Back to the Rain

Christmas morning, Tom and I left the grimy and melting snow of Seattle to spend five days in Los Angeles with his sister, Linda, and her family.  To toy with us, the weather in LA was cold and rainy when we landed with winds whipping the leaves off the palm trees.  Grateful to be out of the snow and sub-freezing temperatures, we found even a wet fifty degrees welcome.  Our Christmas dinner, compliments Jean-Pierre, was evocative of the cold Puget Sound we’d left behind, featuring a large tray of fresh, raw Hama Hama oysters from Hood Canal.  I ate five; lightly spritzed with a lemon wedge, they tasted like standing on the beach at Harstine island and breathing deeply. 

With great kindness, by the next day, the rain and cool gave way to L.A.’s more typical conditions:  blue, blue skies and sun.  I have no idea what the temperatures were actually, but the radiance of the California sun bored into my bones, giving me a hit of vitamin D I hope will fend off the Washington winter blues until the sun returns up north, say about May…if we’re lucky.  The Boscs, too, were kind, traipsing about the beach and hill tops with Tom and me as we attempted to saturate ourselves with sunshine.  Sunday afternoon, Linda, Pierre, Tom and I stood atop the remarkably green hills of the Topanga Canyon Wilderness, shielding our eyes as we looked southwest to the deep blue of the Pacific Ocean as it charged and tugged at the beaches of Santa Monica.  Turning 180 degrees, we could see mansions and villas and odd, old little cabins pocking the waves of forested hillsides.  The two views challenged my long held impression of L.A. as a lot of concrete at the edge of the sea. 

Sunny and seventy, it was still Christmas though.  We opened presents, laughed at stories, and toasted the holidays together.  Those are things we do regardless of our location in late December.  While Christmas marketing leans to romantic images of cottages with snow to the window sills and sleighs pulled by prancing brown steeds over downy fields, I think I’m sold on Christmas a few degrees south.  The dive-bombing hummingbirds that live in the hedge along the Boscs’ deck and a bevy of just-ripe lemons sent home with us, the embodiment of the sun we left behind Monday night, do much more for my spirit than the drip, drip, drip that now remains of our Christmas white.

It’s been gray all day, and only now beginning to rain.  Ruby is restless, waiting for me to finish this entry so she can go out and play.  Rain, snow or sun, Ruby is happy in all weather.  I am going to try to learn that from her.  Lesson one:  go outside and chase cats.

Merry Christmas and Here We Go Again…

It’s eight-thirty in the morning Christmas Eve, and I have a very long list of things to do before celebrating with family tonight.  Yet, here I sit by the fire, laptop in lap, tapping away on this blog.  I have my priorities, though. Before I get on with the tasks, I want to wish all of you a Merry Christmas and Happy Another Year.  It seems I only need to blink and the last digit on the date stamp rolls over again.  2009?  Is that possible?  Well, whether we grieve or celebrate, time ticks on. 

And time passing is apparent in the view out the window this morning, too.  The snow is putting up a good defense, but it began raining a couple hours ago. Our wonderland scene will be brown slop before too long.  At least I’ll be able to get the Mazda out of the garage, a first in about a week. 

Before I sign off on this very short entry today, I want to share a small thrill with you.  Today I Googled “susanintherain” and voila!  My blog showed up on Google!  I truly shouted with glee–yes, really, glee.  I tried it a couple days ago, and got nothing, so I’m not sure what’s changed, but it’s too fun.  It’s like having a little bit of my mind floating out there in the ether.  (That’s not the same thing as having my head in the clouds for you smarty-pants out there.)  If you have a chance, Google it for a chuckle, because your comments are posted there as well.  We live in a fishbowl together.

While I won’t see all of you over the next few days, I’ll be thinking of you.  Thank you for reading my thoughts and offering yours in exchange.  I’m having the time of my life.  And, ahem, a toast:  To new pages in the books of our lives!

“Sorry about the hair” or “Christmas Baking with Ruby”

The house is warm against the snowy scene outdoors and the kitchen air is redolent with the scent of orange.  Ruby is now napping on the hearth rug, her newest toy, “Lammydoodle”  according to the tag, securely in her chops.  I’ve been baking all morning, mixing up oatmeal cookies with white chocolate, dried cranberries and walnuts, and that teaspoon or so of orange zest (see below).  I started the dough for the almond bread in my bread maker, then rolled and filled and curled into a snail by hand–the machine refused to cooperate for those steps.  The almond bread is now cooling on the counter, brown like a good amber ale on top with a dusting of crushed almonds and sugar.  The cookies, crisp and dotted with red and white, are stacked on a cooling rack and calling to me. 

Other than making sweet and sour meatballs and a salad tomorrow, my Christmas food work is done.  And none too soon, says Ruby.  She’s been patient, trailing me around the kitchen and on a couple forays upstairs to the laundry, trying to help out by licking up drips of egg or drops of dough.  The kitchen floor shines from a dog tongue scrubbing.  Ruby now expects to be rewarded with a jaunt outside to burrow  for small beasts in the near foot of snow that has accummulated this past week.  Just a few minutes more, I say, needing to sample those cookies with a cup of rewarmed coffee.  Ruby sighs and chomps lammydoodle, producing a satsifying squeek.

Cookies approved, I dress for cold, and Ruby is convinced we’re finally going outside.  In a matter of minutes, Sno is out of the garage and hobbling toward the front yard, zigging and zagging like a bumble bee.  Ruby has made three zig zags of her own the length of the property in the time it takes Sno to move five feet, and taking advantage of my attention being elsewhere, Ruby makes a break for it and leaps up the back bank to disappear, an orange and white blur into the black and white forest.  I’m sure she feels entitled.  By the time Sno has made it to the front yard, she is exhausted, so we rest, then start our trek back to the kennel and garage.  No sign of Ruby yet. 

Once Sno is back in the kennel, I stand around a few minutes calling for Ruby, knowing she can hear me and will ignore me.  The “call of the wild” is powerful in her; she’s a slave to her nose.  So I decide to kill the time with a cup of tea and another cookie.  What better way to wait for a dog gone AWOL?

A cookie and a half later, I see Ruby bounding down the neighbor’s hillside, suggesting she’s probably covered the whole neighborhood in the half hour she’s been gone.  At least I can relax now and save a few cookies for tomorrow.  I shepherd my dog, snowballs clinging to her feathers, into the garage to melt and warm up.   

Be sure and sample Ruby’s and my cookies if you get a chance.  And if you find a hair, remember, dog’s hair is cleaner than a person’s mouth…or something like that.

“In the Bleak Midwinter”

Nearly a week of below freezing temperatures, several days of intermittent snowfall, throw in some freezing fog and rain for contrast, and you have one unusual Puget Sound Christmas.  I cannot recall, in my lifetime, a similar holiday season spate of weather.  It brings to mind the poem by Christina Rossetti, “In the Bleak Midwinter,” which had always made me picture an old English countryside in the past:

In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,
earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;
snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,
in the bleak midwinter, long ago.

Yet, as you can see in the picture below, our midwinter day–today, the Solstice–suits the poem shiveringly well.

So, like most everything, this weather has brought us mixed blessings.  While the slick roads keep us from completing Christmas errands, the boys are home.  Ian’s here from Western Washington University and Cole, from Seattle, and they are actually sticking around, like the snow.  Usually they drop in, raid the fridge, chat, and go find company in the vicinity more interesting than ours .  But with the weather daunting for driving, three of us actually had breakfast together this morning, and my money is on dinner in our dining room for four.  I have a roast with garlic and rosemary in the crockpot to leverage that bet. 

 The forecasters are saying to expect a continuation of conditions for the next couple days.  So I’ve made my peace with the urge to “get it all done” before Christmas.  I had already whittled the “it” to less than a handful of gifts and some specialty food items.  In fact, just after Thanksgiving, Tom and I made some kind of silent agreement about letting Christmas come and go without much fuss this year.  We’re headed to L.A. to be with Jean-Pierre, Linda, and Pierre on Christmas day anyway, so putting up a tree seemed more ritualistic than enticing.  It would just turn to tinder in our absence, so let’s skip it, we never really said, but somehow agreed.  And what other decor did we usually deck our halls with?  Not much.  The tree angel my mother made for us is on the mantel, bowls of Christmas candy look festive enough on the side board.  Most merry, the faceted bottle of vodka Cole brought us twinkles like fairy lights as the table lamp shines through.  That’s truly holiday spirit!  Other than those minor players in the Christmas pageant, and a batch of sugar cookies we ate before I frosted them, there is little going on at our house to signal a round of “Silent Night.”  And I’m thoroughly enjoying it.

In a conversation with Shelley today, who also abstained from tree trimming this year, we realized we were looking forward to the approaching Christmas Eve gathering at Sherry’s for the food and the family (not necessarily in that order).  Christmas is so often produced by women, the gift buying and wrapping, the cooking, the putting up and taking down of decorations.  Yes, men help out–houses bedecked with wattage-sucking light shows owe their drama to brave men with ladders, for example–but it’s women I see this time of year harried in the grocery store hauling bags heavy with Christmasy foodstuffs, checking off too-long gift lists, and looking at the calendar with chagrin as the days grow fewer and their bank accounts empty.  Did they remember stuff for the stockings?  Is a 20 pound turkey enough?  If they don’t make fudge, will anyone care?  To what degree is it bad for all of us to place the onus of Merry Christmas squarely in the lap of one class of people?  Shelley and I, at least, lifted the whole matter off our laps this year and are doing only what we want to–really want to–do.  It feels wonderful.

Shelley just called.  Derek and Travis enlisted their dad in setting up the top half of their artificial Christmas tree.  It’s propped up near the gas fireplace in their family room, confetti-colored lights blinking merrily away.  No one plans to add glass balls or icicles or any other decorations.  The blinking lights are the comfort they were looking for.  I said to Shelley, “Well it’s good for them to learn to meet their own needs.”  Certainly it’s good for each of us to meet the needs of another, too.  Our very survival as humans depends on mutuality, community.  So I wish you a joyful Solstice, the returning of the sun that brings gradually increasing opportunities for doing good and being together.  The snow will melt, the holiday will pass, and the boys will leave again.  In fact, Cole just told me he’s taking Ian’s Subaru to the mall.  Hope he comes back for dinner.

Ending Well and Beginning Anew

We’re tip-toeing a lot around here in these waning days of the autumn sun.  Holding our breath.  Wringing our hands.  As the year ends and the cold sets in, Snohomish, our 15-year-old Border Collie mix appears to be waning, too.  A recent veterinary appointment resulted in several prescriptions, a diagnosis of renal failure (AKA, old age), and bill for several hundred dollars.  We’ve spent the last three weeks trying to make those expensive pills palatable to a dog who’s not interested in eating anything anymore.  Yesterday, Tom coated one in peanut butter and sandwiched it between two puppy crackers for a canine canape.  Sno ate a few, but I think it was out of devotion to Tom more than anything. 

I’ve been around dogs my whole life, but I don’t recall the endings of most of them.  It may be because I didn’t really consider any of those dogs mine.  The one exception would be Gary’s Cassidy, who played a mean game of soccer with me nearly everyday, and when he disappeared, I felt his absence as a loss.  He was a friend, I guess I find it odd to say.  Even when Sky died, about six years ago now, I felt a distance from the event, no doubt in part because we were in Bend when it happened and because Sky was such a strange little autistic dog who bonded with no one but his kennel mate, Sno. 

But here we are losing Snohomish, breath by shallow breath, meal by uneaten meal.  She spends nearly 24 hours a day now laying down, often flat on her side, showing no inclination to move unless the neighbor’s little bitchy miniature Australian Shepherds have the effrontery to wriggle under the fence and yap cacaphonously in our general direction.  Then the old girl draws deeply from what’s left of her ire and indignation–of which she’s had considerable her whole life long–and hobbles toward the trespassers, barking with a ferocity at odds with her frail form.  Maybe once or twice a day, Tom may coax Sno to walk to the front yard where it’s more pleasant to poop than the kennel, but she doesn’t even have the energy to do that much anymore.  Fatigued by the time she arrives, she collapses on the soggy lawn, and Tom has to lift her up, stand her back arthritic legs under her, and coax her to return to her bed.  Between her severe incontinence and her uneasiness with the steps, it’s no longer possible to have her in the house with us, so we have layers of doggie beds and fleece blankets to keep her comfortable and warm in the garage.  Last night I practically carried her out to the kennel for her evening pee, and once on her legs, she climbed into her straw-filled dog house, then refused to come back out.  I tried reaching in to pull her out, but she resisted me, and I wondered if she was trying to convey something.  I called Tom at work, and we agreed to let her be.  When he got home after midnight, she ate a few more canapes to make him happy, but again refused to come into the garage.  I expected she’d be dead by morning, but she blinked at me each of the times I checked on her when I was out with Ruby today.

The weatherman says we’ll get our biggest snowfall yet this season on Sunday, the first day of winter, the new year of the natural world, the day the sun shines a fraction longer.  There’s something about this juxtaposition of endings and beginnings, of the dead world of winter and the newness of growing days that makes the inevitability of Snohomish’s death more poignant.  She’s a good old dog, and what she’s lacked in charm, she’s made up for in loyalty.  Tom has never had a better friend.

Don’t Get Me Anything, Really

The bad weather of this week, featuring the winter ogres Snow and Ice, has erased my work schedule (and my income, I’m afraid), so I’ve spend the last two days rearranging the furniture instead.  Now that Cole and Ian have true, mailable addresses of their own, Cole’s bedroom has become the guest room, nicely appointed with new bed and bedding, and Ian’s room is being rehabilitated as my office.  Up to now, the bonus room over the garage has served the trifold purposes of TV watching, treadmilling, and billing.  My corner-of-the-room office is for more than sending emails requesting compensation for services rendered, but my tendency to wander the house as I work means stacks of books, rolls of chart paper, and my laptop can be tripped over just about everywhere.  Maybe, I thought early this week, if I have a room of my own for my business, I can corral the stuff of it for everyone’s safety and my sanity.  Additionally, the bonus room would be relieved of one function, which inspired me to reconfigure the room, including a plan to jettison the blue chair (repository of copious dog and boy DNA) and buy a new sofa.  Tom was overjoyed to hear this plan, since with our current seating situation, the bonus room only accommodates two sitters, one large lap dog, and someone running on the treadmill at any one time.  (In fact, I suspect that the boys’ tendency to watch the bloodiest movies in our collection when they visit is a way of discouraging my company, leaving the blue chair to them.) 

So the decision to relocate my office began the concatenation of moving this to move that.  Ian’s room first needed to be rid of Ian detritus: old paint gun canister , a selective service form, a garbage sack of old clothes (dirty? clean? can’t tell).  A couple boxes of Cole’s things also shared the room and had to be assigned a new location.  Before too long, though, I had cleared enough space to begin disassembling my office for transport.  But you know how that goes.  Before you cart even an armload of stuff down a hallway, you ask, “Do I need this?  I should get rid of this.”  Two bookshelves later, I had a four-foot stack of empty three-ring binders and enough paper to explain the clear cut above Enumclaw.

Having purged the obsolete, the redundant, and the dubious from Ian’s former bedroom and my office collection, I was compelled to consider other rooms in the house with the question: do I need this?  Just a couple weeks ago, Tom had savagely purged the garage, whittling away the accumulation like a man crazed with the vision of a long-deferred workbench.  He just wanted a place his tools could call their own.  Now I found myself heated with the same fever.  What in the bedroom was taking up space unnecessarily?  Do we really need all the books stacked on the hearth? (Yes.)   I looked about, took stock, audited our possessions, so to speak.  Well, Hum.  We don’t have much stuff in our house.  If fact, in eyeing the contents of the house, I realized we could really use another lamp in the bonus room, and a side table, maybe a full-length mirror in the bedroom would be nice.  Oh, and I’ve been wanting a Kitchenaid mixer for a long time now…

Whoa!  The vacuum created by the cleared space in the bonus room is sucking out my good sense.  While half the economists would cheer on our list of “to-gets,” encourage us to give the ol’ economic flywheel a couple good cranks, we know the buzz that comes with a new purchase would quickly wear off and be replaced by shame born of environmental identification and frugality.  As if written just to save us, Anna Quindlen’s article (http://www.newsweek.com/id/174265 ) in Newsweek, “Stuff Is Not Salvation,” echoed what Tom and I have long believed, tried to live, and were tempted away from in the giddy state of vacant space.  Quindlen writes:

“The drumbeat that accompanied Black Friday this year was that the numbers had to redeem us, that if enough money was spent by shoppers it would indicate that things were not so bad after all. But what the economy required was at odds with a necessary epiphany. Because things are dire, many people have become hesitant to spend money on trifles. And in the process they began to realize that it’s all trifles.”

Quindlen focuses on the everyday person’s burst bubble.  That as a nation of “consumers,” we have spent ourselves into financial perdition for not much more than a lot of shiny baubles.  Stuff isn’t inherently satisfying, which is why we continue to buy and buy again, replacing such durable equipment as cell phones every 16 months, according to Quindlen.  The temptation here for Tom and me is that we haven’t been buyers, so we have no credit card debt, and now that most Americans have stopped buying, the credit market now frozen, Tom and I could get some pretty good stuff at a pretty low price.  It may be the perfect time for the anti-buyer to buy! 

And then that bumper sticker I got in Fort Collins–for a buck–catches my attention:  “The More You Know, the Less You Need.”  So I’ll compromise with my convictions:  one sofa, please.

I’m Sick of Health Care

I want to begin by admitting that I’m grateful I live in an age where an infected foot doesn’t have to be sawed off to save the patient, or that everyone I know didn’t have to cross their fingers and light candles when I gave birth.  No, I know I am blessed to benefit from decades of science, such that basic health care is as simple as hygiene, ample and nutritious food, and the occasional tetnus shot.  Nonetheless, I am growing weary of the so-called advances in medicine that are able to penetrate my physiology and then tell me: something might be wrong…or not.  As many of you know, I have spent the last few weeks dodging a date with an x-ray machine, fearing I’d learn that a monster lurked within.  Shelley can attest to the wherefore of my anxiety.  She saw the look on my surgeon’s face when Dr. Claire asked–with a revealing tone of concern, I believe–whether I was coughing a lot lately or short of breath, as she moved the stethescope around on my back, evesdropping for information. 

“Is something wrong?” I asked?

“You have a wheeze,” she said.  “Are you sure you’re not finding it hard to breathe?  Or lightheaded?” 

“No,” I said.  “I’m a runner; I run…uphill!”  Suddenly, my already onerous visit, a pre-op for a pre-emptive breast surgery, which, by the way, will leave me looking years younger–about twelve, I think–was overshadowed by some new threat.

“Well, what does a wheeze mean?” I asked.  “Maybe it’s the molds?  This time of year is bad.”  According to Shelley, the surgeon over my shoulder looked dubious at my diagnosis.  Good Dr. Claire added nothing more to the conversation, leaving me to scour the recesses of the internet when I got home.  By eight o’clock, when I called my mother, I had narrowed the cause of the wheeze to pneumonia, TB, or cancer.  And cancer would be the most arguable because, clearly, the calcifications in my breast were cancerous and would have infiltrated my chest wall (magnificent though it is–thank you, nurse!) and attacked my lungs.  That, of course, was the report I gave my mother who said, and I paraphrase: those doctors are dumb.  They are scaring you unnecessarily.  Besides that, you’re fine.  No surprise; Mom was right.

Yesterday morning I got my chest xray, and when I received the nurse’s call about five P.M., I had nearly forgotten about it.  The nurse opened with a chirpy, “Looks normal.” 

“Normal?”  I said.  “What about the wheeze?”

“I don’t know,” she said, “there’s no pneumonia, no signs of cardo-pulminary disease, veins look good. Totally unremarkable, is what the radiologist said,” said the nurse.

“Well, good,” I said, genuinely relieved and seriously affronted.  “You know, I don’t know how to say this, but I don’t understand how the surgeon can get so worked up about my having a wheeze and then nothing shows on the xray.”

The nurse paused and said, “Oh, the surgeon?  Well, she’ll call you with her results.  We don’t see anything.”

Great.  Everything’s fine.  But the surgeon still needs to weigh in on the chest x-ray I had as a precaution to the breast surgery I’m having as a precaution to the remote possibility of cancer in the collection of calcs that can barely be seen through the twenty-first century technology that Jack built.  And the prevailing uncertainty of this whole thing makes me want to light a candle.

Arctic Blast 2008!

Here in the lowlands of the Puget Sound area, we rarely get snow and cold, cold anymore.  Or at least when we get such weather, it is evanescent, the snow melting nearly as fast as it falls.  Last night, however, autumn handed off to winter as the Arctic blew in a cold front that, according to local news stations, would drop our temperatures as low as they’ve been in nearly twenty years and keep them there for about a week.  So we took heed of the frequent–and a bit histrionic–warnings from area weather forecasters to prepare for the onslaught by, among other things, wrapping pipes and bringing pets indoors.  At about eleven last night, Tom herded the pups out front to the yard for a romp and a pee before he put them to bed in the garage.  By that time we had already accummulated a skiff of frosty snow and the air was so cold it bit your bones. 

In our bedroom, from beneath my down-filled comforter, I could hear Tom below in the yard hollering at the dogs, rounding them up, no doubt, so he could join me in our warm bed.  A minute later, another sound:  thunk, thunk, thunk, like someone stomping the length of the front porch.  What the?  I quickly climbed out of bed, threw on a sweatshirt, and reached the front door at about the same time as Tom rang the bell.  He seemed exasperated.  “Can you get my flashlight from under my side of the bed, please?  Ruby’s cornered a cat under the porch, and she’s not responding to me.”  I flapped about the house searching for the flashlight that wasn’t under the bed, and by the time I got back to the porch, Tom was pouring water through the slats of the porch floor, trying to interfere in the standoff below.  A douse of cold water on a freezing night ought to get one of them to budge, Tom thought.  But no.  Not a flinch.  Tom handed me the watering can while he went to riffle through his truck for that AWOL flashlight.  Fortunately–or maybe not–he found it and returned to the porch resigned that he needed to climb under the porch and break up the party.  I suggested an alternative, “You don’t want to go under there!  Let’s just go to bed.”  I knew that once Ruby was engaged in a game of chicken, she would be unmoveable unless Tom could get within grabbing distance of her.  She’s a good dog, and mostly obedient, but when her instincts have been activated, she hears nothing but the breathing of the creature she’s pointing.  But Tom was as determined as Ruby; he was going in.

I could hear Tom scrape his way down the length of the porch and see slivers of illumination from the flashlight.  He made it as far as the bend in the porch, when I heard, “Ruby!  Come!”

“Can you see her?” I asked.

“Yeah, she has a cat backed into the furthest corner by the wall of the house.  Can you run some water down there?”

Begrudgingly, I must admit, I refilled the watering can, moved all my gardening tools, and reached behind the potting bench to drench my dry and tidy work area in the freezing night.  A small reward, I heard the cat yowl.  Tom said, “It’s moved toward the edge of the porch; can you run more water?”  In a matter of moments, I had watered the whole end of the porch, yet the cat was stalwart.  Tom had continued to yell at Ruby who ignored him completely.  The cat and Ruby had something to settle, and Tom and I were just an annoyance.

Tom backed his way out from under the porch, dirty, damp, and disgusted.  “Let’s just go to bed,” he agreed.  In a few minutes, we were back inside.  Tom showered and went back downstairs to make tea.  It was nearly midnight.  I was worried about Ruby in the cold and snow but had to believe she’d find her way to the kennel and her straw-laden cave when she finished her business with the cat.  More tired than concerned, I fell asleep.

When Tom came up about a half-hour later, I woke, and he told me Ruby was now in the garage.  As he was fixing his tea, he spotted her zipping down the driveway.  Having dispatched the cat, no doubt, she was ready for bed.  I’m guessing her tail was vibrating as fast as hummingbird wings to say how nice it was that we’d stayed up to tuck her in.

It’s Off-Putting

This morning, having successfully left my bed at five A.M. to get ready for a day of work in Seattle, I was dismayed to discover myself sunk into the brown leather chair by the fire just after seven, when I should have been out the door.  Where some people (Sister Sherry) show weakness with a snooze alarm, I get up quickly but then struggle to get out of the house when I know I’m going to spend the next hour driving at about five miles an hour on the Valley Freeway in the dark, in the rain.  So while putting off heading to work this morning, I read an article on Newsweek.com about research on procrastination.  It appears that some recent research suggests that people tend to put off tasks or goals that are expressed as abstractions much longer than they put off tasks or goals that are more concrete.  So, in other words, we put off “exercising,” but we’re more likely to put on our running shoes and run a mile.  The gist of the article is if we want to get something done, we should think about it as concretely as possible.

So while I still had a few minutes before I most definitely had to leave for work, I made a mental list of all the things I’d put off recently: cleaning my bathroom, footing a piece of pottery, washing last night’s dinner dishes, getting my chest x-ray, and buying anyone a Christmas present.  Hmmm.  Well the article did say that people tend to put off concrete tasks for shorter periods of time but implied we still put things off.  So maybe I’m not as bad as I could be.  By having a list of very specific to-do’s, there’s a much better chance I’ll get those things done, according to the article, than if I just intended to be a better house keeper or become a good potter. 

Ironically, by leaving the house this morning a bit late, the traffic volume had lessened, and I actually got to Seattle University early–a full half hour before the rest of my colleagues.  So the director of our project asked me if I wouldn’t mind going down the hill to Starbucks to pick up coffee.  Clearly the reward for being the early bird is getting worms for all the late ones.  Oh well, it’s now twelve hours later and I’m back in the brown leather chair thinking about doing last night’s dishes.  At least I know from my own research that I’ll get them done when I need a fork.

Ode to Apple Cakes and Those Who Bake Them

Apparently several of you, according to your postings, expect my writing in this blog to be–shall we say–a moving experience.  While I’m flattered, I am hoping that what I do here provokes some shifts in your outlook as well.  As for those of you who are wary of pumpkin enchilada sauce, well, there’s no accounting for taste.  But I ask you, what have I ever cooked for you that wasn’t delicious?  (Anything from before 1980 doesn’t count, and the pheasant nachoes from 1982 weren’t my fault).  Nonetheless, reading about my culinary experiments does not oblige you to repeat them. 

I do need to admire Tom, though, for his recent spoon-and-mixing bowl achievement.  After volunteering to bring dessert for two different holiday lunches scheduled for the same day, Tom diced, beat and baked his way to triumph last night.  Minutes before eight o’clock, he pulled two perfectly done carmelly apple cakes from the oven, which infused the house with the scent of cloves.  They really were pretty, and of course, off limits.  You can’t very well sample out of a cake that’s going to make a public appearance.  But of course these are our standards.  Most office people are thrilled with three-day old Safeway donuts.  Tom didn’t stoop, though, and buy from the store or ask me to bake something.  He gave his very best to his work mates this holiday.

Tom just called from work.  He said he’d never again make two cakes for two parties in one day.  His actual work kept him from getting to at least one party on time, so his late-arriving dessert is coming home with him, mostly intact.  Tom said he had forgotten how everyone brings so much to holiday luncheons that food actually gets crowded out.  I imagine Tom’s beauties were elbow-to-crust with marshmallow-topped this and chocolate drizzled that.  An honest apple cake, no matter how golden, may have a tough time up against more ostentatious seasonal fare.  Well, whatever lack of office acknowledgement the apple cakes may have endured, I’m chilling the bowl and beaters as I write.  I am thrilled to enjoy their second act, with a dollop of whipped cream.  Nothing more satisfying than a man who knows what to do in the kitchen ( :   

Aunt Mabel’s Fresh Apple Cake

 

1 cup flour (I often use half whole wheat)

1 tsp. soda

1 tsp. cinnamon

¼ tsp. nutmeg (I double this, and I add ½ tsp. cloves and ginger)

¼ tsp. salt

¼ cup butter

1 cup sugar (I use half white, half brown)

1 egg

¼ cup water (I use apple juice when I have it)

½ cup raisins, ½ cup broken walnuts

2 cups 1” dice apples (or more!)

 

Mix dry ingredients and set aside.  Cream butter, sugar, egg.  Mix dry with creamed mixture and add liquid until it’s of uniform consistency.  Mix in apples, raisins and nuts.  Pour into a buttered 8×8” pan, and bake at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes.  Serve warm with whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.