Spa day

Skinny, clean Sophie.

No, not for me! I’m not a spa day kind of a person, though my daughters are. Today was a spa day for Sophie, and I am so relieved. I predicted she would lose five pounds when trimmed and groomed, and while we haven’t weighed her, she looks so much thinner. My Colin had said that she was getting broad across the beam, and I did worry about her gaining weight. I also worried about her being dirty—she was out in all kinds of weather, seeming to love the cold, running and chasing squirrels through dirt and flower beds and whatever. And I admit there was a certain eau d’doggie about her.

I had let her go too long by the time I called for a grooming appointment and then, when it was finally scheduled, an ice storm cancelled it. So today, at long last Nathan, the wonderful young man who grooms her, came to the house. When he brought her back, looking like a new dog, he admitted there was a lot of dirt in her coat and said he thought she felt a lot better with all that extra fur and dirt gone. So tonight I am loving having a clean, fairly thin—okay reasonably proportioned—dog.

Highlight of my day was not so much fun but then again not serious, just a slight inconvenience. Jordan had to drive me to the cardiologist’s office at 8:45 this morning—far too early for me—to be fitted with a Holter monitor for 24 hours. No big deal. The doctor thinks a slight adjustment of medication is needed but wanted to check first, and I’m grateful for the precaution. Though tonight I am “wired,” literally. I have stuck the monitor itself in my jeans pocket—guess who will be sleeping in her clothes!

Other than that, a typical workday. I am moving ahead rapidly on the Irene mystery, even if tonight it was after eight o’clock before I turned to it. The day seemed to go by with emails and news briefs—I cannot tear myself away from the horror in Ukraine nor from the worldwide condemnation of Russia. Dinner was all fixed—Jordan made our favorite casserole Saturday for a neighbor who had surgery, so we feasted tonight on the extra she made for us.

One of those nights when I literally don’t have much to say. Maybe that’s a blessing. But I did want to share the picture of clean Sophie and to wish everyone well. We are living in unforgettable times. I read a commentator who said today our world will never go back to being what it was before the Ukraine invasion. So think about what we’ve lived through in the last two or three years: a pandemic which killed hundreds of thousands of our neighbors, an unprecedented snow and ice winter (and almost a second one this year), an attempted coup against our government, a contested election which has never happened in our history, and now a violent, greedy land-grab invasion. Granted, it’s in a distant land, but the world is small these days. Isolationism is impossible (sorry, Mr. trump) and what happens anywhere in the world impacts all of us. My take? This invasion of Ukraine will separate the true patriots for the selfish, sunny-day people who yell a lot about freedom and democracy but understand neither and do nothing to protect them.

God Bless America!

Misadventure in the kitchen

 

Picture from Honest Cooking
note the charred lemon

My friend Phil Green loves anchovies. I somehow got the impression he would not eat them, but Subie said, “Oh, no, he loves them.” So I suggested supper Sunday night—I’d make an anchovy entrée, if Subie would bring a salad. I had in mind a New York Times recipe I’d saved for smashed potatoes with anchovy and tuna.

But the more I looked at that recipe, the less sure I was. What if Phil doesn’t eat tuna? Several men in my family refuse to have anything to do with even the really good stuff I buy from the cannery in Oregon (Colin on the other hand loves it, so it’s a frequent birthday gift for him). I wasn’t sure about potatoes, and then I looked at the fingerlings that Central Market sent with my order. They are, at the least, thumb potatoes. When I wanted delicate Yukon Gold fingerlings, I got fat, odd-shaped red potatoes. I lay awake in the night worrying about this dinner until it dawned on me that I’d cook an anchovy pasta. Problem solved. I slept.

This morning I searched for anchovy pasta recipes—you have no idea how many there are online, many of them identical and many calling for capers. I did that once several years ago, and the capers overshadowed the anchovies. So I settled on a recipe that suggested artichoke hearts, chopped, as a substitute for the capers, and all of it in a brown butter sauce. And charred lemon cheeks—I who dislike the current fad for charring everything in sight, charred some lemons by putting them briefly, cut side down in a hot skillet. If you don’t know what a lemon cheek is, it’s the half lemon you get when you slice the fruit vertically instead of horizontally. I couldn’t see that charring affected the taste of the lemons or the sauce, but it sure made the skillet hard to clean. I laid out ingredients and dishes and went off to take a nap.

A deep but not comforting sleep, in which I dreamt my mom and I were cooking, and she kept cleaning up where I was cooking, causing me to spill everything. I swear I went through two pounds of butter in that dream! And somehow carrots got into the sauce but when I tried to cook them, they shriveled into tiny, charred lumps (that must have been Christian’s influence because he won’t eat cooked carrots). I decided reality was better than my dream and woke up.

Dinner turned out better than I could have, should have hoped. Instead of cooking right up to the last moment, I chopped the parsley and artichokes, made the brown butter sauce, laid out the pasta plates. After the Greens had settled in with some wine and brie on crackers, I turned up the pasta water that I’d had simmering and cooked the pasta. Subie helped me with draining the pasta—some things are awkward to do from a wheelchair—and I stirred in chopped parsley, topped each pasta bowl with grated pecorino—and forgot to take a picture. But it was good, and my guests raved. For dessert? Those mini chocolate ice cream cones Jordan gets at Trader Joe’s.

It was a pleasant evening visiting with old friends. We talked about politics, but we also talked about old times and people we know—and the talk took me away momentarily from the world crisis. For me, the day started with uncertainty—the news that Putin had put his nuclear detection force on alert was alarming to say the least. That he would even put the “nuclear” word into play. And tonight news followed that Belarus has declared it is no longer a nuclear-free territory. I’m uncertain about that. Does it mean they’ve had nuclear capabilities all along and have been hiding them?

Balancing that was a bit of news that didn’t get much play—Ukraine officials have agreed to meet with Russian representatives on the border between Ukraine and Belarus. At this critical point, any meeting seems to me to hold out hope. Putin is not finding the invasion as easy as he thought, but still Ukraine is being devastated. Pray that they can come to some mutual ground over the negotiation table. Disconcerting rumors about Putin’s mental status are another scary factor—he wants to rebuild the Soviet Union and none of Europe can let him do that. Terrible times.

There’s a distance—I don’t know how to describe it. Maybe a disconnect between the destruction and suffering and amazing heroism in Ukraine and my life as I sit here in my cottage, visiting with good friends, eating a good supper. This morning in church Dr. Peterman talked about what Celtic cultures call the “thin places,” those places where heaven and earth seem to meet for rare moments. This is not a thin place. It’s like those supposed-fingerling potatoes—at thick place like a clumsy thumb. For me, it’s prayer time. For you there may be another answer. For all of us, I urge you to support President Biden and his heroic efforts to curb Russia. And cheer and pray for President Zelensky, the hero who is leading Ukraine and who does not appear to flinch. Mask mandates, truck convoys, “freeduhms,”—pfft!

World horror overwhelms the trivia of cold weather and hobby cooking

 

The national flower of Ukraine

Cold, wet days have become the norm this winter, and today was yet another one. I so wanted to crawl into my bed and hide there, and I did take a longer nap than usual, just because I was so warm and cozy. I just might slip back into bed earlier than usual tonight. The low is predicted to be 29, and tomorrow is not going to be a lot better.

Tomorrow is the Cowtown Marathon, and sometimes I think it is as predictable a weather forecaster as the stock show. All those years ago—1978—I remember sitting in our bedroom and hearing my then-husband swear forcibly, followed by, “Sleet. I did not want to hear sleet.” He was one of the lead organizers of the new venture. Next morning I piled four little kids into the car and headed for the Stockyards, over icy roads, to be part of the support crowd. I look back on that and wonder where my brain was. Oh to be young and fearless again.

As it is I did not poke my head out of the cottage today. Nor did I cook as I usually do on weekends. Still, it is sort of a foodie weekend. Last night I made a skillet of sauteed mushrooms and sweet onions. I honestly think I like the onions as well as the mushrooms—a new revelation for me. I sauteed them in olive oil and butter, added garlic and the white wine. After they were off the heat, I added lemon juice and zest. Jordan and I are the only ones who like mushrooms, but we enjoyed them.

My mushroom skillet

Not so good were the salmon balls I impulsively bought from Central Market. They had Parmesan, which I thought sounded good but now think made them dry. And they had too much of some herb—oregano, maybe. I kicked myself, thinking I could have made my regular salmon patties and we’d have been a lot happier.

Doris' casserole
with one serving out for guess who?

Today Jordan made family favorite Doris’ casserole (think American lasagna or something similar) to take to a neighbor who has just had surgery. I got some for my dinner, and it was delicious. Also a pretty casserole. The Burtons meanwhile have gone to an upscale sushi restaurant for a fundraiser. My sushi palate is not wide—I love salmon sashimi and I’ve had some lobster rolls I exclaimed over, but I’m not adventuresome—and they are downright stodgy. Far as I now, they stick to California roll because neither wants raw fish. The restaurant where they are going is so much for an “in the know” crowd that I had no idea how to order the one time I went. I will be interested in their report.

After a week of distractions ranging from doctor’s appointments to Zoom meetings and a Podcast interview, I am glad to say that I wrote 1300 words on Irene’s latest adventure today. But I find it hard not to watch the TV with one eye or check the news feed constantly. I am waiting of course for what will probably not happen—Putin returning to the negotiation table. The invasion he apparently expected to be a walk in the park has not turned out that way.

So many stories coming out of Ukraine to inspire us: the Russian battalion that surrendered because they thought they were on an information-gathering mission and had no idea they were expected to kill people; the old woman who gave Russian soldiers sunflower seeds (the national flower of Ukraine) to put in their pockets so that when they die on Ukrainian soil flowers will bloom; the families with young children who are making Molotov cocktails; the street signs that have all been changed in order to confuse Russians—now, in Russian, they read “Go f--- yourself.”

I’ll leave you tonight with one thought that came to me today as I contemplated the international condemnation of Putin and support for Ukraine: what would have happened if trump were still president. Nothing would have played out the same. President Biden has been the point man in organizing international sanctions and resistance, and he has done it with wisdom and grace. Just my opinion, but trump having alienated most of our allies, wouldn’t have known how to begin to get them to pull together and given his loyalty to Russia, probably wouldn’t have tried. Resistance would have been scattershot. As it is, with Biden at the helm and joined by other NATO allies, the reaction has been unified and forceful.

My mom always told me the gods work in mysterious ways their wonders to accomplish. Perhaps this is another instance. Pray for the people of Ukraine tonight, but also pray for the people of Russia who are innocent pawns in this mess and who are risking life and freedom to protest. Hardly a night to wish everyone, “Sweet dreams.”

 

Weather, podcasts, voting, and oh my goodness!

 

Doesn't look quite this bad this time--

but just wait

My first instinct is to say this was an average day, with not much going on in my little world. But in retrospect that is so wrong. The weather is the lead story, as far as I’m concerned. Have you ever been so cold? I shiver inside my well-heated cottage and worry about the people of Ukraine. It’s a demoralizing gray outside, and though it’s been cold all day and there’s a bit of ice, I understand it is to get worse tonight. It’s not only when they cancel school a day ahead, but when they cancel garbage pickup, you know you’re in trouble.

In this weather with icy roads, old friends from San Angelo arrived in the Metroplex, here for a meeting. Preston and Harriet Lewis came by for a visit this afternoon, and I was almost surprised to see them. I had thought they would change their minds about traveling, but they are brave. Preston said he was only worried about other drivers—a good caution in North Texas. I probably haven’t seen this couple for twenty-five years, but we were once all active in Western Writers of America (Preston and I are both past presidents). We had a high old time talking about people we knew back when, although sadly several are no longer with us. Still, we laughed a lot, and it was a good visit. Our friendship is also a great example of renewing old ties through Facebook, because that’s what we did. Preston has written some terrific westerns, including comic ones. And he told me today he is the world’s expert on cats on the western frontier. I told him everyone needs a niche.

The other highlight of my day was that a gentleman named Dean Jones interviewed me for his podcast, “The Well-Seasoned Librarian.” As a librarian, he is of course interested in books, but he is particularly interested in the food angle, so we had lots to talk about. I got all gussied up—clean hair, makeup, a good sweater—because the link was to Zoom, and I thought it would have video as well as audio. Not so. I could see him, but I couldn’t tell if he could see me or not. He asked great questions, and I had a chance to talk about everything from the transition from Chicago to Texas to retirement and my conviction that one retires from a job but never from writing. Dean promises a link when it’s up, and I will share that, should anyone be interested.

Moving on to voter suppression. It took me three, determined tries to get a mail-in ballot. Today I was told that my ballot was incomplete, and for it to count I must go in person to the voter registration office. When I explained that I am mobility challenged and don’t drive, they best they could offer was curbside service. (I worked hard to let the nice lady on the other end of the phone know that I was angry but not at her, and I hoped she had a pleasant day.) The hitch is a new requirement that you put either your DL number or the last four digits of your social security number on the outside of the envelope. The voice on the telephone assured me that when you seal the flap the information is hidden from public view. The problem is that the requirement is apparently in tiny print amidst all the print on those envelopes, and those of us who have filed by mail for years simply didn’t look at it. There has been no public campaign to alert voters. Wouldn’t you think if government—in this case Texas state government—wanted to encourage the vote they would mount a campaign about all the changes in ballot requirements? Instead they’ve snuck them in, in small type, and alerted no one. I only heard about it, after I mailed the ballot, on Facebook. Can you spell voter suppression? I have again talked to the independent newspaper that tells me they are still working on an article. And just for the record, I will register a complaint with the Texas secretary of state.

In other state news, Governor Abbott is practicing medicine again without a license. Wonder where he got his medical education? First he exercised his vast medical expertise (and apparent moral superiority) with a series of orders to physicians caring for women that absolute ignored the physical and mental consequences of exceptional pregnancies. Now he has ordered physicians to report to the department of child protective services (or whatever its proper name is) any case where parents are providing transgender healthcare to their children. It is, he says from on high, child abuse. His edict is awfully close to invasion of privacy. And he is more than ever a mean little man who seems to think he is a dictator.

A bright note on this wintry night: Christian made wonderful tortilla soup, and Jordan made chocolate chip cookies. When the going gets tough, you can count on Jordan for chocolate chip cookies. I’m so blessed.

Thoughts on mortality

 

A notice on Facebook this evening informed me that an acquaintance died suddenly, apparently yesterday, of a heart attack. She was a woman I didn’t know well enough to call a friend, but we had crossed paths enough that I knew she was vibrant and lovely, much loved by many people including close friends of mine. What do you say when you write the surviving husband in the instance of such sudden, unexpected death? I am always tempted to steal words from Katie Sherrod and say, “May she rest in peace, and rise in glory.”

Death is on my mind more than a little bit these days. I think it’s a combination of age—at 83, I have outlived many friends and contemporaries—and covid, which has made us all more away of our mortality. Some people will say they want to die in their sleep—a peaceful way to go, suddenly, without the agonizing knowledge that death is approaching. When a dear friend died, having moved out of my life several years earlier, her husband wrote that she was afraid of two things: falling out of bed and dying. So the night she died he sat by her bed holding her hand—he could keep her from falling but not from dying. I guess I too fear the fear of dying.

But I have also thought recently that if I died in my sleep, there would be so much left undone. My oldest son is my executor, and he and I work hard together to keep him up to speed on my career, my finances, my life. But what about that novel I have half finished? And the project I still want to write about Helen Corbitt, doyenne of food service at Neiman Marcus for the crucial years in the 1950s and 1960s. My blogs, and the letters of a Mntana author I want to edit. I have a lot of work yet to do.

I like to think I am a devout Christian, accepting the teachings of Jesus. Indeed, much of my political activism comes because I cannot separate Christianity’s preaching of love each other from politics as I see it today. Remember those bracelets people wore that said WWJD—what would Jesus do? In my book, most conservatives have entirely missed the point, and none so much as most born-again, evangelical Christians. Franklin Graham kind of Christians.

On the other hand, I’m not at all willing to commit myself on belief in the afterlife. I simply don’t know. I know a woman my age who truly believes she will ascend to streets of gold, and everything will be wonderful. I can’t quite buy that vision for myself, but what I do believe is that the soul lives on after it leaves the body. A big question for me: do we reunite with those we’ve loved? Could be ticklish sometimes—like ex-spouses, etc.—but there are many I long to see again. Can we as spirits embrace? I have no idea.

My thoughts on the afterlife are meant as a way of saying that I do not fear death. But I simply do not want to go. At least not now, not yet. I am too happy, enjoying this life too much. I don’t want to leave my children and my dog and my friends and those half-written manuscripts. I know I am among the fortunate, but life as I know it is too good. Which somehow makes me think though that even people in desperate situations cling to life—and that brings Ukraine to mind and the desperate people whose fate hangs in the hands of the superpowers. But that is another subject for another day.

A friend told me that once his father died, his mother soon tired of life. She felt she needed to follow her husband and be sure that he was all right. And maybe that’s the ideal state—to be ready to leave this life. Not with anger or sadness, just ready to move on. And knowing it.

Sudden death doesn’t offer you that opportunity. So I think tonight of that old nursery prayer which must have scared children to death:

Now I lay myself down to sleep

I pray the Lord my soul to keep

And if I should die before I wake

I pray the Lord my soul to take.

 

Where does the Rainbow Bridge lead?

 

You've seen enough of Sophie.
This is son Colin's dog, Gracie, who has now crossed the Rainbow Bridge.
A real sweetie, she used to lie on my feet while I worked. 
Look at those expressive eyes. 

Years ago, when I first moved to Fort Worth, I worked for Tandy Leathercrafts writing catalog copy. It was not an inspiring job for many reasons—catalog copy is really boring, we worked in an old warehouse on Foch Street, and the other women in the office, including the supervisor, were wives of students at Southwestern Theological Seminary (read old-school Baptist).

One day the supervisor was telling us about her dog. Her daughter, maybe ten or eleven, took the dog’s face in her hands and said, “Now, [Fido?], you have to stop eating so much. You’ll get so fat you’ll die, and you can’t go to Heaven.”

Instinctively I blurted out, “What an awful thing for a child to say to a dog.”

The mother replied, “It’s true. Dogs don’t have a soul, so they can’t accept Jesus Christ as their Savior, and therefore they can’t go to Heaven.”

I would like to think that I knew I was outnumbered and kept quiet, but I think I probably said something like, “They can go to my heaven.”

I’m not ready for a theological debate about where any of us go—dogs, cats, people, and so on. But I will stand firm that dogs have souls. They are living, breathing creatures who love, fear, feel pain and anger and loneliness. They like fun, and they know joy. They are often bewildered by the humans they generally adore, and they are crushed when those humans don’t treat them well.

Walk through an animal shelter—you’ll see dogs hiding in corners out of misery, dogs actually crying, dogs desperate for affection, dogs who seem to have simply withdrawn and given up on life.

Most of us love our dogs, and most of us treat them well. I have what some tell me is the most spoiled dog they’ve seen—could be. She thinks she ranks right up there with my two-legged kids and grandkids. Not all dogs are that fortunate, and I am struck more and more by man’s cruelty to a lot of animals, though here I am speaking specifically of dogs.

Worst case scenario, of course, is the dogfight ring, where innocent dogs are used as bait to rouse a fighting dog’s bloodthirst to the point of killing. Rescued bait dogs have cuts and scratches and rips all over their bodies. One of my great fears is having my dog stolen by a dogfight ring, though I am told there isn’t much organized dogfighting in my county. Next on my list of abuses is abandonment—people who move and leave their dogs behind or just drop them off at a shelter, saying, “I don’t have time” or “I just don’t want him (or her).” To me, that’s like dropping a child off and zeroing them out of your life. Some horrific people get a new puppy and leave their old dog at a shelter—the old dog who has known no other home but theirs for as long as fifteen years. I have read of dogs desperately chasing the car form which they’ve just been thrown, because it contains the only “family” they know. Finally, there are the perverted people who torture animals—burn, beat with baseball bats, starve, drown, all the horrors you don’t want to imagine. I even heard of a man who tried to hang a dog.

The underlying attitude seems to be, “It’s just a dog.” And that’s where I think that important distinction comes in. It’s not about whether or not the dog accepts Jesus, it’s about the truth that any dog has a soul.

So dog rescue has become one of the causes I’m passionate about. I cannot take in another dog—though I am tempted daily—but I have a voice, mostly a written voice. Almost every time someone posts about finding a lost dog or wanting to re-home a dog, I launch into my spiel about how to safely re-home an animal.

Never give away a free dog. Plain and simple—not a puppy not a grown dog, not the neighbor’s dog who barks all the time. Always go through a registered rescue agency or your local animal control agency. Most will ask you to foster, if at all possible, but they will work with you if you cannot. They will vet anyone who applies for the dog, and they know how to watch signs, check backgrounds, etc.

If you must deal with a lost dog yourself, watch or signs from the person claiming the dog. Is the dog overjoyed to see them? Hesitancy is a red flag. Do they have photographic proof of their relationship to the dog? Can they point to an unusual identifying physical characteristic? What’s your gut feeling about the person. Would you trust them with your child? If not, be wary of trusting them with a dog.

It's not just a dog! It’s a living, breathing creature with a soul.

 

Adventures with grocery shopping

 

Sheet pan salmon
Ready to cook

An aside: the sky tonight was the most amazing and beautiful deep peach color. From my cottage, I get to see a little band of sky above the neighbor’s guest house, but with bare trees outlined against that pink, it was striking. When I tried for a picture, the pink was completely gone. And within minutes, it was all dark.

Grocery shopping in our household is a big deal, probably because I’m a foodie and I do a lot of the cooking. (Aside: when Christian cooks, we get terrific meals, but it’s a rare night he’s home early enough to fix dinner.) Ever since what I think of in my mind as “big quarantine,” we’ve been shopping with Curbside Pickup at Central Market. It’s convenient, easy, quick, and I am almost always pleased with the quality of the groceries. Big glitch yesterday. I compiled a list—no easy chore with Jordan and me coordinating—and tried to schedule it for today, Sunday. The whole day was blanked out—no slots available. I’ve never seen that happen.

Ever resourceful, Jordan said, “Use Shipt.” Megan uses Shipt routinely in Austin and raves about it. So I registered. Bingo! They offered me a $30 discount on a year’s membership to Central Market (who knew there were such things?) which means free delivery on orders over $35. Who ever orders anything less than that? I jumped at the offer: three credit cards later, I had been rejected three times. I’d love to know why my credit cards did not qualify and may call to inquire.

So we refigured, recalculated, decided to cook tomorrow night’s dinner today and place a Central Market order to be picked up Monday. I laboriously checked lists and clicked to place the order, only to find out that they had slots open this afternoon. So back to plan A: we are having sheet pan salmon with spinach, artichokes, and cherry tomatoes. And lemon butter sauce. It’s in the oven now, and I can hardly wait.

Which somehow brings me to the subject of mayonnaise. I have read that it is the most polarizing condiment in this country—people love it or hate it. Count me among those who love it and use it generously. Once, many years ago, I served BLTs for lunch to several men who had come to help me ex (he who had five thumbs) erect a shed. When I asked what they wanted to drink, one said, “I’m okay. I’ll just drink the mayonnaise on this sandwich.”

I’ve read several times about using mayonnaise instead of milk, cream, or  whatever in scrambled eggs. So this morning I tried it—one Tbsp. mayo for two eggs. Whisking the mayo into the eggs was not nearly as easy as it sounds, and I finally ended with tiny lumps—sort of like when flour and water don’t mix into your gravy as they should. The eggs were good, light and fluffy as advertised, but every once in a while, I got a disconcerting taste of mayonnaise. Between that and the difficult whisking, I don’t think I’ll try that again.

But I’ll keep an eye out for more innovative ideas with scrambled eggs because, like mayo, they are among my favorites.

Hope the coming week is good for everyone and brings peace in Europe—a huge hope and a prayer.

Sheet pan salmon
Ready to eat

Me, ten years ago

 You know that old saying, “Time flies when you’re having fun.” And it’s true—the last ten years, my years of retirement, have flown by. And yet it’s been a long time encompassing many changes. All that is on my mind this evening because three things popped up on my computer—those automatic memory things that the computer world offers (or forces on) us.

First was a reminder that ten years ago today I posted about the publication of my second mystery, No Neighborhood for Old Women, featuring Kelly O’Connell, the intrepid real estate broker/renovator who led me down the mystery trail for eight books. When I submitted my first manuscript and notes on the second to a major NY publishing house, the editor, an old friend, wanted me to scrap the first and replace it with the second which was about a serial killer—no fears, it was still cozy, just with too many bodies. I didn’t want to do that, and I declined. I liked the way the first book, Skeleton in a Dead Space, set up the backstory for the series. Sometimes I wonder how different my career would have been. I might be rich and famous, or at least an inch closer, with the backing of a big house and more people would have read Kelly’s stories, but I’d had have to deal with sales quotas and contracts and deadlines. I think in the long run, I made the right choice.

The novel is still available in print and digital form. And, yes, for those who think the title is familiar, it is a play on Cormac McCarthy’s much more successful—and much grittier—No Country for Old Men. Since that novel, I have published, either through a small press or independently, fourteen more mysteries, two non-fiction titles, and a cookbook, which I’m now thinking of updating. Retirement has been good for me.

The second thing that came up was a picture of me, taken ten years ago by neighbor and photographer par excellence Polly Hooper. It was one of several shots she took that I used on book jackets, blogs, etc. for years because I thought it flattered me. Do you look at other people and think something like, “My, she’s aged. I am so glad I haven’t”? I do that, or, snarkily, I look at women my age and think, “I’m sure glad I don’t look that old!” Truth is, as the photo shows, I’ve aged a lot.

But it’s been a tumultuous ten years. Ten years ago I lived in a 2,000 sq. ft. house—today I am in 600 sq. ft. No matter that I love my cottage, it’s still an adjustment. I did say to someone today, however, that it seems like I’ve lived in the cottage forever, and I’m so content in it that some of my friends worry about blasting me out now that we don’t have to quarantine as strictly. Jordan, Christian, and Jacob lived clear across town in Hulen Bend, but I saw Jacob almost every day and kept him a lot. Pictures of that cute kid pop up a lot too, and they really make me nostalgic.

In these ten years I’ve broken an ankle so badly it was beyond surgical repair, had major hip surgery which landed me on a walker, been diagnosed with atrial fibrillation and acute kidney failure, and had scary eye surgery. Ask me today, and I’ll tell you I’m in good health. It’s all relative, but I sure hope the next ten years bring a more peaceful health scene.

Baby Sophie

Finally, a picture of Sophie popped up. She was a new pup, probably about nine months old. I still had Scooby, my beloved Aussie, and the two were inseparable, though Scooby tried hard to teach Sophie to be a good companion. She was wild, full of Border Collie energy and puppy mischief. If I have aged, so has she—in some ways. She’ll spend days, as she is now, lying by my desk. But when she takes a notion that there are too many squirrels in the yard, Katie bar the door! She is getting a bit of middle-age spread though I defensively claim that once she is groomed next week, she’ll be thin again. She’s a girl with a strong personality, a diva among dogs, and I’ve loved the last ten years. Hope we both get ten more.

So that’s my ten years. I won’t say I wouldn’t trade for a minute of it, because if I could go back in time, I’d change some things and hope not to have the health problems I’ve had. But I’m sure happy with where I’ve landed. Taken as a whole, it’s been a good ten years.

Ladies night out—or in

 

The four of us at an earlier dinner.
Not sure when, but I think it was a Cajun restaurant that had been recommended.

For several years now, a group of four women (including me) has had dinner together once every month or so. We are—ahem! elderly, me more so than the others, and we are all interested in the arts. All three are old friends, though they didn’t all know each other until a few years ago. They claim they first met at my annual tree trimming Christmas parties, now a thing of the past much to my regret. Pandemic threw a huge monkey wrench into our dinner plans. We are all cautious, again me more so than the others. Each of us take masking and vaccines seriously—one because her partner is more elderly even than I, another because she is herself immune compromised, me because I’m an elderly scaredy cat.

We had managed a dinner just before the Delta variant swept us all up and again another in December for a birthday, just before omicron was a threat. And then we were all hiding in our homes again. Two ladies—Kathie and Subie—came to my aborted New Year’s Day party, but Carol stayed home out of an abundance of caution. She, however, was the one subsequently exposed to Covid, and although she tested positive, she was never sure she had it. Meanwhile I spent January alone in the cottage when first Jacob and then Jordan had mild cases.

Finally a week or so ago, Carol suggested we meet for pot-luck supper at my cottage—and joked about how bold she was being to invite people to my house. The usual juggling ensued as we tried to find a date that suited everyone. Tonight was our potluck dinner, and it brings aa couple of thoughts to mind. The obvious one is the good fortune of having four forty-plus year friendships—we literally have grown old together. The ties that bind have lasted, though we have each grown in different directions, developed new interests, etc. And yet, mostly, we blend and share.

The other is that potluck is an old-fashioned idea. As you know if you read this blog much at all, I am increasingly interested in so-called American food, the dishes that are considered passé now, the food of the fifties and sixties. And I’d sure put the concept of potluck right up there with those dishes, although I know it is much older and probably traces back through most of American history. Especially as we all get healthier and sanitation conscious due to covid, I wonder if both potluck and buffet lines aren't going the way of all good things.

As hostess, I felt it was incumbent on me to provide the entrée, so I fixed a chicken casserole, made with Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom Soup. Cooking with canned soups is a hangover from my growing-up years, and yet I have recipes I treasure that call for mushroom, chicken, or celery soup. Lots of cooking snobs scorn such cooking, but not me. Our appetizers tonight were sort of retro—vegetables and dips, though the dips were not anything we thought of back in the day. There was a herb dip—really herbal and really green, a cheese spread spiced with pimiento, and a hummus with peppers (I avoided that). The crispy breads with Parmesan would not have appeared at my growing-up table (we never had bread with dinner). Salad was a tossed green salad—shades of my mom, though she never would have added sunflower seeds, blueberries, and apple. I can just see my dad’s face if he found a blueberry in his salad—he loved them, but all things in their proper place.

And finally there was dessert—a scrumptious fruit salad (with lots of raspberries which is always a plus for me) and good bakery cookies. What struck me about the meal was that it was a blending of the food from our young years with some more trendy dishes from today. And maybe that’s what’s to be treasured about our friendship—the best from the old days when we were young and full of plans blended with whatever wisdom age has brought us and surviving despite diverse interests.

Want that good, light chicken recipe? Look for the Gourmet on a Hot Plate blog tomorrow. I plan to post my two favorite chicken casseroles. Meantime I have taken two days from my novel—one to do taxes and today to make the casserole, straighten the cottage and get ready for company. I laugh at myself because in these tiny quarters I usually don’t do much to prepare for company—just ask a couple of regulars—but today seemed more like an occasion, and I couldn’t wrap my mind around much else. Tomorrow, back to the novel!

The tax man cometh

 

Not my picture
but isn't he adorable

For some reason today, the saying that kept repeating in my mind was, “The Lord loveth a happy heart.” Well, I qualify! My heart is happy tonight because I spent much of the day organizing my tax information so that when my accountant sends his annual questionnaire I have it (almost) all ready to go.

I suppose everyone’s tax information seems complicated, but mine always has for years because as a free lance writer I have income—none of it large, mid you—from several sources. And then I must keep track of all the expenses that qualify for deduction, and I end up with ridiculous questions for my accountant, like “Can I deduct the new tree I bought as property improvement?” Maybe I could detect the value of the hundred-year-old tree that had to be replaced. OH, oops! If you count depreciation, I guess a hundred-year-old tree has lost all its value. But losing it was such a traumatic thing for us and made us so sad, I really think we should be compensated for sentimental value. I doubt the IRS would see it that way, and I’m not about to tempt them.

The tree is sort of like my car—a 2004 VW convertible bug—which is now back in the driveway after spending months in a repair shop of Christian’s choosing. Christian kept telling me this was a good guy, but I began to have my doubts after the car was gone so long. Was the guy driving it himself? Selling it? All is well, because one day it just reappeared in the driveway, in much better shape than when it went away. Jordan and Christian want to keep it for an alternative for a while, because both their cars are old, and Jordan’s needs some work. Meantime, Jordan and I ran an errand in it the other day, and I realized it is so much easier for me to get in and out of than climbing into her SUV. I have requested that we take the VW to all future doctor appointments, etc. But the truth is my little pale-yellow bug has much more sentimental value than actual worth. Like the tree.

And I am headed into a series of routine doctor appointments that I rescheduled when omicron was rampant. I hate it, because now I have all these visits breaking into my work schedule. And I’m always a bit hesitant about some doctors—will the cardiologist find something wrong? Will the dentist find a cavity? How about the eye doctor? I’ve had enough eye trauma to last a lifetime. Probably I’m not so worried about the ones I should be worried about.

My heart is also happy tonight because Jordan and I had a good visit with my neighbors who usually come for happy hour on Tuesday, as long as everyone’s schedule permits. We talked of plumbing problems—Mary has major work being done, so much so that she and Joe are staying in a hotel. And we talked of kids, primarily Jacob’s triumph at a golf tournament today—five schools, and he came in at 77, third place, two strokes behind the winner. I am so proud of that boy. And of course we talked of food and recipes.

After the ladies left, I ate a quick bowl of leftover chicken soup and tuned into a Zoom program sponsored by the Chicagoland chapter of Sisters in Crime on social media. I prepared myself to learn a lot, but what I learned is I am probably doing it all right with a visible presence on Facebook, a less active presence on Twitter (I mostly retweet and must learn to post original content), and some presence on BookBub and Goodreads. The one I’ve left slide is Pinterest, and I went exploring tonight, made a little progress, but need a tutor. And I really need a tutor for Instagram—hmmm, I’m wondering if Jacob can help.

Enough. I’ve had a full day, and I’m going to take my happy heart to sleep and pray for the people of Ukraine. That situation scares the bejabbers out of me—which I guess is what Mr. Putin wants.

Monday blues on Valentine’s Day

 

A reconstructed apartment in The Tenement Museum
Photo from the Tenement Museum

What an oxymoron! They just shouldn’t schedule Valentine’s Day on a Monday. In fact, I may become an activist for rescheduling all those Monday holidays. I know, what I don’t need is another cause when I have Texas politics (and national), banned books, dogs … let’s see, what else?

I didn’t so much have the blues today as the blahs, and or no reason. The day was sunny and almost warm, though the temperature drop between four and six this afternoon was dramatic. Sophie did get me up early—twice, so I missed my morning doze. But my work went well, and I got my thousand words written, though they were what I would call transitional words, trying to get the characters from one problem to another. Now I’ve left them at a dinner party—can’t wait to see what will come out of that dinner, and Henny is nervous about it. She’s serving her homemade pasta, which is definitely not one of her signature dishes.

Zenaida was here this morning, so the cottage is sparkling and clean. Other than her cheery presence, there wasn’t a highlight to the day. I tried to create one by watching a Zoom special on love in the tenements. I follow the Tenement Museum at 97 Orchard Steet in Manhattan’s Lower East Side (I’m pretty sure I’ve blogged about it before, so if you find this repetitive, please bear with me). The building housed waves of immigrants from the 1860s through the 1930s—the Irish fleeing the potato famine Lutherans from Germany, Jewish people escaping the violence of eastern Europe, eventually Italians and Hispanics. The immigrants did not mingle—one wave followed another, so that for a time the building was almost exclusively Irish, then Jewish, etc. It’s like a mini-history of New York City. Rescued from demolition in the late 1980s, 97 Orchard Street is slowly being refurbished, and “model” apartments are stark reminders of the shabbiness of poverty and the lack of amenities.

Tonight’s program featured just a few couples in love and probed the question of how you find out about love in history. The part about a Jewish couple featured quite a bit about traditional matchmaker and the decline of their business early in the twentieth century.The pictures were fascinating, along with interesting chat comments. But I so want the museum to do some training of their presenters. Tonight there were two—a woman who was so animated as to be almost frenetic; she talked too fast so that she was hard to understand; her constant playing with her long hair was distracting. (Yes, I had my hearing aids in and my auxiliary speaker turned on—still not good.) She was partnered with a young man who was just the opposite—laid back, soft spoken, lacking her obvious spark. I don’t know which is better—or worse. A side note: each was identified by name and pronoun preference. She preferred she/her, and he identified as he/him. But I thought it interesting that they felt it important to include that information.

One of my colleagues on a writers’ listserv just recorded some demo work hoping to get voice-over assignments, and she shared the demos with the group today. I was impressed by the range and variety of her voice and by the fact that whether she was doing a voice for an animation segment or one for a corporate presentation, her speech was clear and understandable. I want her to run up to NYC and teach the Tenement Museum staff. I know they operate on a shoestring and the staff may even be volunteer, but I think if they upped the quality of the programming, they’d get more contributions.

My recommendation, if you’re interested in this history, is to read the book, 97 Orchard: An Edible History of Five Families in One Tenement, by Jane Ziegelman. Or check out the website: the tenement museum - Search (bing.com)

Christian is fixing a new version of carnitas for Valentine’s Day, and I’m being reclusive—I guess the blahs have made me lazy. I declined an invitation to dine in the house—they can have a candlelit dinner. I’m waiting for a plate of food.

Tomorrow is a new day!

Christian's carnitas
Just delivered and delicious!

Souper Bowl Sunday

 

Here it is once again, the biggest Sunday of the football year. Not being a football fan, it leaves me apathetic to say the least. Perhaps bored would be a better description—or maybe a bit angry at the extravagance of a sporting event.

I remember several years ago when PBS had Souper Bowl programming. I think it was a series of programs devoted to soup in a play on words—and perhaps a reaction to all the junk food that is eaten at watch parties. Which reminds me—did everyone see that because of drug cartel violence, the US cut off all import of avocados from Mexico as of last night. On the eve of the biggest avocado sale day of the year, because everyone is making guacamole.

I discovered tonight that there is an organization that shares my concern it should be turned to a better cause. Project Care sponsors the Souper Bowl of Caring, couched in football terms for church groups, youth ministries, any kind of non-profit group. First down, they say, is to organize your team. Second down: what do you want—food donations? Cash donations? They talk about virtual food shopping, fundraising, food drives, and other ways to “make a touchdown.” Third down is to register your project with them and fourth to use their resources. I have no idea about the legitimacy of this program, but I would like to believe in them. It’s a neat idea.

On the other hand, it sounds like a whole lot of work, and I had my hands full today just making a pot of chicken soup. The recipe calls it crack chicken soup. It has all the things you’d expect—onion, carrot, celery, chicken, and broth (I had two cups of really good homemade broth in the freezer). But then it has the unexpected—a packet of ranch dressing mix, a can of cream of chicken soup, half and half, a half-pound of spaghetti, grated cheddar. Two friends came to share it with me, and if I do say so, it was excellent. One friend brought delicious cornbread, and so we feasted. A problem with pasta in soup—it tends to soak up all the liquid. The soup was thick tonight; by tomorrow, I imagine I’ll have to add more broth to the leftovers. Easily done.

The soup and the company soothed me at the end of a difficult day in which, ultimately, I proved myself a bad doggie mother. There’s a doggie devil that occasionally takes over Sophie, especially in the early morning. When she goes out for that morning pee, she runs madly from one end of the yard to the other, chasing squirrels, barking, squeaking in excitement. When she’s in that zone, I might as well talk to myself. I bundle up, go out with leash (to fool her into thinking she’s getting a trip) and cheese, her usual treat. I call, beg, plead, and cajole. She doesn’t even look at me.

This morning, after an hour, Jordan, who likes to sleep late on weekends, came out and went after Soph—something I can’t do when she’s back in the bushes. Jordan’s concern was that running on the ground cover and gravel in a couple of small beds, tears up Sophie’s feet. She finally brought Soph inside, but my sweet dog was not happy about it. She barked at me continually, until I went from scolding to yelling. I was not going to let her out to repeat that performance. About noon, when Jordan came to bring me something, Sophie slipped out and took the longest pee ever. Poor thing—she’d just been trying to tell me she needed to pee. She promptly went to her crate and fell asleep, either out of exhaustion or relief about the peeing—or resentment of me. We did not speak until suppertime.

But when Renee and Jean arrived, she got lots of love to make up for her cruel mistreatment earlier in the day. As of this writing, I think we’re friends again. This morning was the second in a week in which she got in that wild zone, so I’m a bit apprehensive about tomorrow. And, honest, I don’t want to get up at seven in the morning. I’m retired, after all.

It's a new week, and the world is getting back to normal. I hope everyone has a good week.

Winter returns … a day for reflection

 

My favorite weather forecaster-
See those eyes?
She's not letting me out of her sight in scary weather

Yesterday was a tantalizing touch of spring—close to eighty degrees and sunny in the afternoon, though by six-thirty, when we came in from the patio, there was a definite chill in the air. Still, last night I was full of optimism—the rodeo is over and gone, my family seems for now free of the virus, and for the first time in over a month Jordan sat in the cottage and visited and then stayed on the patio to join friend Renee and me in talking about dogs and kids and friends and all the things that make life so good. I wrote Jordan this morning to tell her what a pleasure it is to have her back in my life, after all those masked, five-minute visits. Reminds me of a Snoopy cartoon I saw today, where Snoopy is carried on the shoulders of his friends, and he says how glad he is that friendship is free, because he could never afford all the wonderful people in his life.

Maybe it was last night’s conversation or maybe Snoopy this morning, but I’ve been reflecting on the nature of friendship—some are long-lasting, some transitory, and some change in nature. Today is the birthday of a colleague to whom I was once close—we plotted and planned books and programs, we had lunch together several times a week, we were good friends. Today I almost never hear from him; when I do it’s because I reach out to be sure he’s okay—eight years older than I (can you believe that?), he’s been hiding in his house from omicron. I told him I miss him, but really what I miss is the old friendship. We can’t go back to that.

I have other friends and colleagues who have dropped out of my life, and it always pains me a bit. I think it’s Ann Lamott who wrote that when someone drops out of your life, it means their part in your story is over. A woman I used to travel with to meetings of everyone from Western Writers of America to the Texas State Historical Association and the Texas Institute of Letters—I sent her a birthday card just before Christmas but had no response. I’ve always had the feeling I somehow offended her, though I would never have done that intentionally. Then there’s the woman who’s a great correspondent just after we visit, but then it tapers off and I rarely hear from her. I guess it’s time for another visit. And at my age, inevitably, I’ve lost people I really card about to death. Another colleague wrote me recently that of the five people he felt close to, two had died and one had moved across the country. Circumstances over which we have little control change our friendships, and it’s often sad.

I have new friendships—neighbors that I’ve come to know, acquaintances that have moved out of that casual category to become true friends, and I value them all. I talked yesterday to my associate provost to whom I reported at the university. We are the same age, and when I said I felt we are fortunate—meaning fortunate to be as healthy and involved in life as we are—he said, “Life continues to unfold.” I thought it was well put. As for those whose part in my story is over, I have lots of wonderful memories to hold close. On the birthday card I sent today I recalled a birthday when twelve women, all part of his fan club, took this man to our favorite café for lunch. A good memory.

I knew during the night that the weather was changing. Sophie slept right by me, instead of in her spot across the room. And when I woke and moved around about seven this morning, she didn’t show any interest in going aside. Her instincts about weather are always several hours ahead of mine, but when I finally got up this morning, I was greeted by a gray day that probably feels chillier than it is. Even Jordan, my child with hot Mediterranean blood, is complaining of cold this morning. So much for our plan for lunch on a patio somewhere. That will have to wait.

Today is one for a cut of tea, a blanket, and a good book.

 

Just call me Charlie

 

How would you feel about reading a chapter of a novel and then waiting a week—or even a month—for the new chapter? That’s what people in Victorian England did, as Charles Dickens wrote his way to fame in weekly or monthly installments, starting with his first novel, The Pickwick Papers (1836). For Dickens, the advantages were several: first among them, a more regular income, which he needed to support his wife and family. But he could also change characters, directions, etc. according to public reaction to the installments. When his wife’s physician expressed displeasure with the way Miss Mowcher (David Copperfield) reflected her disabilities in her personality, Dickens strengthened the character and gave her a more positive outlook. Often, he wove contemporary events into his narrative.

Here are some novels that were serially published over the years: Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Crime and Punishment, Treasure Island, The War of the Worlds, Heart of Darkness, Ulysses, A Farewell to Arms, In Cold Blood. (Here’s a literary test: how many authors can you pair with the above titles?) Contemporary authors who have used the form include Stephen King nd Michael Wolfe.

In 1986, in celebration of the Texas Sesquicentennial, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram commissioned me to write a novel in honor of the celebration. Installments appeared twice a week, and in between I wrote frantically. Like many who write by the seat of their pants, I didn’t really know where the novel was going until I wrote that last installment. Someone said to me, “You do like the sentimental ending, don’t you?” Too late to change that. Sesquicentennial ended; so did the novel, and I never thought more about it.

Today serial publication is back in vogue, especially with genre fiction—mystery, romance, and science fiction. The idea is that you can read on the fly—a chapter in the dental office waiting room, another chapter on the subway to work, still another waiting to pick your child up from school. Several platforms let you download installments to your iPad or phone.

Today, I joined the authors at KISS Crazy Maple Studios with the launch of the first in my Blue Plate Café Mysteries, Murder at the Blue Plate Café. Crazy Maple has contracted for the other three books in the series: Murder at Tremont House, Murder at Peacock Mansion, and Murder at the Blue Plate Café.

Here's the blurb for Murder at the Blue Plate Café:  Small towns are supposed to be idyllic and peaceful, but when Kate Chambers returns to her hometown of Wheeler, Texas, she soon learns it is not the comfortable place it was when she grew up. First there’s Gram’s sudden death, which leaves her suspicious, and then the death of her married sister’s lover. Kate runs Gram’s restaurant, the Blue Plate Café, but she must defend her sister against a murder charge, solve the murders to keep her business open, and figure out where the café’s profits are going. Gram guides Kate through it all, though Kate’s never quite sure she’s hearing Gram—and sometimes Gram’s guidance is really off the wall.

You have to subscribe to the KISS app on iTunes ( IOS Android) and then when you open the app a search button appears in the upper right corner. Just type in author’s name or book title, and it will take you right to it. Here’s a link right to the book, but I think it’s for browsing only if you haven’t subscribed: direct link to your story.

Bear with me. This is all new territory for me, and I am not an app user, don’t use iTunes (although some of my books are for sale there), and don’t use my iPad, except in computer downtimes, and my phone only for phone calls and texting. You can clearly see that I am a Luddite so it’s exciting for me to have my work part of this new—or new-again—technology.

To celebrate this publication Kiss gives me 20 gold coins to give away to readers. So I will send the redemption code to the first four who tell me my dog’s name.

Why do I feel that I’m treading in water over my head?