On the dock......

I wake earlier than usual and walk down to the dock and there she is, coming my way.  The trail of smooth convex bubbles gives her away. Her gray barrel-like body glides along, her calf, half her size carefully tucked on the far side of her massive body, safe, away from me. She has three scars above the base of her tail. They are old wounds, healed over from a past propeller strike. Manatee mom and baby move silently past, they are relaxed, moving at a leisurely pace.

Look around and you will rewarded. See the gifts that give depth and meaning to each of our lives - the little things. A trip down to my dock, a 10 minute Sunday drive to the Port to do some photography.  In my house there are stacks and stacks of books that have transported me to other parts of the world. A basket of colorful yarn represent projects just waiting to be knitted. 

Some of my greatest treasures - a mason jar full of purie marbles bought at a flea market years ago for a buck. A statue of a schoolboy striding to or from school (from the look on his face I’d go with the latter) chalkboard at his side – which belonged to my beloved grandmother. My great grandmother’s  “Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name” kitschy knick-knack that sits in a place of honor on my shelf. 

Here are a few of my favorite adventure travel books that you will find on my shelves.

A Wolverine is Eating My Leg by Tm Cahill

Tales of a Shaman’s Apprentice by Mark Plotkin

Savages by Joe Kane

The Origin by Irving Stone

25 Years of Outside Magazine by the editors of Outside Magazine

Ice Box Rolls, my great grandmother's recipe

Ice Box Rolls  -Golda Authenrieth Recipe

1^st Mixture:

2 cups boiled water poured over

½ cup sugar (I add a little more sugar)

4 tbl shortening (Crisco)

1 tsp salt

2^nd Mixture:

In ¼ cup luke warm water

Dissolve 2 cakes of yeast  (nowadays 2 packages)

1 tsp sugar

In a small separate bowl

2 eggs beaten

-Pour 1^st mixture over eggs

Stir in 4 cups of flour

-Add 2^nd mixture

-Add 4 more cups of flour Stir with spoon.
Wet your hand in cold water & smooth over*

-Put dough in ice-box

(*I actually knead the dough a bit before placing in the frig)

When you want to make it into rolls, take a hunk out & let rest stay in ice-box.
Cut into small sections and roll into rolls. 

Put into buttered pan, let raise high. (I let it rise for about an hour).

Rub top with butter before baking and after it comes out of the oven.

-Bake 25 to 30 minutes at 350 degrees.

Remaining dough can be kept for several days in ice-box & used as needed.

Words......

Ok here’s the deal, I went to the public library today, one of the greatest institutions our country has ever created. It is open to anyone - a place of quiet refuge.

Libraries offer worlds beyond our everyday lives, wonderful worlds to explore through seemingly endless shelves of books, through movies, magazines and periodicals – all free to those possessing a library card. It was designed for the people, for the masses – and it is an absolutely brilliant idea. Public libraries also offer services to their patrons such as access to computers, free tax consulting in the spring, art and exercise classes throughout the year.  But in the end it is all about the power of words.

I park next to a car that has stickers everywhere on its backside, lamenting this country’s turn towards “socialism.” The message clear  - that somehow our government is the enemy, that we are controlled by a malevolent corrosive system.  

This imperfect thing we call democracy - our government - provides police and firemen in times of great distress and fear, it provides a safety net in the form of Medicare and Social Security.  Is it perfect? Nope, but it sure has a lot of positives going for it.

Here’s another deal, I am tired of it all – the left, the right – the manufactured outrage from both sides. The willful ignorance, the  vitriol in dealing with very complicated problems - the environment, gun violence, our lack of civility.  We use ugly words to define one another, words that could just as easily be used to inspire or disarm.

When did we lose our sense of humor? I don’t need a lecture, make me laugh and I’ll start to listen. For the owner of that car, how about  a quiet moment of self-reflection in order to see the irony of using this very public facility.

John F. Kennedy quotes:

“For the enemy of truth is very often not the lie - deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive and unrealistic. We enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.”

 “I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered at the White House- with the possible exception of Thomas Jefferson when he dined alone.”  (Describing a dinner for Nobel Prize winners)

Treasure Hunts

Last week I for some unknown reason started looking through my bookshelf as well as a box of what I thought was junk in my office and lo and behold I found treasures.  A tiny book measuring 4 by 7 inches full of amazingly profound, witty and thoughtful  quotes from John F. Kennedy. Quotes that I find inspiring and eerily timely in their recognition of man’s pettiness in governing.   The book is not just a commentary on politics, but on our relationship to nature and the awe-inspiring beauty of this planet and its fragility, on the goodness of our species, of our foibles and failures. They are observations on the human condition.  So I open it every morning randomly selecting a page and read…….here today’s quote. 

“There will always be dissident voices heard in the land, expressing opposition without alternatives, finding fault but never favor, perceiving gloom on every side and seeking influence without responsibility.”  JFK

Another treasure found - a series of tiny children’s books I bought while in Johannesburg airport a couple of years ago. They are charming in their size, their illustrations, their sweet stories.

And maybe the best find was my great grandmother’s handwritten recipe binder – with her name and year 1956 on the inside cover.  It is beat-up, falling apart, pages brown and crumbling, snippets of newspaper recipes falling out as I leaf through it but ohhh what treasures it holds.  Grandmom Authenrieth’s elegant cursive hand-written recipes recommend, comment, and instruct. I have already tried making the “Icebox Rolls” solely based on her comment on the upper left corner “Very good” underlined twice.  Yep they are yummy, maybe not the healthiest but fresh out of the oven with a slab of salted butter - nothing better.  

Trees......

The trees are glowing, as if some sort of inner light is casting about from them. Even when the sun is not out, there is a certain tree, a maple I think, with deep red leaves that seems illuminated from within.  The streets I walk are some sort of child’s kaleidoscope of varying shades of gold, orange, yellow, red and even fading greens.  Each tree has its role in this orchestra of color, clashing, highlighting and complimenting one another.

The oak trees do not have beautiful and electric colors. Their green leaves turn from green to brown, quickly, matter-of-factly.  Maybe because they are so impressive as is, so massive in breadth and length, their branches reaching out like some Hindu goddess with multiple arms, they don’t need to tell the world of their beauty through such short-lived garish colors. These oaks are not climbing trees, the first branches far too high above heads. No, these are practical sentinels standing over neighborhoods-providing a variety of species a place to nest in spring and abundant food in the fall. Preparing for winter the birds and squirrels are in a feeding frenzy at the moment. The other day I stood under a young oak and watched as a family of Bluejays tap-tapped acorns opening them for the rich nutritious meat within, while a squirrel looked down on us scolding me for allowing the dog so near.

I love trees, always have. There is something comforting about the ability of wooded areas to protect and encircle anyone within its shaded confines. Take a walk in a city park dotted with soccer fields but bordered by woods.  In the heat of the summer, walk by these woods, not even in them, and you will feel a temperature drop, a refreshing coolness that is exempt from the flat exposed playing fields.

On a sweltering summer day, there is nothing quite like walking out of the glare of sunlight into the enfolding arms of a shade tree, its leaves softly shifting as a breeze blows and cools our hot sweaty selves.

As a kid our maple tree in our front yard, situated by the curb was the neighborhood climbing tree, it also served as home-base for Hide-n-Go Seek. Under its green canopy we played Kickball and Kick the Can. It’s branches leaned far out over the street and as we got older we thought it was cool to position ourselves on them, hidden, then spit on unsuspecting cars that dared to drive under us. In October our maple glowed orange and red, in Spring it yielded bundles of green seed-like pods that we split open and stuck on our noses. We called them “helicopters” because of the twirly way they drifted to the ground once released from the tree – as if we could hear the soft thwak, thwak, thawk sound of rotating blades.

Yesterday the evening light was like magic, the skies blue with gray/white puffy clouds casting light and shadows over the trees. They trees lit up, the phrase "in the gloaming" comes to mind. Gloaming is an Old English word meaning - "poetic twilight or dusk"