get it installed.

Then we went grocery shopping at Central Market. Celebrating this way is a family tradition. The one thing that Brooke wanted for her 18th birthday was unlimited time and unlimited spending at Central Market. Her wish was granted. We had neither unlimited time nor unlimited spending but we did have fun. I think we experienced the same feelings of joy on our special day as Brooke did on her monumental birthday.

Coincidentally the Resounding Harmony end of the season/beginning of the new season party was today. In some ways this was a perfect way for us to celebrate our first year of married life. RH is the first thing that we decided to do together after we were married. It is the only group that has known me only as married to Weber. I did not have to transition through the name change thing. It is the one place where we have a completely clean slate. For this reason, nobody at the party this evening knew that today is our first anniversary, but we did. And we were able to enjoy our time together with new friends pretending that the party was being thrown on our behalf.

When we got home I prepared for school and did the laundry. It was like any other evening. And like every other evening I give thanks that I have someone whom I deeply love to share my life. Each day that we fall asleep and wake up together, share a cup of coffee and work the crossword puzzle, stroll through the grocery store discussing whether we should buy Gala or Fuji apples, fold a basket of laundry together, or take turns sweeping the never ending wads of dog hair is a day of celebration. What more can a person ask for?

Our wedding day was an amazing day but life keeps getting better!

Two Week's Time

2011-07-07T20:31:00.000-07:00

,I seemed to have lost track of time. I was shocked when I realized that I have not posted here in nearly two weeks. Like most of us when we fall short of our goals I have tried to figure out what went wrong; what the heck have I been doing for all this time? What makes this whole situation even more curious is that I have been at home the entire time, except on the days I teach, because Weber has been without his contacts during these two weeks in preparation for cataract surgery and has not been able to drive. As I have reflected on these past couple of weeks, I realize that I have accomplished a few things. The fact that I have done so in a leisurely way is so uncommon for me that I have the feeling that I have not done much when the truth is that I really have. Calm feels really nice!

What I Have Done Over the Past Two Weeks

Though I have not written a blog post, I have done some writing for some projects whose identities are not yet ready to be disclosed. If and when they are, I will gladly share them with all of you.

I have walked to and from school. The morning walk is a fabulous way to start the day. The temperatures are cool, relatively speaking, the birds are singing, and I get a little exercise. The afternoon walk home is not quite as pleasant but it is certainly not unbearable.

Through the miracle of Netflix we watched several Michael Moore films, all of which were eye-opening, maddening, powerful, and very well done. We also watched a documentary titled, “America’s Most Hated Family.” This chronicled the doings of Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church. I don’t recommend this film to anyone who has high blood pressure, a heart condition or anger management issues. It will make your heart hurt, your blood boil, and trigger even the slightest inclination toward a fit of rage. Because we could not go anywhere to get ice cream, chocolate, alcohol or anything else to calm our souls after watching this, we opted to watch something much less controversial, something focused on the process of creation rather than destruction. “Between the Folds” is an amazing documentary on the many facets of origami - everything from its beauty as an amazing art form to how it is used as a teaching tool in classrooms across the world.

I unpacked a few more boxes, probably not as many as I could have or should have. But, every little bit helps, right? Please say “yes”!

Adidas and I have taken our individual obsessions and formed a meaningful symbiotic relationship. He is an compulsive shedder and I have become a compulsive sweeper. This may be where 99% of my time has gone during my days at home. The upshot here is that all things considered, the house is pretty darn clean right now. And watching Clean House on the Style channel makes me want to keep it that way. Many facets of my life may make for a hit reality TV show; Clean House is definitely one that I don’t want to be on!

I did not do much laundry. When you don’t leave the house, the dress code reads, “Same shirt. Different day.” And, several other articles of clothing are, lets just say, unnecessary.

We did all of the daily New York Times crossword puzzles - even Friday. I have not decided whether is comforting or disturbing to have come to the point where we can do a successful mind meld with Will Shortz.

FYI - Amazon.com sells my new favorite cookies. (I am getting my money’s worth from my Amazon Prime membership.) The UPS man is my new best friend. He brings my cookies that Amazon sells and he brings coffee too! This is just a public service announcement. I did n ot spend time ordering these things. The truth is that it takes very little, probably too little,time to order just about anything online - especially books. Enough said.

I knit, therefore I have one sock. I need two socks. I needed two socks a month ago. I did not knit enough.

We also spent time watching our garden grow. Though we have yet to see tomatoes or cucumbers, the okra and jalapenos are doing great. We also picked our first crooked neck squash. I have to admit hat this was very exciting. It was so exciting that Weber took a picture of our first squash.

With that we give thanks for the fruits of our garden, the fruits of our time, and the fruits of our imagination!

One Small Step for the Kitchen, One Giant Step for Our Gastronomic Possibilities

2011-06-24T19:55:00.000-07:00

For many months our kitchen has looked like this.

The refrigerator has protective coverings but has been plugged in and working for quite a while. That has been the extent of our kitchen function. As you can see, the oven is in place but its protective coverings and interior packing materials have not been removed. The many boxes in this picture contain the cooktop, microwave, garbage disposal and, yes, the kitchen sink. You will notice a definite lack of cabinets and countertops.

Today we took one small step for the kitchen and one giant step for our gastronomic possibilities. The oven has now been fully installed! Real baked potatoes, pizza bigger than 13" (whicht is the biggest that the toaster oven will hold), a Texas-sized pan of brownies and angel food cake that is not seared on the top are all mine with the push of a few simple buttons.

Weber, being a good consumer, opted to read the manual for the oven rather than choosing my more experiential method of just pushing all the buttons and figuring out that way how it all works. This proved to be as entertaining as it was informative.

The following are exact quotes from our new oven's manual.

Never Use the Oven for Warming or Heating the Room. I thought this was an added bonus offered with most ovens, one that is not appreciated at this time of year.
Children should not be allowed to sit or stand on any part of the oven. I guess that they should be laid comfortably on an appropriately sized pan before cooking.
Wear proper apparel. Loose fitting or hanging garments should never be worn while using the oven. I now have an opportunity to wear that baking bikini that has worked its way to the bottom of my drawer. And I'm so glad that they specified "hanging garments." I'd hate to think that I couldn't cook unless I'm wearing proper foundational garments!
Flammable items should not be stored in an oven. I sure hope we have cabinets soon since I no longer have a place to store the lighter fluid.
Do Not Heat Unopened Food Containers. So much for convenience foods.
DO NOT TOUCH HEATING ELEMENTS OR INTERIOR SURFACES OF OVEN. Where was our governor Rick Perry when this manual was being written? He vetoed a bill prohibiting texting while driving because he said that he "did not want to micromanage the personal behaviors of individuals." I think I should have the right to touch my oven wherever I want to. If I am foolish enough to engage in an inappropriate relationship then I should learn from the error of my ways.

Though we had several good laughs reading these warnings, the sad truth is that they are included here because someone or ones did these very things, probably with somewhat negative results, and tried to blame the manufacturer. If we promoted cooking education instead of abstinence our society might be better equipped to face the challenges of everyday life. Oh wait, wrong soapbox, but I guess it works here too. If rather than simply saying don't touch the heating elements, the instructions said be sure to use an oven mitt when the possibility of touching a hot oven exists. And remember, oven mitts alone are not a guarantee against serious burns.

Despite the comical nature of the oven's instructions, it is a very nice appliance and I am looking forward to building a long-lasting relationship with it. It does some really cool things. It has a setting for dehydrating. And one for proofing bread. It also has a Sabbath setting. It does all the normal stuff too. And, did I mention that it will cook an angel food cake without searing the top? This is a relationship made in heaven!

Frames, Francis, and Felines

2011-06-23T19:34:00.000-07:00

As the end of June nears, I find myself struck by how quickly time has passed. It has been a little over a year since we began the work to remodel the house and a little less than a year since Weber and I were married. To mark these milestones we are doing our best to assimilate mine, his, and ours to create a home that is comfortable and uniquely ours.

After the arrival of dining room furniture tomorrow, every room will have furniture. I can say this because kitchens don’t have furniture; so, the fact that we are still minus a functional kitchen doesn’t compromise the truth of my statement about furniture. Well, we will eventually need bar stools but that seems like small potatoes in the big scheme of things.

Now that we have furnishings, we can start to hang art on the walls and add those little touches that make a house a home. Once we got all of our pictures and prints in one place I was amazed by just how much we have – photographs that I have taken, paintings done by Weber’s mother and grandmother, prints that we have collected, a few original pieces, and several icons. We spent today looking at our collection, deciding what should go where, and buying the necessary frames. Since we have removed a few walls, we may very well have more art than we do wall space. I can think of worse situations. (Like no sink, or stove, or cabinets . . .) Back to the point-

One of the things that needed a frame was this.

It is an image of St. Francis done by artist Catherine Nolin. (www.catherinenolin.org) This was Weber’s wedding gift to me. Sadly it has been safely tucked amidst a cardboard sandwich for nearly a year. I remember thinking when I first saw it that it was beautiful but that it didn’t make any sense to frame it and hang it at that point because we were in a state of transition. I decided to wait until we had moved and settled into our new home so that it would have a room, or at least a wall, of its own.

Looking at this picture again today with fresh eyes, I still think it is beautiful. I feel like I am right there with Francis, watching him, feeling him, admiring him, and breathing his essence. The door is open for me to follow him, to join him on the path of humility, love, and joy.

The thing that today struck me most about this image is the cat. To most, there is probably nothing particularly striking about this cat. However, if you are a regular reader here, you may remember that in the assimilation of mine, his and ours in the “ours” is a kitten who came to live with us shortly after we returned from our honeymoon.

Though in her baby pictures the kitten is pure white, as she has grown orange highlights have emerged. To me she looks like a toasted marshmallow. She also looks like the cat it the picture. They both have the orange ears and tail and faint orange shadings on their backs. And, they both enjoy sitting, or lying, at the door and watching the world outside. It is as if our newest family member was the model for Catherine Nolin’s depiction of St. Francis.

As I have said more than once, I don’t believe in coincidence. That Weber chose this particular picture of St. Francis when there are literally hundreds of them available, that it contains a cat that looks just like ours, at that our cat’s name is Frankie, a name that we did not chose for her, are things that did not happen simply by chance.

What is meant to be will be.

Father's Day 2011

2011-06-19T17:06:00.000-07:00

It is funny how our obligations to and relationships with holidays change throughout life. My first memories of Father’s Day are from when I was four or so and my “gift” to my Dad was to help him wash the car. Having now raised two children who were at various times four years old, I’m not sure how much of a gift that really was for my Dad; it was perhaps a better deal for my mom who got some free time while I had some bonding time with my paternal parental unit. As a teenager I struggled to find gifts for my Dad because as an officer in the Navy he was not home much. I didn’t know him very well and he didn’t know me. Now, some thirty years later, we have gotten to know one another pretty well, and we are very much alike. I sent my Dad a book and a pound of Texas Pecan coffee, two things that I would be happy to receive on any occasion that necessitates gift giving.

The one thing that I did not do this Father’s Day was to help the girls shop for Mike. First of all, they are not in close proximity and second of all, they are old enough to check the calendar and realize that they need to acknowledge the day without me nagging them. So, I didn’t. I do know that Offspring No. 2 was shopping last night at midnight. I’m not sure about No. 1. And, it is not my problem.

At our house, we have joined the realm of people who receive Mother’s and Father’s Day cards from their four-legged children. Technically, Adidas and Harley have a step-dog relationship with Weber. Although with Adidas, “top dog” in his world is whoever feeds him. Most of the time that is Weber so Adidas ignores the stepparent designation.

In the realm of some relationships are kind of complicated, is Harley’s relationship with Weber. In a post back in February of 2007, I told the story of Harley coming to live with us. At that time, I neglected what has come to be a rather ironic detail. I did receive a call from a friend at the local knit shop asking me if I wanted a tiny, freezing, abandoned puppy. The irony is that before this friend called me, she had called Weber’s ex-wife asking if they wanted the puppy. Obviously she said “No” and the rest is history . . .sort of. It seems though that the greater plan was that Harley was indeed to be in Weber’s life and she was destined to live here in Dallas. For this we are all very grateful!

"I love you, Dad!"

So how did the dogs and their dad spend Father’s Day? Doing something that they all love . . .sharing watermelon. Both Adidas and Harley “helped” Weber cut the watermelon, much in the same way that I helped my dad wash the car when I was four. They all had several bites of the melon just to make sure that it was indeed good. Though the process took longer than it probably should have, they all seemed to enjoy themselves.

He who cuts the watermelon gets the first bite.

He who whines the loudest, or helps the most, gets the second bite.

Patient girls finish last.

Good to the last drop!

Happy Father’s Day to all of you who have parented both two-legged and four-legged kids!

The Graduate

2011-06-14T19:51:00.000-07:00

We spent last weekend in Chicago attending the graduation of Offspring No. 1. The University of Chicago does everything with much pomp and circumstance. On Friday evening they hosted a champagne reception at the Museum of Science and Industry. The Convocation, conferring of degrees and awarding of diplomas consumed most of the day Saturday. We spent approximately six hours outside in folding chairs – and rain and 50 degree temperatures. I must say that I would much rather spend six hours sitting outside in the Chicago chill than the Texas 100 degree heat! The various parts of the ceremony were divided by what someone affectionately referred to as “the $200,000 lunch.” We were given a very nice sack lunch provided “free” by the university – free if you disregard the $200,000 price tag of a UC undergraduate education.

To be fair, Brooke did get a great deal more than a veggie wrap and small cup of fruit from her time in Chicago. She earned a degree in linguistics. She studied both Russian and Georgian and is fluent in both. Her mind was challenged and expanded; her body was challenged and bruised playing rugby on the University of Chicago women’s rugby team; and, her view of the world was challenged and broadened by living on the south side of Chicago. We all know that a college education involves much more than what goes on in the classroom.

I bet you are all wondering what a Russian-speaking college graduate with a degree in linguistics who plays rugby (which really means can hold her own when faced with inordinate amounts of beer) does after college. Lucky for you I have the answer.

They go to culinary school to become a pastry chef. Seems logical, right?

Maybe it seems logical to me since I know that Brooke has had a fascination with food since her tiny taste buds first encountered “real” food. From the beginning she would eat any vegetable that I would puree for her toothless palette. Fruits too. The same, however, was not so with meat. She would not touch baby food meat. Once she had teeth, meat still took a backseat to fruit and veggies. Every now and then she would make an exception for what she affectionately termed “flat meats” – pepperoni, chicken fried steak, and an occasional Chicken McNugget.

At age three, I signed up for a Kid’s Cooking Club. It was one of those deals where every month you received recipes, ingredients, and kid-sized cooking tools. A passion for cooking was born. While at home, Brooke baked for anyone having a bake sale, regularly often cooked our family meals, and regularly prepared gourmet meals for a local residential home for persons living with HIV-AIDS.

In addition to her academic and not so academic pursuits while in college, Brooke has continued to hone her culinary skills. Though her meals often consisted of rice and beans, she, her roommates, and her boyfriend’s fraternity never lacked for exquisite desserts.

When I asked what Brooke wanted for a graduation gift, she said that she would like a nice camera (because hers was stolen when her apartment was broken into in one of those worldly educational experiences) so that she could take pictures of her creations to establish a portfolio and hopefully a blog. Since she doesn’t yet have a summer job, cooking is how she plans to occupy her free time. I ordered the camera and it was to arrive today. I am anxiously awaiting her first blog post!

As I began writing this post, my phone buzzed indicating that I had a text message from Brooke. I assumed that it was to let me know that her camera had arrived. The message read, “I just got my first stitches!”

Holding true to her summer plans, Brooke was baking her first cake as a college graduate. Those of you who bake cake know that often cakes need leveling. You get the picture . . . As Brooke said, the serrated knife is the sharpest because it gets used the least.

Her very sweet boyfriend came over and took her to the emergency room, texted her roommate to tell her that the blood all over the kitchen in their apartment was not evidence of a brutal crime scene, streamed cute cuddly pictures from cute.com for Brooke to look at as they stitched her finger and tweeted before and after pictures of Brooke’s finger. How’s that for true love!

Despite the somewhat ominous start, I trust that Brooke will have many sweet successes on her culinary path. I am proud of all that she has accomplished thus far.

And in case you are wondering, she was making a layer cake with strawberry jam filling. The cake layers, which she checked to make sure were blood-free, are in the freezer waiting to be filled, iced and decorated with flowers.

First Fruits of Summer

2011-06-07T20:00:00.000-07:00

When we moved to the country, I had dreams of having a bountiful garden. Despite having four acres, my garden never happened. It never happened because I was the only one who had this dream and I didn't have the drive to go at it alone. I'm not sure why that was the case, but it was.

As this spring approached, I still had dreams of a garden. Now, living once again in suburbia, I have one. How is that for irony?

About six weeks ago, after waiting out the torrential rains that we had this spring, we finally planted our garden. There was no doubt that raised beds were the way to go. Our planting choices were determined by our taste and our space. We figured that this year's garden would be primarily a learning experience. We would see what worked and what didn't and adjust accordingly next year.

Residing in our garden our yellow squash and zucchini, cucumber, red bell and jalapeno peppers, okra, basil, cilantro, and tomatoes. Because we got a late start planting, we began with small plants from Home Depot rather than seeds. We also got three tomato plants from another local nursery.

These three tomato plants have a somewhat sad story. Because it is close to the house, we began our search for plants at a nearby nursery thinking that they might have a bigger selection and might be more helpful to a few novice veggie gardeners. We were wrong on both accounts. But what they did have were tomato plants for 50 cents each. Sadly, these were plants that looked as if they should be in the horticulture ICU on life support. We chose the three that had a little green on them figuring at 50 cents each we didn't have a whole lot to loose. When we got to the register to pay for them, the cashier said that these plants were free. That should give you some indication of how pathetic they really looked. I am proud to say that with a little TLC they all not only survived but are thriving.

Here is our garden six weeks into its growing season.

Even without fresh vegetables, rabbits love our yard. You will see marigolds scattered throughout the vegetables. Those are to deter the rabbits. We lost one squash plant early on, pulled up by its roots with no trace left, but other than that, the marigolds seem to be functioning well in their capacity as rabbit deterrents.

Everything is doing great! All of the plants have either set blossoms or are bearing fruit.

Here are a few jalapenos who are about ready to make their contribution to some salsa along with the cilantro that is growing right next door.
The bell peppers are doing equally well. Though not ready to pick, there are several that are well on their way.
The squash and cucumber are growing to fill all available space and then some. I'm not sure how much longer the marigolds will survive here. They may never see sunlight again!

The cucumber and squash are setting blossoms, lots of them. We'll see how many pickles we get to can and how much squash casserole we get to eat this summer!
The tomato plants have blossoms as well, with the exception of one; it has a tomato already.
And in case you are wondering, this is one of the ICU tomato plants. Its fruit is somewhere between the size of a tangerine and a small orange. Or, I should say, it was. I took these pictures yesterday and this morning the tomato was gone. As you can see, it was on the very edge of the bed - an easy target for any tomato predators.. Some wildlife somewhere is enjoying a nice plate of fried green tomatoes.

I picked two okra the other day but did not cook them. The only way I like okra is fried; we still don't have a kitchen so frying them was not an option. We took pride in our success at having actually grown them and then put them out for the birds or rabbits or whomever.

Perhaps our first taste of the garden will be a basil, (store-bought) tomato and mozzarella pizza.

Ya gotta start somewhere, right?

My Daniel

2011-05-25T08:05:00.000-07:00

I belong to a women’s Bible/ study group that meets on Tuesday afternoons. Unofficially, our group is called Companions in Christ because that was the title of the first book we studied when the group formed three years ago. During its first two years, the group’s members ebbed and flowed a little. We now consist of five loyal companions who have been together, faithfully meeting, for nearly a year. During that time we have shared births and birthdays, weddings and anniversaries, illness and injuries, sadness and sorrows, joys and triumphs. We have grown to be a close-knit group that celebrates our diversity of spirit and comes together hand-in-hand to walk this journey as followers of Christ.

One thing that we all have in common is that we are mothers. With the exception of one, all of our children are college aged and beyond. All of us have raised daughters. I am the only one who does not have a son. Of the four who do have male offspring, three have sons named Daniel. I’m not sure what that really means, but it is certainly an interesting statistic.

At the end of each of our gatherings, and often woven through the discussions of our study, we share the incidents of our daily lives and our prayer concerns with one another. Yesterday I shared an experience that I had on Monday.

A representative group from Resounding Harmony sang for the “Service of Remembrance” at Children’s Medical Center here in Dallas. This service is an opportunity for the hospital staff - doctors, nurses, social workers, therapists - to grieve the loss of those children who have died in the past year. This year there were 212 little ones remembered.

Prayers were offered by the pastoral care team, poems were written and read by nurses, and amidst almost total silence, with the exception of a sniffle here and there, the name of each child flashed in a soft white script against a solid black screen. The sadness of this seemingly endless list of lost little ones was broken by quotes and pictures of flowers that were bursting forth with life.

Resounding Harmony sang three selections - “Through the Eyes of a Child”, “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother”, and “This is Why We Sing.” During our warm-up Russ Rieger, our director, warned us to look at him rather than those who had come to grieve because this was an incredibly emotional experience and it is very difficult to sing while crying. We all had our eyes fixated on Russ but it didn’t help much.

They lyrics of the songs become so much deeper when sung in this context. Glancing out at a sea of people who gave their all to save the lives of so many children who ultimately succumbed to death and singing the words, “Can you still see the world for all the good it has to give?” or “If I’m laden at all, I’m laden with sadness because all the world isn’t filled with the gladness of love.” will move almost anyone to tears. The pain and sorrow in that room yesterday were eased slightly in the lyrics of our last piece, a piece that aptly states the mission of Resounding Harmony, not only in the context of the Children’s Medical Center Remembrance service bur in each note we sing. “This is why we sing . . .soothe a soul, mend a heart, bring together lives that have been torn apart . . .this is why we sing, why we lift our voice, why we come together as one in harmony.” I pray that we were a part of soothing some souls on Monday.

Because the theme of the service had been seeds and flowers and life and growth, we were all asked to take with us a sachet of wildflower seeds. Each had the name of one of the 212 children on it. In planting those seeds, the memory of the child lives on. I took my seeds with me yesterday to show my companions at book study. On the attached tag it said, “Remember Daniel.” One of the group members quickly exclaimed, “You too have a Daniel!” . . .Why yes I do.

I do have a Daniel. I have never seen him or heard him or touched him. I have never fed him or calmed him or laughed with him. But I will hold him. I will forever hold him in my heart and in my prayers. When my seeds sprout and bloom I will imagine him as a boy alive, happy and carefree.

I will remember "My Daniel".

What I Want To Do On My Summer Vacation

2011-05-23T08:10:00.000-07:00

I am beginning my second week “off.” As each semester comes to a close, I find myself making mental lists of all the things I want to do during my break. This process helps distract me from the mountain of tasks that emerge in the final weeks of the semester - final exams that need to be written, final exams that need to be graded, grades that need to be calculated, and spending time with those students who want to know if they can make up all of the homework that they didn’t have time to complete during the course of the semester but are confident that they have the means to finish it all in final fourteen hours of the semester.

Somehow I got it all done. Last week I found myself at home during the day with an opportunity to revisit my list of things I wanted to do on my break.

First on the list was to sleep later than the normal 6am school alarm time. This was a nice thought, but a little unrealistic. Though my brain may not be, my body is still on “school time.” I was wide awake at six o’clock - before the alarm clock even reared its ugly buzzer. I was awake, hungry, and in need of coffee. The dogs were also wide awake, hungry, and in need of going outside. Weber was awake, hungry and in need of going to school. Poor guy! So much for sleeping in. The consolation was that at least I did not have to be awake and dressed. I managed a second cup of coffee while still in my pajamas before heading for the shower. That made it feel like a break. I suspect that my internal clock will reset itself to the summer schedule about the time I begin teaching summer session in a few weeks.

Another item on my summer to-do list was to spend some lazy afternoons on the couch reading. My intended reading material includes magazines and a novel that I downloaded to my iPad - nothing cerebral at all. In fact, I have not even looked at the last week’s Chronicle of Higher Education! I have run into a slight glitch with the reading on the couch part of my plan. Sadly, I have discovered that we really don’t have a couch. What I thought to be a couch is apparently a rather expensive dog bed. Every time I grab my magazine and head for what I thought was our couch, I discover that that space is occupied by our canine housemates. Did you know that a ninety pound black lab can take up an entire sofa? I now know what the dogs do all day while we are at school. They spend the day sleeping on the couch and apparently they too are still on a school schedule. If I want to read I’ll have to find myself a comfy spot outside under a tree in the backyard. There is something way wrong with this scenario!

During this first week off I also wanted to wash things that don’t get washed regularly like curtains and bathroom rugs. Though first, I did our regular laundry. Well, almost. The last load was in the washer and the washer decided that it didn’t really like me being home because it had to work too hard; so, it went on strike. Actually it outright quit. After consultation with the higher-ups (the Sears repairman) we concluded that it was best to permanently terminate the current washing machine and replace with a new one. As i write this, the curtains and the bath rugs have not been washed, that last load of laundry begun several days ago is still resting soggily in a laundry basket and I am anxiously awaiting the delivery of our new washing machine. By the way, buying a new washing machine was quite an experience, an experience that deserves its own post. So, stay tuned!

Also on my list is to knit. I have not really done that either - a few rows but nothing measurable, literally. I am teaching a class and need to finish the sleeves of a sweater. Hopefully that will happen this week. Somehow it is hard to muster the enthusiasm to knit a wool sweater when it is 90 degrees outside with a 110% humidity! Oh well, this is one of those have to, not want to things. Working on the sweater is this week’s sole project - once we get the washing machine and I rewash the soggy load from last week. Hopefully I can convince the dogs to give me a corner of the couch so that I can knit. If not, there is still that shade tree in the backyard.

Seven days into my summer break I don’t seem to be doing very well with my vacation wish list. And I have not even thought about the things I have to do

Memorize an hour and a half of music for a concert in two weeks
Finish a commission composition
Write my syllabi for my summer school classes
Make travel arrangements for Offspring No. 1’s college graduation

This is beginning to sound not much like a break!

I’m off to work.

Happy Mother's Day

2011-05-08T00:01:00.000-07:00

At least this mama gets to lay down while she's fixing dinner!
I took this photo back in October at the Texas State Fair. I have been waiting to find the perfect occasion to post it! Happy Mother's Day!

Mother's Day Card

2011-05-06T15:50:00.000-07:00

For the past several weeks, the newspaper has been filled with articles and ads about how to celebrate Mother's Day - advertisers confident that they are selling "the perfect gift" that every mother wants and needs, deals on meals for those that want to keep mom out of the kitchen on her special day, and for the traditionalists, everyone from the city's finest florists to the local grocery stores all have a beautiful selections of flowers guaranteed to make every mom smile.

For me, Mother's Day is a non-celebration. I can't bring myself to call it a holiday. My mother died in 2006 so I no longer find myself in the card section of the store trying to find THE card, you know the one with that perfect sentiment. My kids are at the age where mom is more of a nuisance than something to be celebrated. (Why do I have to buy a card or a gift for someone who, despite the fact that I am eighteen or twenty-one, still nags me about studying for tests, cleaning up after myself, and taking my future seriously?)

Kids tend to forget that moms once were kids and had these very same feelings. So, I am willing to pull up my Big Mama panties and trust that they will realize someday that despite all my nagging and other faults, which they can enumerate on demand, there is no one on this planet who loves them more than I do.

I find myself this year wishing that I could send a Mother's Day card to a special woman whom I have never met, my husband's mother. Though she passed away long before he and I married almost a year ago, she has had a huge influence on my life. She raised her son to be a loving and responsible husband. She taught him the value of family. And, in her unique way, instilled in him a steadfast faith.

In many ways I feel like I know her very well. I have heard wonderful stories about her, seen pictures of her from when she was a child, read letters that she and Weber exchanged with one another during his one visit to summer camp and when he was away at college, and i live in the house that for many years she made home.

Though we are remodeling the house and now making it our home, she is still very much here with us - in her paintings that hang on the wall, the side table that sat by her chair, and the tin measuring cup that I used last night to pour rice. But most importantly, she is here in her son - in that sparkle in his eye when he talks of her tenacity, the tears of joy when he speaks of her love, and in the spirit with which he embraces life.

If I could send a card, I would have a tough time finding just the right one on the store racks. A generic Hallmark poem will not suffice here.

I wish I could say "thank you" to you face to face. I wish that I could look you in the eye and promise you that I will love your boy as much as you do. Since I can't, I will trust that you feel my love for you as we feel your continued love here with us.

Happy Mother's Day.

Is it OK to call you Mom?

To Sweat Or Not To Sweat

2011-04-20T18:49:00.000-07:00

At some point in our lives we have all been told at least once “don’t sweat the small stuff.” This advice is usually offered by some well-meaning person who is trying to keep us from having some kind of emotional meltdown. I believe that I have even seen a series of books, in the self-help section of the bookstore, whose titles consist of these very words. Though this gem of wisdom seems to give comfort to many, I find myself wondering if it is really sound advice. I have been pondering this for several weeks. Why? Possibly because during this time nobody has uttered to me this very phrase in question. And that is probably a good thing

During my multi-week musings I have come to think that “Don’t sweat the small stuff” is really poor advice. It really is the small stuff that makes all the difference in most circumstances. In my mind, to not sweat the small things implies that we will happily settle for mediocrity. I suppose that for some this is perfectly acceptable: for me it is not.

Perhaps I am intrigued by this philosophical dilemma right now because much of what I have been doing for the past few weeks has been intensely focused in what on the surface seems to be “the small stuff”

A few Fridays ago my task for the day was to write a very short piece, by short I mean somewhere between a minute and a minute and ten seconds, for one of my colleagues. I spent roughly six hours working on this piece. If you want to do the math, that computes to about one hour of work for every ten seconds of music. Do you find yourself wondering how this can possibly be? This is how. Getting the creative juices flowing is not what takes the time. Luckily on this particular day the raw ideas came quickly. It is sweating the small stuff that takes a composition from simply a sketch or a draft to a piece of art. Should that note be a half note or a quarter note followed by a quarter rest? Maybe that part should have an F# instead of an F natural. Is the best tempo 90 beats per minute or 96? Sometimes it is literally the small stuff that consumes a disproportionate amount of time: should I use a dotted rhythm or equal note values. That little dot can make all the difference. Taking the time to consider, or perhaps obsess, over these seemingly minute details is ultimately what made this particular piece not just an OK piece of music but something that I was proud to say that I had written

Here is another real-life example. I am currently teaching a knitting class on how to make a particular sweater pattern. Without going into a lot of unnecessary detail, suffice it to say that to make a knitted garment fit properly, you have to knit to the appropriate gauge. Let’s say that you want to make a sweater that is 40’ at the chest. The pattern calls for a gauge of 4 stitches to the inch. Therefore your sweater will consist of 160 stitches. What if your gauge is almost 4 stitches to the inch, but not quite? Maybe it is just a tiny bit off, as in 4 ¼ stitches to the inch. A gauge that is only off by a quarter of an inch surely isn’t going to make that much of a difference, right? Wrong! In this case, your sweater will be nearly three inches smaller than you want it tobe. We all know that when it comes to the fit of clothing, three inches is not “the small stuff.

One more example – this time about literally sweating. Despite the fact that it is barely the middle of April, we have already seen temperatures above 90 degrees here in Texas. Thinking it ridiculous to turn on the air conditioner “so early” we opted to start the cooling process by making sure that all of the ceiling fans were turning in the “right” direction – the direction that pulls the cool air up rather than pushing the hot air down as is the case during the winter months. The problem was that we were not 100% sure which direction accomplished which goal. To further confound us, when we went to the Internet to solve our problem we found contradicting information. One source said the fans should run counter-clockwise in the summer and another said they should run clockwise. Obviously someone was mistaken. Nope. They were both correct. The clarity comes again in the small stuff. The crucial little detail here is whether you are looking up at the fan or looking down on it. In the summertime, if you look up at a ceiling fan it should be moving in a counter-clockwise direction. If you are looking down on it, it is moving clockwise. This small detail literally makes the difference between sweating and not.

Despite the examples I have given here I am sure there are cases where the small stuff really doesn’t matter. In the big scheme of things it probably doesn’t matter if one of your socks has a hole in the sole or even if your socks don’t match. It probably doesn’t matter if you eat the last few spoonfuls of yogurt the day after the “Best if used by” date. Whether you pay $3.78 or $3.79 a gallon for gas is a much bigger deal in principle than it really is to our pocketbooks.

It all comes down to what is important to each of us as individuals. If it’s important to you, sweat it no matter how big or how small.

A Prayer for Japan

2011-03-28T17:26:00.000-07:00

Creation, Devastation, Restoration; A Prayer for Japan

Loving God,

In the beginning, You created

the heavens and the earth,

light to separate the darkness,

sky to divide the waters above and below,

and dry land to set apart the lower waters.

On the dry land You created flowers and trees with seeds to bear life and fruit.

In the sky You placed lights to illumine the darkness

and to nourish the seeds of the earth.

You then filled the sky with birds

and the waters with fish and whales

and all kinds of things that live under the water.

On the dry land you created cattle and pigs,

bugs and butterflies,

spiders and snakes,

- animals of all kinds.

And then you made Man - humanity, my brothers and sisters.

With each new thing, You looked and saw that it was good.

Yesterday, in Japan,

the heaven’s cried out,

the earth shook,

darkness filled the sky,

the seas and the dry land no longer were separated,

t he seeds of the earth, the animals, and humanity were all under the water.

Good was hard to see.

As ones made in Your own image, O God,

Help us breathe new life into the land and peoples of Japan.

Create in us strength to help bear the burden of our brothers’ and sisters’ darkness

and compassion such that we can bring light again into their world,

Create in us knowledge to help our neighbors separate the waters from the dry land

and give us wisdom to help restore life in both,

Create in us giving hearts so that we can restore the land of Japan

with plants and animals to nourish its people,

homes to protect them,

and livelihoods to sustain them.

Create in us the courage to do all that we are called to do.

And, Gracious God, create in us love and faith

that, in the end, are strong enough to look around and see

that all is good.

Amen.

- Kris Elliott Baker, March 2011

Random Thoughts for Today

2011-03-21T19:08:00.000-07:00

1. Time flies when you’re busy . . . and when you’re not.

Spring break is over and we are back in school. I’m not sure where the week went. Unlike past years, Spring Break was uneventful; unless, you consider taking animals to the vet for their shots, doing your taxes, shelving books and getting rid of clothing that doesn’t fit anymore eventful. Still that doesn’t seem like a week’s worth of time spent. As a friend pointed out (*See No. 2 below), I didn’t even write a blog post.

2. I have some great friends! All kinds and I treasure them all.

I like the one’s who remind me that I have not written a blog post since February 24^th. I like the ones we shared a vegan dinner with. I like the one’s who felt comfortable asking us to pick them up from a scary doctor’s appointment. I like the one’s who wanted to come spend the weekend with us even though we only have a toaster oven and a microwave with which to cook and we have only partially finished bathrooms. We do however have real beds with clean linens and everything! *See No. 3 below.

3. 3. A home without pets is a home without fur. I mean, it is a home without lots of love and entertainment.

Do you know how much hair a furminator removes from a black lab? It removes enough to make nine more black labs – at least that’s what the blob of fur blowing across the yard looks like. We regularly furminated the dog to keep the real linens real clean. FYI We did not furminate the cat. White fur is quite striking on a teal bedspread. While we are on the topic of fur removal, I figured out how I can vacuum the whole house by only having to plug the vacuum cleaner into only two different plugs. And, no more stairs!

4. 4. It is amazing what you can cook with only a toaster oven and a microwave.

I am addicted to angel food cake with berries on top. You can cook an angel food cake in a toaster over, at least you can in the one we have (It’s a Breville, in case you care.), if you don’t use quite all the batter. Angel food cakes rise a lot. Microwaves are good for steamed vegetables but not as good for oatmeal. I miss oatmeal, the really good rough cut oatmeal that doesn’t have the word “instant” on it’s packaging anywhere. The kind that is chewy and you can feel all the individual oats. Did I mention that you can cook some really good stuff in a toaster oven? But not oatmeal.

5. 5. Dogs barking at the bathtub in the middle of the night is never a good thing.

We all enjoyed sleeping in over Spring Break. We went to bed last night dreading the 6am alarm this morning. Knowing that, the canine alarm went off at 5 am in an effort to spare us the 6 am misery. The problem with the canine alarm is that the snooze button wouldn’t work. I finally got up to see what the problem was. Harley was in the hall bathroom barking fiercely at the bathtub. The kitten then joined the defensive maneuvers and perched herself in the bathtub. During a lull in the barking, we discovered the enemy. Well, sort of. There was a scratching sound inside the tub. Not the inside we could see, but the inside like underneath. It sounded like something big. Or maybe the inside of bathtubs just echo a lot. I opted to leave the canine and feline army on duty and go back to bed trusting that they would protect us from any vermin or varmints that dared to emerge beyond the confines of the underside of the bathtub. As of this writing, all is clear.

6. 6. Making music with people is about the best feeling in the world.

I love singing with Resounding Harmony. We had rehearsal last night. I had a nasty cold last night. (I have it tonight too.) I had a terrible sore throat and no voice to speak of but I wanted to be at rehearsal. I sat in the back on a row almost by myself and pretended like a descent sound might come out of my mouth. It didn’t but I was happy to be there anyway with people who love to song and love each other – the each others in that room and the each others for whom we sing.

7. 7. Spring colds, well, they just plain suck.

Enough said.

8. 8. Spring, on the other hand, is beautiful.

It has been in the eighties around here lately. The birds are singing. The flowers are blooming. Our yard is full of bunnies and squirrels and ducks. As I walked home today I reveled in the beauty of creation. And, I prayed for those in Japan who are surrounded by devastation.

9. 9. It took me 22 minutes and 30 seconds to walk home from school today.

Now that we have moved, I can walk home in one-third the time it took us to drive home before. I get some exercise. And, we are saving a ton of money on gas. The fuel cost for my commute was a peanut butter and jelly sandwich once I got home.

10. 10. Never underestimate the power of a hug from someone who loves you very much.

Spring colds suck but a nice warm hug makes me feel a whole lot better!

Write and Bear Arms

2011-02-24T19:48:00.000-08:00

I moved to Texas in 1983 with the intention of staying maybe two or three years, however long it took for me to earn my Master’s degree. Twenty-eight years later I am still here, having now lived in Texas more than half of my life. Until moving to the Dallas area, I had never lived in any one place longer than four years. Just in case you are wondering, my family was not on the run from the law or in the Witness Protection Program; my dad was in the Navy. When duty called, we moved, usually from one coast to the other.

There is much that I love about Texas – the wild flowers, many of the people, chicken fried steak, and the Texas State Fair. But, like with anything, Texas also has its negatives. Right now, in my mind the biggest negative in the state of Texas is the unfortunate marriage between politics and education. Education has become the abused spouse in this partnership. As with any marital relationship, when the two “parents” don’t support and respect one another, it is the children that get hurt. The children I speak of here are our students.

I could pontificate here on my feelings about state mandated testing, our legislature’s censuring of our nation’s history in adopting textbooks, or the severe budget cuts being faced by our schools all the way from pre-school to college, but I’m not going to do that. I want to talk about something that is truly a matter of life and death – the bill before our state legislature, which is probably about to be passed, that allows the carrying of concealed weapons on college and university campuses.

What are they thinking? How can anyone truly believe that such a proposition is worth debating let alone worth passing into law? The sad reality, at least to me, is that over half of the Texas House of Representatives supports this measure and the Senate already passed a version of the bill two years ago and is expected to do so again.

In one of my classes this morning, the topic of handguns on campus came up. Only about half of the class was aware that such legislation was pending. When they heard about it, their response was a unanimous, “That’s scary!” Yes indeed. That is scary. This particular class, which is diverse in every way-age, race, and gender-wanted me to explain to them why handguns on campus are necessary. I couldn’t do it. Most days I feel competent to stand before my class and educate my students. Today I felt woefully unequipped to answer their questions and address their concerns.

Those who support an individual’s right to “conceal and carry” purport that guns on campus will create a safer environment for our students. They offer support for their argument by saying that in light of the shootings that occurred on the campus of Virginia Tech and more recently on the University of Texas campus in Austin, if more people had been armed, someone else could have shot the original shooter and lives would have been spared. Would lives have been spared? Or, would there just have been more bullets flying around? The truth here is that no one can say what the outcome of any of these tragic situations would have been had more students or faculty members been armed, but I stand by my opinion that the greater the concentration of deadly weapons in any one place, the greater the number of potentially dead human beings.

Though shootings on college campuses have been in the news of recent, the ratio of shootings to institutions of higher learning is quite small. I have spent nearly every day of my life for the past thirty-two years on a college campus as either a student or faculty member. I can honestly say that I have never felt the need to be armed. Looking back, there may be a few times when I am quite thankful that some of my students were not armed. I say that somewhat jokingly; however, if the legislation allowing guns on campus passes, such a statement will no longer be said it such a way, but rather in an air of fear. Fear. That is an awful environment within which to work or to learn. Seemingly, our state’s lawmakers don’t seem to agree. Or, maybe they do. For them perhaps being unarmed in the classroom generates an atmosphere of fear. Surely not.

In Texas, all public high school students must pass the TAKS test – the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills. This test evaluates a student’s potential for success upon graduation. Students are tested in reading, writing, math, science and social studies. Should the “conceal and carry” bill pass, perhaps a sixth test should be added – marksmanship. If students are going to be protecting me while on campus, I want them to be as skilled with their guns as they are with their words and numbers. And as an added bonus, this will provide jobs for all those teachers who are being laid off because of cuts in the budget for education. And, the state would collect money for all those teachers who would then have to pay to take the test for this additional certification.

I am not speaking poorly of education in Texas. Really, I’m not. I am married to a teacher and both of my children graduated from public high schools in Texas. The education my children received has served them well in their college careers. I must say, however, that I am glad that neither of them is attending a public college or university here in Texas; nor in Utah, the only state that has already passed conceal and carry legislation with regard to college campuses.

Texas likes to think of itself as a leader in the nation. Right now I wish that our legislators would become followers, followers of their counterparts in twenty-seven other states who have voted down this type of legislation.

Prepare for the Expected

2011-02-18T13:52:00.000-08:00

Last week in North Texas we found ourselves dealing with weather related school closings, battling icy roadways, and trying to stay warm despite single digit temperatures. Today, I have no heat on, the windows are all wide open, the house plants are on the back patio basking in the sunshine and eighty one degree temperatures. You often here people around here say, “only in Texas,” when referring to these drastic weather changes. I will not argue that here it is possible to experience the weather of all four seasons in a single week, sometimes even within a much smaller time span, and that these changes are often rather dramatic, maybe even more so than in other geographic locations, but the truth of the matter is drastic and dramatic changes happen everywhere and all the time. I’m not sure why we all seem so surprised when these extremes are manifested in our weather patterns.

Often in life such extremes occur in a matter of a mere second – birth and death, the transition from child, in legal terms, to adult, single to married and vice versa. I still remember the morning that I left for school married, again in legal terms, and about halfway through the morning was struck with the realization that after twenty-six years of being married, I was now again single.

With the present state of the economy, many people these days wake up as gainfully employed citizens and by the end of the day are jobless. On the flip side, there are also those who get up in the morning wondering how they are going to pay their rent or buy groceries this month and suddenly find themselves millionaires after winning it big in the lottery. I could go on here, but you get the idea; for every condition and state of being, there exist extremes on a continuum. In most instances, we live our lives somewhere near the middle of these extremes. This is known as balance.

I suspect that at some point in each of our lives someone has said, “you need to be prepared for the unexpected.” Translation; “You need to be prepared in case someone or something throws you off balance. On the surface this sounds like good advice, but is there really any such thing as “the unexpected”?

Anyone who does not expect that things – whether it be the weather, state of health or marital or financial status – can and probably will change at some point in their lives in not only woefully unprepared but is delusional.

Society tends to think of “the unexpected” as some catastrophic event. Reality check. Catastrophic events happen every day. Automobile accidents, home fires, school shootings, severe weather phenomena, deaths; they happen every day. Maybe not to you or me today, but they could. Would we not be better advised to prepare for the expected? Are we not better off if we have prepared for the “worse-case scenario” and never have to rely on those action plans rather than find ourselves in the place of never having considered them and suddenly finding ourselves in a place whose existence we have never acknowledged?

I am not suggesting that we breed a culture of pessimism; however, I do think that we need to admit that we live in a society where, for whatever reason, people are faced with difficult and painful circumstances every day. A vigilant awareness of this reality will help us to be better prepared should we find ourselves in such a situation as well as better prepared to give aid and comfort to others whose lives are disrupted.

And just in case you are wondering, I have not had a bad day. In fact, I have had a wonderful day. It is 81 degrees and I learned how to send a 100 foot snake down a pipe. Was that what I expected to do today? Not exactly. But, I know that pipes sometimes clog up and that it can happen here just as easily as it can happen at your house. (If it does, call me. I now know how to snake a pipe.)

As I have progressed through this post I have been thinking about how I am going to get myself out of this discussion. I think that means that I have been trying to figure out exactly what the point of all this is. As circumstance would have it, the following quote just came to me in a forwarded email, which, by the way, has nothing to do with anything that I have said here, but I think is nonetheless an appropriate closing to my present thoughts.

"Life is not the way it's supposed to be; it's the way it is. The way we cope with it is what makes the difference.”

Winter Break

2011-02-03T18:09:00.000-08:00

We have one more day of winter break, a winter break that we did not know we were having until Monday night. Usually as the spring semester begins, students and faculty are all counting the days until spring break, which occurs midway through the semester. By that point, everyone is ready for a break - either to get out of town for a real vacation or to just sleep late and enjoy quiet time at home. We have barely started this semester so it is hard to truly appreciate a nearly week long break, a break “scheduled” by mother nature, not dictated by an academic calendar. In fact, this break is wreaking havoc with the academic calendar, but we’ll not worry about that right now.

So what does one do with a nearly weeklong unplanned break?

We are still sort of camping out at our still-not-completely-finished-being-remodeled house. The good news is that as of last Friday, only three days before the frigid temperatures hit our area, we became the owners of new bedroom furniture. The significance of this is that we are no longer sleeping on an air mattress on the tile floor. Make that the cold tile floor! All of the humans, canines, and felines living here are quite happy with this particular home improvement!

In addition to a new, big, warm, king-sized bed, we also have a microwave, coffee pot, TV, Internet, and lots and lots of books. In addition to the master bedroom, the other room in the house that is done is the library. Weber and I have managed to sort, combine, unpack and shelve all of our books. That is no minor task, trust me! It took many trips to Recycled Books to weed out enough books so that what we are keeping fits on the designated shelf space. Between the two of us, we probably have a bigger poetry collection that the public library. For some reason, the cats also seem to love this room. FYI, bookshelves can double as pretty fine kitty bunk beds if necessary.

I have had several big music composition projects hanging over my head lately. Time has been such that I have an hour here or thirty minutes there to work on them and nothing much really was getting done. I have to admit that I am not one who works well like that. I like big blocks of time where I can concentrate on what I am doing; time where my train of thought is not continually interrupted. I got that this week. It was awesome! It is a great feeling to have a pair of those “monkeys” off my back. I am looking forward to turning over these newly completed composition to their respective owners should we ever get back to school!

Our lack of a kitchen has been the toughest part of this week. Though there are pretty good things that can be cooked in the microwave, even good canned soup and instant oatmeal get boring after a while. We decided this afternoon to do something to break our mealtime monotony. With nearly an inch of solid ice on the driveway and much of the street that leads out of our neighborhood in the same condition, it was clear that attempting to drive anywhere was not our best choice. So, we decided to walk. We have a grocery store, a 7-Eleven, and a Burger House within minimal walking distance from the house.

We bundled up in coats, hats, and gloves and set out on our way. There were small spots along our street that were completely ice free. By carefully stepping,much like in a game of hopscotch, we made our way to the main street, which we expected to be much clearer than our neighborhood side streets. We were wrong. The only thing that was clear were two twelve inch tracks down each lane. The rest of the street and the adjacent sidewalks were solid ice. Not only were they incredibly slippery; they sloped toward the street. The possibility of sliding off of the sidewalk onto the street (and the oncoming traffic) was very real. Though the city had not done anything to make the sidewalks safe, we could see that some of the businesses along the way had spread sand and cat litter on their sidewalks. By choosing our route carefully, we figured that we could make it safely to our destination. And, we did. We enjoyed a nice hamburger with many other locals who were nursing a bout of cabin fever.

After lunch we slid across the parking lot to the grocery store. This became more of a sightseeing excursion once we realized that we couldn’t buy anything that was breakable or could be smashed if we fell on the way home; we couldn’t buy anything too heavy because balance was key to getting home in one piece; and the truth of the matter was, we didn’t really need anything anyway.

The Dallas area is expected to remain below freezing for another 36 hours and more snow is predicted for tonight. By 5:00 this afternoon, school had already been cancelled for tomorrow, the fourth day in a row.

Having accomplished several major tasks this week thus shortening my To-Do list, I’m not sure what we’ll do tomorrow. Perhaps we’ll surf the 300 channels of U-verse for that one TV show that is worth watching. Weber and I have watched more TV in the past three days than we have watched in the last two an a half years. That sad reality here is that I don’t think that we have missed much in all that time.

Once you get beyond House Hunters, Bridezilla, and Wife Swap it is all downhill!

In lieu of watching TV, I think I’ll just curl up with a cup of coffee, a book, a few animals, and my wonderful husband and try to stay warm.

Cooperation and Appreciation

2011-01-24T19:49:00.000-08:00

Christmas break is now officially over and everyone is back to school. I had five weeks off, which seems like an eternity until you cram an eighteenth birthday, a twenty-first birthday, Christmas, another birthday, New Years, house guests, sort of moving, and then the recovery from all of the above into that time frame; then it feels more like two days, sixteen hours and thirty-six minutes to be exact. Well, not really exact. The point is that the break seemed to fly by at a record speed. All of the sudden I am back at school trying to juggle what at first seemed to be an impossible schedule.

Though we have a printed schedule of classes with instructor assignments, this document and what I end up teaching usually bear little resemblance to one another once the semester shake down has occurred. I’m OK with the mystery and intrigue that each new semester brings; it just makes for a hectic first week of classes.

This semester is no different. The complications came with several classes that were listed in the catalogue as TBA. These courses were scheduled this way because they are “off-semester” courses in a four-semester sequence. i.e. they should not have attracted many students; but, they did. And this created a scheduling nightmare. Not only did I have to coordinate seven or eight students’ schedules with my own, we also had limited physical space possibilities with which to contend. This time last week I was panicked about how I was going to make it all work. After many emails, phone calls, and quick conversations in the hall with students, today I am pleased to say that it is all pleasantly under control.

In a state that really can only be described as utter amazement, I find myself looking back trying to figure out how and why things fell into place relatively painlessly. As I review all that has taken place in the past seven days, I realize that what made a seemingly impossible situation accomplishable is my students’ willingness to be flexible and their consideration for their classmates.

I have students who are willing to endure what seem like interminable commute times on Dallas’ fledgling mass transit system to be in class at certain times; others have changed work schedules to accommodate another student’s already scheduled classes; I have even have one class that is willingly meeting at 8 am. I have been amazed by the concessions that each and every student has been willing to make to help one another and to help me. It speaks volumes to the character of our students.

I can’t help but wonder what things might be like in this world if everyone was so adaptable, flexible, and considerate of his or her co-workers, family, or even strangers. How would things be different if we were all willing to place the good of the whole rather than the good of ourselves at the top of our priority list? If this kind of cooperation were to be adopted on a societal level, how would we feel about each other? How would we feel about ourselves? Would we care more about each other? Would we build a closely-knit community?

I don’t know how all of these students will feel about one another at the end of this sixteen week semester, but I can say based on the number of “thank-yous” that they have shared with one another already this semester that they are aware and appreciative of the sacrifices that others have made for them What a refreshing atmosphere in which to work! For this privilege, I am grateful.

Hat's Off!

2011-01-14T10:03:00.000-08:00

It has been five days since snow blanketed our area . . .and much of the ground and steps and deck here are still covered. In the 27 years that I have lived in North Texas, the snow has never lingered this long. Usually, ice and snow cover the roadways early in the morning when decisions about school closures need to be made; by lunchtime there is no evidence that the snow and ice had been there only hours before. This time, the temperatures have barely climbed above freezing all week long.

I am happy that it has been cold all week. Why? Number 1 - because I like cold weather. Number 2, and most importantly, I finished Weber's "Christmas" hat the day before the cold weather moved in. His bald head has been warm all week long!

You may remember that I confessed a few posts back that I tend to finish his "Christmas" socks in June when he is wearing Birkenstocks and no socks let alone wool socks! This year I licked my own bad habit. I opted to make him a hat instead of socks. There is more than one way to win at this game! Hats, however, have not always been my saving grace.

Almost two years ago when we went to Italy, I decided that I would make Weber a hat on the flight to Rome. Nine hours in atmospheric captivity was plenty of time to get a simple hat made. No problem. Until, I realized a couple inches in that this hat was going to be way too big. My only option was to pull it out and begin again, which I did after a nap, a meal, and a few chapters of my book. What I am saying is that again I did not meet a self-imposed knitting deadline. As we arrived in Rome, the hat resembled a headband. Again I thought, no problem; I can get this done in the next day even with the agenda we have planned.

As we spent our first day in Assisi, it became apparent that all of my effort to finish the hat before we arrived was unnecessary. The temperatures were in the 60's and 70's during the day and only in the 40's at night; we weren't outside much at night so I abandoned the notion of finishing the hat at that point.

And then I learned a lesson. It either had to do with procrastination or God's sense of humor.

After a week of beautiful springlike weather in the Italian countryside, we awoke on our last morning to this.

"Boy, a nice warm hat sure would be nice!"

It's probably not much consolation at this point, but I hear that it's not snowing in Rome. We'll be there in a few hours.

Peace and Vulnerability

2011-01-09T20:43:00.000-08:00

This is what North Texas looked like today.
Today was a great day for snow because it is Sunday. No one had to get up early and watch those mile long crawls on the news to see if school was cancelled. Inevitably, we always tune in to the news when the alphabetical listing of school closures is in the E's. We need to see the C's and D's so there we sit impatiently waiting for the loop of closures to begin again. None of that today. With the sound of sleet and freezing rain hitting the deck early this morning, we rolled over and went back to sleep until . . .ah, until . . .until . . .let's just say until much later than usual.

When we finally got up, it was absolutely beautiful outside. The few inches of snow on the ground lay perfectly undisturbed. The dogs had not been out yet so there were no little paw print trails; no cars had yet been down the road; or if they had, it was long before we got up and the tracks had already been filled in by the furiously falling snow. This morning's sights and sounds were to me what peace looks and sounds like.

We put on a pot of coffee and went to get the paper. Rarely do we have the luxury of leisurely reading the morning paper actually in the morning. As we sat down together with warm mugs of coffee and the newspaper, suddenly that sense of peace that overcame me only moments before was shaken by the cold reality of the paper's front page article recounting the horrifying details of yesterday's shooting in Arizona. Word by word, second by second, detail by detail, those feelings of peace were chiseled away. I forgot what peace felt like. I forgot what peace looked like. Peace became an imaginary land veiled by the curtain of harsh reality.

The trees in whom I had seen only beauty and serenity only moments earlier to me instantly became a picture of vulnerability.

They reminded me of all the people who were standing innocently at that grocery store yesterday. In that moment the trees didn't look peaceful; but rather cold and burdened. Literally frozen in place by what was going on around them.

In a few days, the temperatures here will rise; the sun will shine and the snow that blanketed the trees today will be gone. That cold and burdensome appearance that is reflected in the trees will disappear. For those whose lives were directly touched by the bullets that were fired in Arizona yesterday the chill will last far beyond winter's days and the burdens may last a lifetime.

I pray for a time, a place, and a people for which coldness of heart is overpowered by a warmth of spirit and an understanding of true peace.

One for the Baby Book

2011-01-04T20:55:00.000-08:00

When your kid is twenty-one, you usually aren’t still thinking of firsts that warrant recording in one’s baby book. Many of the firsts that happen at this point in life are best left undocumented

first week subsisting entirely on rice and beans
first all-nighter
first bounced check
first time filing your own taxes
first hangover
first time buying beer legally
first . . .

Then there is the first cable.

No, not cable as in TV, knitted cable.

My freshly twenty-one year old came home for Christmas break with the desire to knit her boyfriend a scarf. That, in and of itself, made me happy. I remember a time when I was talking to the girls about needing to write my will. One of them said that it was not important for me to do so because all I had were books and yarn; nobody would want that stuff. I now am comforted to know that I can leave my yarn stash to Offspring No. 1. I also know that she appreciates my healthy collection of poetry since I often have to reclaim volumes from her “nest.” Whew! One less thing to worry about.

In an effort to nurture this interest in knitting, Brooke and I sat down and looked at scarf patterns together. She already knew how to knit and purl; she wanted a pattern that would be challenging yet accomplishable and that was appropriate for a twenty-one year old man. That left out lace – challenging, but not appropriate. She decided that learning to make cables would be fun. We found a reversible cabled scarf, Here and There Cables in Interweave Knit’s ScarfSTYLE, that is a perfect first cable project and looks manly enough.

The next day, which happened to be my birthday, we took a field trip to the yarn shop to find yarn. (I probably had something in my stash that would have worked but we all know that going to the yarn shop and selecting just the right yarn for this particular project from all of the wonderful choices is a big part of the fun. I was happy to indulge her and it was a fun birthday adventure for me.) She chose a very striking deep burgundy yarn.

As soon as we got home, Brooke cast on to begin her scarf. She knit until time for the first cable row. At that point, she handed her work to me so that I could show her how to make the cables. I did the first few on the row and then handed the fledgling scarf back to her telling her that it was now her turn. I have not touched the scarf since. She had eight inches or so done before she left to return to school.

"Baby's First Cables"

It makes me happy that she both values and enjoys knitting, something that is important to me. Those of us who knit often make things for babies and children who have no context from which to appreciate the time and effort that went into whatever was made for them. After all of those booties, hats, mittens, doll clothes and sweaters, it is rewarding to see that appreciation emerge, especially in such a way as she wants to learn and develop the skill so that she too can create something for someone she cares about.

I hope that Brooke will finish her scarf before the Chicago winter has past. We discovered while she was home that Weber and her boyfriend share the same birthday. Many of the knitting projects that I have started for Weber over past Christmas holidays have not been completed until his birthday in June. Hopefully Brooke will not follow my example on this point!

As I was writing this post, I got a text message from Brooke that said, “I just joined my next ball of yarn all by myself!”

The following text message conservation ensued:

ME: Awesome! Are you enjoying knitting?
BROOKE: Yeah. I might make another scarf like this for me. A grey one.
ME: Big surprise. (Grey is her favorite color.)
Do you want me to send you yarn to match your hat? )I still have her “Christmas hat” to make. If I don’t finish it until her birthday next December, at least she will be able to wear it immediately. Just kidding; it will be done this weekend.)
BROOKE: Sure.
ME: I will get it in the mail early next week. I have not mailed the stuff you left yet. I will try to get some of it in the mail tomorrow.
BROOKE: Can you make sure that my magenta bra is in the first batch you send? It’s important.
ME: I’m not even going to ask why, but yes.
BROOKE: Proper undergarments are the fundamentals of a good outfit.
ME: I want to make sure that your fundamentals are in good array.

The end.

Whatever is going on with the magenta bra is probably one of those things that should not be included in one’s baby book or any other permanent record.

So, I will just smile and be thankful that my baby (in the magenta bra and . . .) has discovered the joy of knitting.

A (Sappy) Romp Through the Past Year

2011-01-01T21:04:00.000-08:00

So here we are beginning a new year. A few days ago, on my birthday, I said that I was not in the mood for a sappy romp through the past. Today I have changed my mind. I am a woman; changing my mind is a woman's prerogative, isn't it? Prerogative or not, I am about to take a look back at the highlights of 2010 in my world.

The early part of the year was calm for us though Erin was in the midst of applying to colleges. It wasn't until spring break that things really got rolling. Fortunately by this time Erin had already been accepted to Sewanee so we didn't have the college worries. Though Weber and I were engaged in September of 2009, it was not until March that we got serious about making wedding plans. Due to poor planning on our part, we also began the house remodel at about the same time. Spring became a time where we learned the real benefits of effective time management as we juggled making significant decisions about house plans, muddled our way through wedding plans, and finished out the school year.

June marked the first real milestone of the year. Erin graduated from high school as valedictorian of her class. .
Brooke came home to be part of the celebration despite the fact that she could only stay the weekend because she had to return to school to take her spring quarter exams. My dad also came from Delaware to be with us.

We tried very hard not to let the wedding plans overshadow Erin's graduation. So, by the middle of June, we had one month and a lot to get done. With the help of our family and many wonderful friends, we made it.

On July 10th, Weber and I were married. The wedding was perfect.

Shortly after we returned from our honeymoon in Vermont, we added the newest member of our family, Frankie. Despite the picture below, she did not arrive in Brooke's backpack. Frankie was a stray that our vet thought we needed.

She is an entertaining addition to our lives. It is hilarious to watch her chase the dogs and once caught gnaw on their legs like one does turkey legs at the State Fair. Frankie also loves to climb into anything that resembles a container - boxes, bags, backpacks, the dryer. She is also fascinated with water - water in the sink, water in your glass, water in the shower, water in the toilet. I suspect that if she could figure out how to manipulate the handle on the commode, she would spend the day watching the swirl of water in the bowl.

In August we took Erin to Sewanee to begin her freshman year of college. Though this was the first time in nearly twenty one years that we have not had children at home, I didn't suffer too much with empty nest syndrome. Rather, I was stricken with Less Laundry Syndrome and Wow!, the Kitchen Looks Just Like It Did When I Went To Bed Syndrome.

The last major event of our year occurred on the 22nd and 23rd of December; Offspring No. 1 turned 21 and Offspring No. 2 turned 18. That is hard to believe. It seems like only yesterday that they were both sitting in my lap - at the same time. (Now they have to take turns.)

Offspring No. 1 doesn't look like this anymore though with enough beer she may act like it.

Offspring No. 2 doesn't look like this either. If only she would still let me dress her.

They graduated from lower school and middle school in the same year.

Here is what a clown looks like at 21..

And, this is Offspring No. 2 when allowed to dress herself. OK, I admit it; she is much better at hair and makeup than I am. Once you get beyond pigtails, my "cosmeticological" skills are maxed out.

I was glad to have both girls stand with me when Weber and I were married.
Our family was blessed with many joyous occasions in 2010. For that we are all incredibly grateful. We all know too many people whose lives were touched by grief and tragedy in 2010. For all that we were given and all that we were spared, our family is ever grateful.

We wish you blessings and peace in 2011.

Happy New Year!

Standing Naked

2010-12-28T00:30:00.000-08:00

Today is my birthday. I thought about all of the things that I could write about to commemorate this occasion and then I thought again. I'm not really in the mood for one of those sappy romps through the past nor am I in the mood for a prophetic foray into the future. My solution, which may or may not be a good one, is to share a poem that I wrote a couple of weeks ago.

I don't often share my own poems here but, for whatever reason, this is how I am acknowledging my birthday.

STANDING NAKED

I sat clothed in a wardrobe of the past.
Layers of tightly woven fabric keeping the cold in
and the warmth out.
Hiding a body and spirit that had dared to live
nearly half a century.

You pleaded with me to shed my hat,
unbutton my coat, kick off my shoes.
To let you remove gently these makeshift bandages
allowing the wounds beneath
the healing breath of fresh air.
You bid me to stand naked,
to hide nothing from you and nothing from myself.

As my last garment fell to the floor,
I saw, as if magnified tenfold, the scars of life given
and life lost.
I felt fresh pain, inside and out, from punches
taken by hand and by word.

As I reached desperately for the security of my old clothes,
My flesh and soul instead were enveloped by the cloak of your words –
“You’re beautiful.”

KEB
12/16/10

Christmas 2010

2010-12-26T22:19:00.000-08:00

t is December 26th and I have emerged from beneath the Christmas rubble into the after-Christmas haze. The empty boxes, shreds of wrapping paper and abandoned bows have all made their way to the trash, most of the gifts are resting comfortably in their new homes, and the holiday leftovers have been tucked away in the refrigerator. We tried to keep things simple and low-key, but that is not the way things looked around here yesterday. When you have seven people each giving one another just one gift you end up with 49 gifts. That’s a lot of stuff!

Those of us that did not already have iPads got them for Christmas. I wasn’t sure that I really wanted one, but it sure is a lot of fun. It may even prove to be useful and make me more productive – or at least make me appear to be doing something useful and productive. The iPads themselves were a gateway gift to many other gifts – speakers, headphones, cases, and even a few iTunes gift cards. One of the funniest iPad accessory gifts that I saw, though none of us actually received this, was the book The iPad for Dummies – The Kindle Edition. We have all managed to download Apps, books, and music just fine. I am thinking that first of all if you actually need this book and secondly if you are reading it on your Kindle, perhaps the iPad is not for you.

Though no one received The iPad for Dummies book, there were many other books, real paper ones with actual pages, that emerged from under the tree – cookbooks covering everything from good old southern cooking to vegan Italian, The Cat in the Hat in Russian, graphic novels, daily mediations, and tales of an American naturalist in Italy. Despite that fact that we all have access to ebooks, none of us has been able to give up real books.completely.

Handmade gifts were also in abundance. Erin is our queen of scrapbooking and master of Photoshop. She put her talents to use making each of us something to preserve memories from 2010. Brooke created a recipe collection especially for her sister. These two have taste buds that reside on opposite ends of the culinary spectrum so this was truly a gift of love. The recipes included ingredients such as cheese, eggs, bacon, and butter – things that Brooke does not herself cook with or eat. She did manage to sneak in one recipe that called for swiss chard or some other leafy green vegetable such as spinach – ingredients that Erin does not cook with or eat.

I did get some knitting done for this Christmas, not as much as I had hoped but more than I have managed in a long while. I made Erin an afghan for her dorm room and a pair of socks for Jason. Ok, I started the socks last year with the intention that they would be a gift for Christmas 2009. Now I realize that I had really just gotten a head start on my knitting for 2010. Despite this head start, I did fall short with what I hoped to accomplish for this year.
My goal was to knit hats for Erin, Brooke, Mike and Weber. I fell about 33% short of this. I finished the hats for Mike and Erin in plenty of time to actually wrap them and put them under the tree.

Brooke’s was under the tree; it just happened to be in the form of two unknit balls of yarn and an IOU. Weber’s was about half done and I didn’t even bother with trying to make it look gift-like. I humbly admitted that it was not done and promised that I would finish it as soon as I could. Unfortunately, the temperature is in the 20’s in Dallas right now. He could be wearing the hat if I had finished it. I figure I will have it done in a few days – when it is supposed to be 70 degrees here. This should come as no surprise to him since I finished his last pair of (wool) socks for his birthday – in June!

All in all, Weber is a good sport with regard to my poor timing with knitting projects though he did point out that he thought it was a little ironic that the bald guy got a hair (and beard) trimmer for Christmas but the hat to keep the bald head warm had no crown.
What can I say . . .

Don't tell him that using his reading glasses as a magnifying glass (like we used to do as kids to burn a whole in paper) probably won't work to keep his head warm.

Though we all had a great time giving and receiving gifts, by far the best part of Christmas was all being together laughing, doing crossword puzzles, playing with Squirmles, and eating Brooke’s homemade cinnamon rolls.

I wish you and your loved ones a blessed twelve days of Christmas.

Top Secret Mission

2010-12-19T22:17:00.000-08:00

So why was I at the mall again this weekend? I was on a top secret mission. No, I was not looking for a Christmas gift. And no, I have not finished Christmas shopping, but yesterday was not the day for that. Despite what you may be thinking, I was not checking up on Santa to make sure he was doing what he is supposed to be doing at this time of year. My assignment was to be in the shoe department of Nordstrom Department Store at 2:15 pm. Look around. See the latest styles in boots, heels, and flats. Bask in the Christmas cheer – the lights, the decorations, and the flurry of shoppers. But remember, I’m not shopping; it just looks like I am. I’m just waiting for my cue to spring into action.

At about 2:28, the store pianist ended his rendition of “Jingle Bells” with a coda that rivaled that of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. That was my cue, and the cue for 460 others who had been perusing the various departments of Nordstrom, to stand ready. Our mission was about to begin. We all abandoned our interest in the lovely shoes, clothing and jewelry that we had been admiring intently for the last ten minutes and readied ourselves. Then came our official call to action – the opening bars of Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus” leaped from the piano. After four measures of introduction, the entire store was filled with the sounds of 460 people singing this wonderful piece of music. Hallelujiahs high and low and everything in between resounded around two floors of the store and I suspect the enormous sound of our combined effort even reached beyond that. The faces of the singers lit up with joy as we sang together – never having rehearsed together or met one another, in many cases, before. The faces of the unsuspecting shoppers in the store did not evidence that same look of joy. Some look stunned. Others amazed. And some looked a little pissed off that our top secret mission of the day was impeding their progress with regard to their top mission of the day - serious, really serious, shopping. Oh well . . .as they say, life is what happens while you are making plans.

What I have just described to you is a Flash Mob. And, it was the best five minutes that I have spent in a long time.

Here is a link to some rough video (taken with someone’s phone) that has been posted to YouTube. Sadly, the quality of the audio leaves a lot to be desired, but you can get the gist of what was going on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aj3c7G0Nmi8

The Dallas Morning News also carried an article this morning.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/localnews/stories/DN-flashmob_19met.ART.Central.Edition1.4374e3d.html

“Beware of large crowds of like-minded people!”

Hallelujah!

That's Better, Santa!

2010-12-19T20:41:00.000-08:00

For reason I will explain in my next post, I found myself yesterday afternoon at the same mall where I spent last Saturday afternoon. What are the chances? I have lived in Dallas for twenty-seven years. In the past eight days, I have doubled the number of times I have set foot in this particular mall.

I was glad to see that with only a week until Christmas, Santa is beginning to get serious about his job. He is no longer putting off the inevitable by moonlighting as an exterior lighting designer.

(For further explanation, see the previous post.)

Sights and Sounds of Christmas

2010-12-12T20:41:00.000-08:00

The semester is over! At exactly 4:14 Thursday afternoon I turned in my grades. What have I been doing since then? I’m not really sure. All I know is that we have made three trips to the airport in the last twenty four hours; everyone is coming home for the Christmas break and I have done very little, well actually, I have done nothing to get ready for the holidays.

In an effort to remedy that sad situation, we went to one of the big malls in Dallas yesterday. It was full of people, mostly happy people. There were a few kids who, by their wailing, made it clear that they had had enough shopping, but for the most part everyone was enjoying the sights and sounds of the holiday hustle and bustle. The entire mall was beautifully decorated. Greenery, lights, bows, and shiny Christmas balls were everywhere. On every wing a different group sang familiar Christmas carols, instrumentalists gave their own renditions of these same tunes, and ballerinas twirled to the sounds of The Nutcracker. Despite the fact that I am in a mild state of panic due to my lack of preparation for Christmas, I could not help but to be happy too. I was even happier when I left the mall because we actually bought a few gifts.

Amidst all of this, we did see a couple of puzzling Christmas sights.

1. As we approached the busy intersection where the mall is situated, there stood Santa on the corner – wearing sunglasses and holding a placard advertising that he installed home Christmas decorations. Does he really have time to do that right now? Shouldn’t he be making his list and checking it twice? Shouldn’t he be making sure that the elves aren’t spending their working hours on Facebook, Twitter, or Match.com? Shouldn’t he be negotiating a bulk discount with Apple for all of the iTouches, iPhones, and iPads that are on everyone’s Christmas lists? Surely he should not be trimming the columns on people’s porches to look like peppermint sticks or draping strings of lights around animated reindeer. What is he thinking?

2. Then there was the U-Haul truck parked in two parking spaces. Except for the fact that we couldn’t find one parking space, I don’t have a problem with taking two parking spaces, I have a problem with driving a U-Haul truck to the mall. Who has that much shopping to do? I want to meet the person who buys that many gifts. Maybe they were planning to shoplift the $14,000 model train that is on display.

3. There was also a school bus parked out front. I’m sure it was an economics class from a local high school working on an end of the semester project - If you max out mom and dad’s credit card, and pay them back by making the minimum monthly payment, can you pay off the debt before you reach social security age? Or maybe it was a statistics class trying to determine what percentage of the stuff in all of those stores is actually needed by any of us. Or perhaps a physical fitness class was building endurance by walking round and round the mall until they found the exact thing they were looking for for just the right price. Score!!

After our day at the mall, I have purchased a few gifts. I have not put up the tree or cleaned where the tree will eventually go. I have not figured out exactly what I am giving some people on my list. I have not finished my Christmas cards. But, I am in the Christmas spirit. My feelings of holiday cheer do stem from my adventure at the mall and the fact that I don’t have to go to school tomorrow!!!!

I Wonder

2010-12-07T20:34:00.000-08:00

I wonder if we are born knowing to wonder or wanting to wonder,
If wonder is a gift or a curse.

I wonder why I am different or if I am different,
Why I care or why you do.

I wonder if we all see the same colors,
Is my blue also your blue, my red your red?

I wonder if we see the same good and the same evil,
Know the same despair and the same hope.

I wonder why some of us crave chocolate
And others alcohol, pills, or sex.

I wonder how words mean one thing to me and another to you,
And how the obvious escapes so many.

I wonder why anyone would choose raisins over chocolate chips in their cookies,
Why corn dogs taste so good.

I wonder why I like the mountains better than the ocean
And cold rather than heat.

I wonder why Bach moves me at the depths of my soul and Wagner doesn't,
And why I would rather read poetry than fiction.

I wonder why God is always close whether I want Him to be or not,
And why the most gentle messages are delivered in the midst of chaos.

I wonder who discovered that bread needs yeast to rise and biscuits need baking soda,
Why our body temperature should be 98.6 rather than 98.5 or 98.7.

I wonder how people fall in love and how they fall out of love,
How the same emotion can be the most beautiful and the ugliest life force.

I wonder why I don't like peas or mushrooms or olives,
But love brussel sprouts, squash and cucumbers.

I wonder who decided that teachers should be better at answers than questions,
That knowing the right answer is better than knowing the right question.

I wonder why so many people have such a narrow definition of family,
Why we even need the word "normal" in our vocabulary.

I wonder if life is over when I run out of questions,
I wonder . . . .

Tryptophan, Trees, and Thankfulness

2010-11-27T19:18:00.000-08:00

I must begin by confessing that Thanksgiving is one of my least favorite holidays - not because of its intention, but because of the way we go about "celebrating."

Most of us run ourselves ragged preparing a meal that amounts to enough food for a week or two but is consumed in one afternoon in a time span that is probably equal to one tenth of the time it takes to make it all. We tried to keep it simple this year. Our gathering was small, only five of us and everyone made their own favorite dish. Weber smoked the turkey and made bread, Mike made sweet potatoes and pies, Erin made the green beans and gravy, and I was left with mashed potatoes and dressing. The traditional Thanksgiving meal is definitely not vegan friendly so Brooke sautéed some spinach, had mashed potatoes that I had made with soy milk. We all had plenty to eat and plenty of leftovers for the days to come.

As I was waiting for various things to make their way in and out of the oven, I took a moment to look out the window. All of the sudden, it looked like fall. The grass is brown; many of the trees are bare and the ones that have not lost their leaves don vibrant shades of orange and red. I must say, I was a little startled by this observation. The day before Thanksgiving it had been 80 degrees. In fact, Brooke got off the plane from Chicago and the first words out of her mouth were, "Why is it so F@#$ hot here?" By the time we awoke Thursday morning, the temperature had dropped by more than half of its previous day's reading. It truly felt like we had skipped fall and moved directly to winter. Add to that all of the Christmas ads in the newspaper and the carols on all the TV commercials and you have all the makings of the early stages of a winter wonderland.

In a lull between culinary responsibilities, I took a walk around the yard looking at the trees.

These images don't compare to the majesty of snow capped mountains or seagulls soaring over ocean waves or forests that have been around for generations.; they are snapshots of the everyday, the simple beauty that resides literally in our own backyard. They remind me of how quickly things change. They are also evidence that things must change to continue to grow. And, that there is beauty and something for which to be thankful at every stage during the process of change.

No matter how bare things may seem, a glimpse of beauty is always possible.

Baby Picture

2010-11-23T19:45:00.000-08:00

It has been awhile since I posted a picture of the newest member of our family. Here is the latest picture of Frankie. She moves quickly, as kittens do, so I never hae time to get my "real" camera out. Usually the best I can do is to snatch my phone from my pocket, which is the case here.
Don't mind the fact that she has made herself comfortable in the middle of the coffee table. This is an improvement over the kitchen table or counter that are also favorite lounging spots.

Saturday 11/20/2010

2010-11-20T21:31:00.000-08:00

There are lots of things that I could have, and maybe even should have done today.

Make a shopping list of all the necessary items for a home-cooked Thanksgiving meal.
Go grocery shopping so that I can purchese all the necessary items and get a head start on the preparations for a home-cooked Thanksgiving meal.
Dig out and then iron the table linens so that I have a worthy place to serve a home-cooked Thanksgiving meal.
Find a loving new home for the two dogs and two cats that have turned nocturnal. FYI, we have not joined them in this new lifestyle.
Fluffed the girls’ beds and swept their rooms so that, when they come home this week, home will have that special kind of feeling.
Cleaned the rest of the house to insure that home would indeed have that special kind of feeling.
Started writing my final exams so that I can spend next weekend Christmas shopping with everyone else on the face of the earth.
Made a Christmas gift list so that if I had written my final exams and was going shopping next weekend I would know what gifts I was going to buy.
Slept all day because I was awake most of the night as a result of the newly nocturnal animals that did not find a new home today and that did not sleep last night.

I didn’t do any of these things. Today was the first day in many days, weeks, maybe even months that we have not had something that we had to do. It was a strange feeling not to have to set the alarm at all. It was odd to read the paper over morning coffee rather than evening tea.

While reading the paper, I saw an ad for something called ICE at the Gaylord Texan Resort. ICE is a display of carved ice sculptures that, this year, depicts scenes from “A Charlie Brown Christmas.” Going to see that sounded like fun. We logged on to the website and sorted out details like times, admission cost, etc. Decision made. That’s what we were going to do today. In fact, we decided to have an entire “date day.”

Before beginning our day of frivolous teen-aged behavior, we did accomplish one thing on the To-Do List; we went to Lowes and bought bathroom faucets and transition pieces to compliment the eighty boxes of hardwood flooring that are sitting in the middle of the den floor acclimating to their new environment before being laid in their permanent position. After that brief moment of responsible adult behavior, we were off for a day of fun.

We had lunch at our favorite pizza place – chicken and spinach pizza with bacon, tomatoes, and lots of cheese. I suspect that this may be the absolute best pizza on the planet! Once we devoured almost the entire pizza, we headed to the Gaylord Texan Resort to see ICE.

We purchased our tickets. (Here the cashier asked us politely if we were eligible for the senior discount. We gave an honest response of “not quite yet, but thanks for asking.” The show begins with a short video explaining the process of creating all of these scenes from ice. It included statistics such as how many tons of ice, what temperatures are necessary, how much refrigeration and how many people it takes to create and maintain these amazing ice sculptures. The whole concept of ICE was inspired by huge ice sculptures that are created each winter in the northern part of China. In fact, it is the skills of a group of Chinese artists that are flown to Texas and spend many hours carving these magnificent ice sculptures of Charles Schultz’s iconic characters.

After the video, everyone is given a parka to wear into the 12 degree area where the Peanuts Gang is waiting. The sights were pretty amazing!

The Peanuts Gang

A familiar image of poor Charlie Brown

And the classic image of Lucy.

Shroder

Pigpen singing his heart out.

Sally

Linus and his blanket

The beloved beagle Snoopy and a happy ending

Not quite ready for our date to be over, we decided to stop for dessert and coffee. To double the pleasure, we opted to have this nightcap at Barnes and Noble. Caffeine, sweets, and books! Life doesn’t get much better than when these three elements converge.

And what better way to bring a wonderful date day to close than by . . . .writing a blog post.

Late Night Dilemma

2010-11-16T19:55:00.000-08:00

I’ve gotten to the point where I don’t like to eat out at restaurants unless it is for a specific occasion or because my taste buds yearn for something whose preparatory process exceeds my culinary skills. I really hate the notion of “having” to eat out because there is not enough time to prepare a meal at home. Most food in restaurants these days seems to be primarily variations on a fried theme; little variety exists from one place to the next except in details like whether their fried pickles are chips or spears.

The other thing I loathe about eating out is the dreaded, “So where do you want to eat?” Does it really matter? Everything tastes the same anyway. Sometimes the answer to this question is based on whether the restaurant serves Pepsi or Coke. Often the choice is made depending on where we have coupons. Other times where we eat is simply determined by opting to take the path of least resistance – what is closest? In cases of eating out due to necessity rather than desire, rarely is the restaurant chosen based on wanting something specific to eat.

The other night after the Resounding Harmony concert we were starved and it was late, at least it was late by U.S. weeknight dinnertime standards; it was about 10:30. By this time at night, the already slim food selections become even slimmer because many eating establishments have already closed for the day. We began the dreaded conversation about where to eat. Much to my surprise, when I asked Weber what he wanted he did not respond with the typical, “I don’t care;” he said that he wanted chicken tenders. From this point a conversation about where one could get chicken tenders at 10:30 on a Wednesday night ensued.

Most fast food drive-thru windows were still open, but McNuggets don’t really count as chicken tenders. They barely count as chicken. We entertained the idea of Dairy Queen, but I really didn’t want an entirely fried meal. After running through the gamut of possibilities, we finally settled on IHOP. They are open 24 hours. They were on the way home. They have chicken tenders. You can have something that resembles real vegetables with your chicken tenders. And, they have Diet Coke and bottomless pots of coffee. We were set.

In case you are wondering, IHOP has really good chicken tenders. They are served with mashed potatoes (made from real potatoes not some tasteless white flakes from a box) and steamed broccoli. We ended up eating a rather tasty meal served on a breakable plate and eaten with real utensils instead of what we thought we would be eating - fried something wrapped in paper and eaten with our hands.

When Weber picked up our check he got this funny look on his face though he didn’t say anything. I knew how much our meals were so it shouldn’t have been “sticker shock.” Our server didn’t look like the type who would sign the check with a personal message claiming “for a good time call . . .” Finally I inquired as to what the cause for Weber’s strange facial expression. He said that the total bill was way less than it should have been. We looked at it carefully. At the bottom it said BOGO SD. BOGO, buy one get one, we understood. But SD? We looked around and finally saw a large sign in the window advertising the buy one get one senior discount – SD. In small print it said that this discount was “for our guests 55 and older.” Neither of us is 55. One of us is closer then the other. Nonetheless, we were not deserving of the discount.

Here began our dilemma.

Weber’s first instinct was that we should tell the server that we were not eligible for this discount and ask him to re-calculate our bill and charge us for both meals. My reaction was that we can’t do that because it would embarrass the young server. As we contemplated what the right thing to do was, I realized that part of our difference in opinion over how to handle this situation was due to conflicting views on the whole concept of aging.

My thinking that correcting the server would embarrass him is rooted in the idea that in our culture aging is viewed as a negative process. To assume someone to be older than they actually are is considered an insult. I didn’t want the server to think that he had insulted us and therefore we were upset. From that regard, it didn’t bother me at all that he thought one or both of us was over 55.

In other cultures, with age comes wisdom and with that wisdom comes respect. One earns that position of respect in society by reaching a certain age. Another way to look at our late night dilemma is that we have not yet reached that age of wisdom and were therefore not worthy of the respect shown to us in the gift of the senior discount.

Despite our somewhat lengthy conversation on the morally and ethically correct thing to do in this situation, we decided not to embarrass the server and kept quiet as to our actual ages. The money that we saved on this meal went to feed those who otherwise may have gone hungry.

Saturday Chills

2010-11-06T19:34:00.000-07:00

This first Saturday in November was a day, for me, that was marked by chills, all kinds of chills.

The chills began at 7:30 am this morning when the alarm went off the first time. I was huddled under the covers, but I could feel the chill in the morning air. Harley and the kitten were strategically positioned under the covers as well. Harley was pushed up against me and the kitten found a warm spot between me and Weber. We were all warm and comfy. I thought to myself how nice it would be to stay in this position for a few more days, or at least a few more hours, or even just a few more minutes.

Wasn't happening. We had to get going because we needed to be in downtown Dallas for a rehearsal at 10:15. We all reluctantly rolled ourselves out of bed and quickly made the bed so that none of us would be the least bit tempted to crawl back under those covers where at this point it was still quite toasty.

I opened the door to let the dogs out and the two acres beyond our backdoor were covered by a thin layer of frost that glistened in the morning sunlight. Looking back on this first glimpse of today's morn, I can say that it really was beautiful but at that very moment, I was overcome by the 33 degree blast of air rushing through the door rather than this vision of nature's beauty. So, no picture. Sorry!

We dressed and had a warm breakfast and a few cups of coffee before heading out. I am singing with Resounding Harmony, a philanthropic chorus, in Dallas. This year's fall concert is Wednesday at the Meyerson Symphony Center, the home of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. I am almost embarrassed to admit that this was my first visit to the Meyerson; as one who proclaims to be a musician, I should have been to many symphony concerts, but I haven't. After many years of spending my evenings at volleyball, basketball, and soccer games, which by the way I don't regret at all, I now have the opportunity to spend my evenings at the symphony if I choose. But, my first experience at the Meyerson will be from the stage rather than the audience. But first . . .

This was the first thing that caught my attention after parking downtown.
I was OK until I saw that there was a human being up in the cage of this massive construction crane.

Here marks today's second experience of chills, chills that were very different from the first. I am scared of heights. As I stood in the crisp morning air, I thought to myself, I am so glad that it is not me up there. I may not be warm in my bed, but I am not hundreds of feet up in the air looking down on the Dallas' Arts District. Perspective is everything!

I'm not sure whether these three members of the construction crew are, like me, counting their blessings because their feet are firmly planted on the ground or if they are envious of their co-worker who is sky high - literally.

Once the heart palpitations stopped and my legs felt more like human legs than Jell-O, we headed across the street to the Meyerson, an architectural piece of art. The angular lines of this building create fascinating structural illusions.

After checking in with security, we made our way through the belly of this hall eventually being spit out backstage after passing the mailboxes and lockers of the great musicians who make up the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. In some ways, being backstage was kind of magical and in other ways it was confirmation that at our root, we are all the same. Some of the orchestra members' lockers were covered with drawings obviously given to them by special children in their lives; some had newspaper reviews; still others had cartoons and stickers. - these momentos were much like those things we all have on our desks and/or refrigerators.

Here are a few images from backstage.

This is a sound proof practice room for musicians to warm up. Presumably it is reserved for soloists. This little cubicle would be a wonderful candidate for "If These Walls Could Talk."

Scattered behind the stage are cases containing . . .I'm not sure what. Large instrument of some kind, probably.

This is the green room, the place where performers come to relax before making their way on stage.

Resounding Harmony did a complete technical run-through of our upcoming performance. Being in the hall was amazing. Listening in the hall was breath taking. Singing in the hall brought head-to-toe chills - third time for chills today. And again, very different from the first two instances.

Our concert is to benefit the North Texas Food Bank. All of the pieces on the concert are emotionally charged works whose lyrics address the many aspects of food in our lives. These passionate words and the hall's acoustic majesty combine to bring chills that result from both physical and emotional stimuli.

Here is a view of the house taken from my vantage point on stage. (I snapped all of these pictures on the sly with my phone so please don't judge their photographic merit.)

I can only imagine that the goose bumps I experienced today while singing to an empty house will be magnified ten-fold when it is faces rather than rows of empty chairs staring back at us.

After rehearsal, we had a nice lunch with a fellow singer and student of mine before returning to the tasks of everyday life, grocery shopping and laundry. As we were making our way through the last few aisles of the grocery store, I suddenly realized that I didn't feel very well. I was tired, my body ached, and I was freezing. These are not good signs.

By the time we got home, I was trembling with chills, the kind of chills that only accompany a fever. The thermometer confirmed that I do indeed have an elevated temperature. These chills are my least favorite of the day. So, I am going to end this here and get some rest so that I am feeling well for Wednesday's concert.

Time Change

2010-11-01T16:07:00.000-07:00

I am getting to that age where I find myself saying, “Times sure have changed!” I am learning to live happily with some of these changes.

Like .. .

Grocery sacks that have moved from paper to plastic to reusable
Paying all my bills without licking a single stamp or envelope
The ability to carry every music recording I own with me at all times thanks to my iPod
Pets can be micro chipped so that should they get lost, they can be reunited with their rightful owner
Google, Amazon, and Restaurant.com
Blogs
Debit cards
Post-it notes
K-cups

Then there are those things that I really don’t like . . .

Pre-packaged food
The fact that it is nearly impossible to reach a human being when telephoning a business
Email and texting as a primary means of communication
Online textbooks and college classes that are 100% online
The opinion that making things yourself is an anomaly
The notion that bigger is always better
Multitasking
Web-cams
Junk mail

As we would expect, many of these “advancements” have caused changes in our educational process. Kids just don’t need to be taught the same things that we were taught “back in the olden days.” Girls don’t need to take home economics anymore because they don’t need to know how to sew or cook. As far as they are concerned, cakes come from boxes and bread comes from a plastic sack. Fried chicken comes from KFC and vegetables are transported frozen from the North Pole by the Jolly Green Giant.

And make clothing? That requires knowing things like the difference between lycra and linen, what is fusible interfacing, and the meaning of bias. It also means accepting the fact that the tape measure never lies. Why spend time teaching these things when some form of clothing is available almost everywhere you go and for much less money than it would cost to make it from scratch.

Schools don’t teach typing anymore; they teach keyboarding, a skill that is a little different. Typing on the computer, or keyboarding, doesn’t carry with it a love-hate relationship with carbon paper and correction tape or the hard fact that some mistakes can’t be corrected and you may just have to start over.

And then there’s penmanship . . .Does anyone learn penmanship anymore? Based on what I have seen from my own students, I don’t think so. Children no longer learn how to form all those perfectly proportioned loops and lines that result in cursive handwriting. No more do they have to work to perfect their writing skills to achieve the honor of being allowed to write with an ink pen in class. These days we are lucky if students come to class with any kind of writing utensil.

The prevailing wisdom is that students don’t need to worry about legible handwriting because everything is now typed – or is that keyboarded? Very rarely do people send handwritten notes or letters or even invitations. With texting, email and Evites at our fingertips, why waste time and energy to write a letter and then have to wait for it to be delivered via snail mail? In an era where our motto is “time is money,” such a means of communication is obviously inefficient and old fashioned.

I wonder what the study of historical documents will look like two hundred years from now. Will the rare book rooms in libraries just be walls of encased hard drives that can’t be accessed because their technology is antiquated? For that matter, will libraries as we know them even exist? Research skills that require using a card catalog and actually putting your hands on a real book are another thing that is disappearing from the educational process thanks to the Internet. The Internet is a primary source, right?

And here’s another question. Is it really necessary for children to learn how to read a clock, one with hands and a face? Aren’t most of our time telling devices now digital – our microwaves, DVD players, computers, cell phones, cars, oven timers, and alarm clocks? Every now and then you will see an “old-time” (no pun intended) clock in a public place, but how many people really look at them? We are all looking at our cell phones and iPads, which, in this digital age, will supply us with the time – digitally.

The ability to tell time by reading the hands on a clock used to be an integral part of our human knowledge. I can remember all through elementary school doing worksheets to hone this essential skill. Such is not the case any longer. Many children view hands on a clock in the same light in which they view a dial on a telephone – “What in the world are you talking about?”

Recently I was talking with a friend whose mother is in her seventies and is experiencing problems with memory loss. He took her to the doctor to be evaluated to see if she is entering the early stages of dementia or Alzheimer’s. One of the tasks that the doctor asked her to perform in this evaluation was to draw the numbers on a clock, presumably because this is a deeply ingrained skill. There is perhaps only one or two more generations for whom this is truly the case. What will Alzheimer’s tests look like for the children of today?

When today's youth has become senior citizens and are being tested for memory issues will they be asked to draw the layout of a TV remote? Respond to questions using only text speak? Give instructions for how to use the microwave to make popcorn? Recite their credit card number – including the 3-digit security code? Articulate how to order properly a medium café mocha with an extra shot, skim milk, and no whipped cream at Starbuck’s?

There are some scary times ahead!

Right now, I have until the big hand is on the three and the little hand is on the four to use my favorite fountain pen to write a heartfelt letter to the one I love while sitting in the library amidst shelves of books. I am going to take advantage of this situation before it is too late!

The Score is Tied

2010-10-31T20:35:00.000-07:00

After our second night in the old/new house, the battle between its two male occupants is tied.

Male Parental Unit:1 Adidas:1

See below for highlights from this week's match up.

"The Point Earning Move"

For details of the first match between these two slumber seeking boys, please see this blog's previous post. Stay tuned to see who wins the tie-breaking match. The winner will snooze away on his very own blow up air mattress. (Bed linens are not included in the prize package.)

First Night

2010-10-22T21:12:00.001-07:00

We spent our first night in our “new” house this week. Well, it’s not really new, but it feels new. You may remember that back in the spring we began renovations on Weber’s house in Dallas. We had hoped to move before school started in August; for many reasons this did not happen. These are not necessarily bad reasons, they are just reasons. And for these same reasons, despite the fact that we spent the night in the house, the renovations are still not complete. That being said, progress is being made.

We have Saltillo tile floors in half the house. The other half is concrete slab awaiting hardwood flooring. We have some painted walls, some base boards, and some crown molding. Throughout the house are forty five can lights. The guys at Home Depot who had to climb to the very top shelf to get the four dozen light bulbs that we needed for these forty five lights love us. They love us because they had to work over the weekend instead of going to the Texas State Fair. Riding the lift to those tip-top shelves is almost like experiencing the Midway at the fair.

We have three new functional toilets. (This is a really good thing to have when considering overnight accommodations!) We have running water in one shower and one sink. And another perk – the hot water heaters are hooked up! We even have a towel warmer, which is great on cold winter mornings. Unfortunately it is still hot here so this luxury went unappreciated on our first night’s stay except as a plain old towel bar. The problem with this whole scenario – the shower, the sink and the towel warmer are each in a different bathroom. So, we had progressive bedtime and morning rituals. Brush your teeth in one bathroom. Move to the next to take a shower; then to the last to hang the damp towels. This all sounds a little convoluted, but it worked.

Did I mention that we have no kitchen? Let me rephrase that. We have a place for a kitchen; it just has nothing in it except a refrigerator. Well, that is not exactly true either. It does have an oven and dishwasher too; they just happen to be sitting in the middle of the floor still packaged and not connected to any power source. The kitchen walls do have pencil lines showing where the eventual cabinets, appliances and sink will go. But right now, the kitchen exists only in our very vivid imaginations. We did manage a cold breakfast of fruit and yogurt and a bedtime snack of popcorn (store-bought) and diet coke. Meal preparation beyond that level was impossible. As with the bathroom situation, this worked for the short term as well.

The only furniture in the house right now to speak of is a recliner and a straight back chair. Neither is conducive to a good night’s sleep. We have taken a few naps together in the recliner but this manner of sleep has about a thirty minute limit. Beyond that, the only things that go to sleep are arms and legs whose circulation has been cut off. We solved this dilemma by taking an air mattress with us. Oh, and we also had to take the dogs with us.

The dogs have been going with us on days when I have late night rehearsals. Our contractor, Paul, and the dogs have become big buddies. They all seem to enjoy each other’s company. How many people get a contractor and dog sitter all in one?

On the days when we have left the dogs at the house, we have been spreading a flannel sheet on the floor for them – the same flannel sheet that we now needed to put on the air mattress. Though we had taken the mattress for us to sleep on, we had neglected to take any dog beds. Not a problem; we could run to Target and get a dog bed. Did you know that dog beds at Target are $40! You can buy a brand new comforter or a twin air bed for less than a dog bed. We decided that the dogs could just sleep on the old towels that were already at the house.

We aired up the mattress and I put the sheets on it. We then began the pilgrimage from bathroom to bathroom and readied ourselves for bed. We returned to our bed to discover that the dog bed dilemma had been resolved. Adidas was curled up on his male parental unit’s side of the bed. He looked quite comfy and not the least bit upset with us for not spending $40 on a bed for him. I laughed. The above mentioned male parental unit was not so amused. In fact, he was so unamused that I didn’t have time to take a picture of our precious black lab all tucked in for the night. In an instant, Adidas was back on his pile of towels and we humans had claimed our spots on the air mattress. Harley managed to wiggle her way under the covers next to me. Why should this first night in the new house be any different from any other night?

Many would see this whole experience as “roughing it.” To me, it had the feeling of perfect simplicity. We had no television, internet or kitchen sink, but we had hot and cold running water, a warm place to sleep, a fridge with diet coke, and each other. What more do we really need? Truthfully? Not much.

The reason that we had this little slumber party is because we had several nights in a row of late meetings and rehearsal on top of our usual early morning departures for school. Staying this one night saved about a hundred miles and two and half to three hours of driving. This in itself was worth the trade of no internet or kitchen sink! It gave us a taste of what life will be like once we finally move.

I have to say, I am looking forward to that time. So are the dogs. After a good night’s rest, Adidas assumes the role of site foreman in an effort to keep things on track so that we can move as soon as possible.

The Last One Standing

2010-10-14T20:19:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I walked into the office at school and our beloved administrative assistant was filling a bowl with this year’s first round of Halloween candy. Today as I passed by this same bowl, this is what I saw.
What is it about the last piece of any kind of food? I see similar images when I walk by the doughnut table at church on Sunday mornings. By the time the late service begins, one lonely doughnut sits on a platter that it once shared with four or five dozen friends. And sometimes, there sits only half of a doughnut. Someone really wanted that last one, but couldn't bear, for whatever reason, to take the whole last morsel of this sacred Sunday confection.

We have all been to parties where trays of hors d’oeuvres linger on the table waiting for someone to swallow their pride and eat the last one. Why is there this hesitation? Why won’t we just snatch that last bite with the same vigor that we do the first? Or the middle? Is something wrong with it? Is it the one that every other guest has had their fingers on? Is it the one that everyone but you saw as having a fly garnish only moments ago? Is it the one that someone carried around on their plate and then returned to the platter because they didn’t like it? Surely not. Or, maybe so.

Maybe this poor lonely piece of candy pictured above that has found its place as the jack-o-lantern’s nose is like that last kid who gets picked for the basketball team at recess. Nobody wants him on their team because he’s too slow, too short, doesn’t have the right shoes, or would really rather play hopscotch with the girls. Are any of these good reasons for exclusion?

Is this a case of “saving the best for last?” For instance, as the Christmas parade, passes by, anxious children wait while floats carrying paper mache snowmen and red and green clad elves roll by followed by marching bands playing renditions of those nostalgic tunes that we all recognize as heralding the holidays. Fire trucks cruise by. Horses prance past. Every now and then there is even an ambling elephant. But all most of these excited children really want to see is the last unit of the parade – Santa Claus. Nobody thinks of watching nearly the entire parade and then leaving before the final participant has made his appearance. In this case, the last is the best, at least in the eyes of all those children who are pretty sure that they have been nice all year long.

Last is a hard place to get a grip on. Sometimes being last is a good thing and at other times it is definitely not so good. And sometimes it is hard to know the difference – like in the case of having the last word.

And then we can wrestle with the idea that “the last shall be first.”

I think I will go have a piece of candy and ponder this one a little more.

Random Thoughts

2010-10-07T18:28:00.000-07:00

Here is a list of random thoughts in need of context. Feel free to insert them into a place that works for you.

I wrote it down. Therefore, it is written down.
Those who are voted most likely to succeed may fail. The converse is also true.
Sometimes a rainbow is just a rainbow.
If it is good for you it might actually taste good too.
Wisdom often comes in tattered packages.
If I have it all then I have nothing to do.
A grown-ass woman does not need to say vajayjay.
If you're happy and you know it say "Amen."
A symphony is written one note at a time.
Bananas come in different shapes and some of them are not good.
Now I know how the moon feels.
Make sure that the writing on the wall is legible.
Without fear there can be no war.
There is nothing between the lines. Really.

A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Laughs

2010-09-30T18:11:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you have to wonder whether people do these things on purpose or if they are unfortunate coincidences. Or, maybe I am the only one who sees anything funny in these pictures. Actually I know that is not the case because Offspring No. 1 sent me the second picture.