My
family has left me on my own for supper on this drizzly Sunday afternoon. I’m
not particularly blue about it, because I have a dinner plan—I will open a can
of that good salmon I get straight from Oregon, put a lot of lemon and a bit of
sour cream on it, and run it under the broiler. But I realize how quickly I
would fall into bad habits if I totally lived alone.
Jordan
has a cardinal rule: you don’t eat dinner in the clothes you slept in. But I am
still in those clothes—a bright tie-dye T-shirt that the Tomball grandchildren made
for me years ago and a pair of pants that could pas for slacks if your
standards aren’t too high. But on the positive side, I have cleaned up, my hair
is washed, and my bed is made. I’ll probably eat supper a lot earlier than we
would eat if we were having family dinner.
I’ve
just talked to Megan in Austin and of course we hit on the fact that all 17
Alters were supposed to be at her house for Thanksgiving. It’s not going to
work out that way. They are recovered from covid and have disinfected their
house thoroughly, including using those special lights hospital use. The
problem, for me, is the trip down there. As soon as you tell me we can’t stop,
I will have to make a bathroom stop—as Megan pointed out, a woman with a walker
doesn’t have the bathroom options a man does. My sons do not feel that they
have quarantined well enough to be with the family, so we will be four separate
family units. It is more than a little sad to me.
It
really is a gray day and chilly with drizzly rain predicted. I’m grateful that
Jordan has decorated the cottage for Christmas, and I have two bright spots of
light—a glass block with Christmas lights inside it that I’ve had for years and
Jamie’s table-top artificial fireplace that glows with realistic flames. Or,
depending on how you look at it, depicts the fiery eruption of a volcano.
Scientists have now proven that putting up lights will make you happier, and
these days I think we should give scientists all the credit we can. So I’m glad
for that bit of scientific knowledge..
Beside
that scientific boost, I’ve had a longtime habit justified in print. For years,
when entertaining—a formal dinner or the huge tree trimming parties I used to
give—I put the serving dishes out days in advance and put a little note in each
to remind me what I intended to put in that dish. After she married and began
to entertain on her own, Jordan did the same. Christian was astounded and
finally told her, “You and your mom have a screw loose.” (Megan would be the
first to let you know that gene for organization skipped her.) Today in his
column, Sam Sifton mentioned putting the dishes out early and putting a sticky
note in each. Need I say more?
A couple
of nods to nostalgia: when I was a kid, my mom used to mix cornmeal with milk
or water (I don’t remember which), pour it into a loaf pan and let it harden.
Then she’d slice it, fry the slices, and serve them to us for breakfast with
lots of maple syrup. We called it fried mush. These days, we have a fancier
name for it—polenta—but you can put lipstick on a pig and it’s still a pig. I
made tamale pie with polenta for the family last week, and it reminded me how
much I liked fried mush. So when we ordered from Central Market, I got more polenta,
and this morning I fried a couple of slices in butter and slathered them with real
maple syrup. So good. I was a kid again.
My
other nostalgia trip even pre-dates me. But Sam Sifton mentioned in his column
that this is the 125th birthday of Hoagy Carmichael and offered a
link to Carmichael doing his 1930 classic, “Georgia On My Mind.” And there was
Lauren Bacall in the still photo accompanying the music, looking intently at
Carmichael who looked up sideways at her. Classic 1930s jazz. I loved it.
And
speaking of anniversaries, I thought this anniversary of the assassination of
JFK went by with little public notice. Too bad, when we are embroiled in one of
the worst political threats our democracy has ever seen. It would be soothing
to go, even briefly, back to the days of Camelot.
I kind
of got carried away, and I apologize for this long blog. Stay safe and well—and
cozy tonight.
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