A cozy Sunday evening

 

Roast sweet potatoes and spinach

Oh, the weather outside is frightful—well, not really, but it’s darn chilly. So here it is, Sunday evening, and I am warm and cozy in my cottage, with The Sound of Music on the TV. A bit of salmon salad on Ritz crackers for supper, followed by some chocolate truffles from Central Market. What could be more blissful?

Today I had a lovely visit with friend Linda, who left Texas a year or so ago for Taos. Linda and I have known each other for close to fifty years—a history and friendship that encompasses divorce and death, lots of struggles and lots of joy. We have children the exact same age—if Jamie turned fifty this year, I knew her Melanie did too. She has wonderful stories about when the children were little, like Megan walking into her house and making a beeline for her make-up dresser. Apparently, I was deficient in such matters.

I had made a new dish for supper last night and fed Linda leftovers because I had them, but more than that it was the kind of food she likes—roast sweet potatoes and spinach with green onions and feta. Oops, forgot the jalapenos. The recipe called for sprinkling juice from a jar of preserved jalapenos over the sweet potatoes. Last night I did that—cautiously—and added a bit more today. But it also called for sprinkling the finished dish minced jalapenos. Last night, Jean took one bite of the minced to see if she wanted them on her dinner and madly reached for the baguette slices I had put out, followed by a glass of water. When at last she could speak, she managed to say, “Too hot!” Linda said she ate one slice today, but, yes, they were hot! Otherwise, the dish was a keeper. Jean thought maybe it needed a grain element, and I wondered about something crisp.

A friend gave me a package of Tours mix, and I thought that might be good, though I didn’t try it today. You have to have lived in Fort Worth for years to know Tours mix—Tours was a lovely restaurant at Seventh and Monticello, and their signature salad was sprinkled with this crunch mix of seeds and nuts. You can buy it now at Vending Nut Company. And if you go down the street to Michael’s Restaurant, you can buy a jar of the original Mac’s Salad Dressing, from now long-gone Mac’s House. It’s great with Tours mix.

Anyway back to my visit with Linda. I’ve used to not seeing her often, because she has lived in Granbury almost her entire life, but now that she has pulled up stakes for Taos, I feel the distance. So today we caught up on each other, families, friends, all the things we share. At one time, we were both married to osteopathic surgeons (they were briefly partners) so that’s a whole world, now mostly lost to us, that we talk about. But today it never came up—have we let go of that part of the past? I thought Linda moved to Taos principally because she had an art teacher there that she really liked, but she told me today the pervasive MAGA politics drove her from her hometown. She’s not the first person I know who has moved out of Texas because of politics. Texas has a great and glorious history—well, with some myth-busting—and I hate to see the rigid ideology of Abbott and his cohorts drive my friends away.

Politics aside—and how I wish we could just brush it away—the holidays are a great time to catch up with old friends, reach out to new, share the sense of hope that the season brings. I’m hoping for a couple more visits like that, though it’s a busy season for all of us. One friend has already reluctantly cancelled a planned girls visit in favor of an unexpected chance to see her son and his family, and I certainly applaud that. This morning the sermon at church was about the importance of friendship, of having someone with whom we can share our deepest secrets, our hopes, our triumphs and our disappointments. I am blessed in that respect.

So what does Christmas week hold for you? I’ve got cranberries on my mind—some chutney and a cranberry cake. And friends and visiting and happy times. Hope you do too.

I just have to add, no matter how many times you’ve seen it, The Sound of Music is a tearjerker. And even now I cannot watch the cemetery scene!