I'm trying to. Spring forward, that is. When I was growing up, fall was my favorite season because I loved getting back to the school routine. Maybe it was the new clothes. I still have fond memories of a flannel dress I wore on the first day of sixth grade. It had license plates all over it, and I thought I was destined for the cover of Vogue, especially with the accompanying black and white saddle shoes that were all the rage. But I'm a summer gal now. I suspect this has something to do with where I live. Every year at this time when we return to daylight savings time, I find Mother Nature to be particularly cruel. One day it's sunny and warm, hinting at what's to come. Then the next five are wet and cold, forcing the capris back into the closet. It could be worse, I know, and my apologies go out to those of you who live east of the Mississippi. But you will soon have something that those of us in the Northwest rarely get -- a real, sustained spring. So I...
Posts
As you may have noticed, my productivity has decreased noticeably since last summer. This is not due to lack of interest. No, this is due to lack of sleep. I have a teenager who should be going to his first period class around 9am but instead is learning trigonometry at 7:20. He has a mom who should be sleeping until 7am but is awakened over an hour before her body would like to see the light of day. All work and no sleep has made me a tired and unproductive writer. I was once asked if I am an early bird or a night owl. "Neither," was my reply. "I am a wimp at both ends." Always have been and always will, I suspect. And so my ears perked up last week while listening to an interview with Jennifer Senior , contributing editor at New York magazine and author of a new book on parenting called All Joy and No Fun: The Paradox of Modern Parenting . Kids, she points out, were originally part of the economic engine of a family; they were housed and fed and expected to wor...
Most every Friday I go to work with tears in my eyes. I know this doesn't make sense -- it is Friday, after all. But at 7:25am, when I am about a half mile away from my school, I always hear the familiar jingle that identifies a new segment of StoryCorps, the NPR program that helps people record their life stories, archiving them to leave a lasting legacy for their families and loved ones. Like a Pavlovian dog, just hearing that jingle gets my tear ducts ready to flow, and like a junkie who knows that showing up to work in tears just doesn't make any sense, I can't help myself. These conversations are just that compelling. Sometimes they're funny, sometimes sad, but they are always a fascinating look into two people's lives and the connection that exist between them. In a world of news that often feels removed, these stories are very real. Birth, death, and love, the essence of human existence, are the most common topics, and these conversations illustrate that n...
It's funny what we remember from our youth. Why some memories stick while others disappear does not always make sense. Take, for instance, a memory I have from second grade. Mrs. Netherby, who honestly was one of my favorite teachers, asked us to write what we thought about the Vietnam War. The Vietnam War! In second grade!! Perhaps because I was always very young for my grade, or perhaps because my friends and I did not discuss things like this while playing kick the can, I honestly had no thoughts at the ripe old age of seven as to what the Vietnam War even was. Fortunately, I sat across the aisle from Angela Johnson who was really smart. As I stared at my paper, wondering how I was going to start, let alone complete, this assignment, she was busy writing away. A quick glance told me that she believed that war was bad. Now here's where my memory is particularly sharp all these years later. I thought to myself, "If I write the exact sa...
I have something to share about myself that will probably surprise you. But before I divulge this information, I must tell you about a small success I had recently. I was in a liquor store in search of an ingredient for my latest drink. I know, I know...this flies in the face of the resolution I made in the Kitchen Gods post, but hopefully you will ultimately be on my side with this decision. Anyway, there I was searching among all the different bottles when I overheard the store employee helping a woman find some brandy for cooking. She pointed her towards a type that came in a bottle far larger than your airplane variety, and the woman said, "Yikes, that's big. Are there any drinks you can make with brandy?" Other than suggesting a Brandy Alexander, the employee was kind of stumped. And so I stepped up and offered up my sidecar recipe, history and all. I kind of shocked myself, to be perfectly honest. I'm not the type to remember a joke, even ten minutes after it...
Many moons ago I set out on an adventure to bike around New Zealand. Looking back all these years later, I realize how Lewis and Clark it was of me to set off by myself to such unknown territory on a bike I had not ridden all that much with a tool kit I had barely touched. Such is the naivety of youth that allows us to head off on such an adventure without any second thoughts about the "what ifs". Two days into my expedition, having consulted my "Cycle Touring in the North Island of New Zealand" book, I left the small village of Kaitaia to ride up to Cape Reinga, the northern most point on the island. Surrounded by beach and water on all sides, I envisioned paradise. What I had not envisioned was the condition of the road out to Cape Reinga. As I poured over this book in the weeks leading up to my departure, I often came over the words "sealed" and "unsealed" as descriptions for roads. I figured that unsealed roads were ...
I'm on a new mission. No longer will bags of produce be pulled from my crisper dripping in brown ooze that only comes from buyer neglect. I'm determined to find a use for that little bit of feta cheese that lingers in the cheese drawer just waiting to get moldy. And I vow to use up every heel of every loaf of bread I ever buy again. I will boldly go where I seldom go and force myself to regularly use up what's in my refrigerator before returning to the grocery story. I will think more creatively about what I can put together with the ingredients on hand as opposed to pulling out a new recipe and adding unwanted food to an already crowded refrigerator. Oh, these vows sound so good, but they are so difficult for me because I am a recipe kind of gal. Blame it on my mom who created terrific meals but was wedded to her cookbooks. I am not genetically predisposed to winging it in the kitchen. Which is why I marvel at Lynne Rossetto Kasper who hosts NPR's show The Splendid ...