Endearing words

For some reason they are all around today — the sweet little bloopers that make me love my family so much.These are the mistakes I will never correct or comment on because they always make me smile:

When Towhead asks to be picked up, Mr. A and I will often tease her by only lifting her part way off the ground. Her response is usually, “No, I want upper.”

Mr. A’s use of the word “plausibility” instead of “possibility.”

My father-in-law’s spelling of “Christmass.”

Towhead’s requests for a “dambaid” when she has an owie.

The times when Mr. A pronounces celery the same as salary.

I am so grateful that I have such sweet and wonderful people in my life. I love hearing the laughter that greets me on so many mornings, often before I even get out of bed. The abundance of silliness, the chasing, the tickling, the games and fun that make up our family make me so warm and full I don’t think I’m going to need food on Turkey Day this year.

**As a postscript, I discovered three more eardearing word I don’t want to forget: Daddy drinks “beard” with dinner, Airplanes land at the “oar-port,” and after a storm it’s often “froggy” out.

Hummingbirds: What we do for love

I wish I could find a way to post this video on the mating display of the spatuletail hummingbird. Click on the link. Please. Watch this – it’s truly amazing what evolution can accomplish in the name of love!

It reminds me of a Pattiann Rogers poem, “The Hummingbird: A Seduction,” from her book Firekeper. This is erotica; this is love; this is sex as it should be.

The Hummingbird: A Seduction

If I were a female hummingbird perched still
And quiet on an upper myrtle branch
In the spring afternoon and if you were a male
Alone in the whole heavens before me, having parted
Yourself, for me, from cedar top and honeysuckle stem
And earth down, your body hovering in midair
Far away from jewelweed, thistle, and bee balm;

And if I watched how you fell, plummeting before me,
And how you rose again and fell, with such mastery
That I believed for a moment you were the sky
And the red-marked bird diving inside your circumference
Was just the physical revelation of the light’s
Most perfect desire;

And if I saw your sweeping and sucking
Performance of swirling egg and semen in the air,
The weaving, twisting vision of red petal
And nectar and soaring rump, the rush of your wing
In its grand confusion of arcing and splitting
Created completely out of nothing just for me,

Then when you came down to me, I would call you
My own spinning bloom of ruby sage, my funnelling
Storm of sunlit sperm and pollen, my only breathless
Piece of scarlet sky, and I would bless the base
Of each of your feathers and touch the tine
Of string muscles binding your wings and taste
The odor of your glistening oils and hunt
The honey in your crimson flare
And I would take you and take you and take you
Deep into any kind of nest you ever wanted.

And the beet goes on

It’s spring! And evey spring for the past two years I look forward to something I know to be most abundant and tasty this time of year: beets and greens.

I was never an adventurous eater as a child. I didn’t really learn to like and enjoy a lot of new foods until I went to college. You’d never know it now I’ve tried snails (in both garlic and tabasco sauces), elk, moose, deer, beef tongue, crickets and meal worms, octopus, and I’ve developed an affinity for kimchi.

Many of you have heard me talk about the CSA basket we subscribed to in Reno. Well, this is where I developed a taste for beets, thanks to a simple recipe from Tina Smith of HomeGrown Nevada Farms that combines roasted beets, beet greens and chevre. I remember being intrigued by beets long before that though after reading Tom Robbins’s Jitterbug Perfume.

I wanted to quote the introduction, for the book begins and ends with beets. But as usual, I can’t find it when I’m looking for it. It’s an odd book that way and has done this to me a couple of times. I misplace it, or lend it to someone. And then I get hungry for beets. Which means I get hungry to read Tom Robbins and his eccentric description of beets. And then I can’t find it. However, I did find the first couple sentences excerpted in a review of the book:

The beet,” begins this book, “is the most intense of vegetables. The radish, admittedly, is more feverish, but the fire of the radish is a cold fire, the fire of discontent not of passion. Tomatoes are lusty enough, yet there runs through tomatoes an undercurrent of frivolity. Beets are deadly serious.

It’s an odd and funny book, best read by people in their late teens and mid-twenties, and/or those who enjoy the quirky aspects of life and the symbolism that hides in the everyday. I’ve never heard anyone describe beets as Robbins does. I think that’s why he wrote about them – because no one ever has.

Beets are stubborn, vivacious, and very much of the earth. They come in an array of colors from white, to pink, to an almost midnight magenta. The strength and audacity of their color makes me laugh whenever I cook them. The way my fingers stay pink for days afterward no matter how much I scrub them tickles me, well, pink. The greens are mild and much sweeter than other leafy greens like kale or chard. No one sells beet greens though. That fact alone makes me hate modern supermarkets on some level. Most of the beets sold in stores are large and therefore tough. Those and canned beets I think are what give people such a bad impression of them. They remind me of those grizzled men that hide in the rural corners of the world. They appear dirty, tough, and unsavory from the outside, but for a few select people they reveal themselves as compassionate and tender beyond measure. If you’re going to eat them, humor me and get them from a garden closeby or local farmer’s market. Savor the sweet earthy taste. And as I’ve told a number of people, don’t be afraid when they come out the same color they went in (ya knew I couldn’t let the poop theme die so easily).

When I uncover Jitterbug Perfume I’m sure it will be well past beet season, but if I remember I’ll post additional excerpts. In the meantime here’s one of my other favorite beet recipes:

Dilled Cucumber and Beet Salad

 Beets

Cucumber

Salt and pepper

Olive oil

White vinegar

Sour cream

Fresh dill

 

I use about 3 beets and 1 cucumber, but this recipe does not have to be exact. Feel free to adjust any of the above ingredients based on your personal preferences. 

In heavy-duty tin foil, wrap trimmed beets and some olive oil (I like to add a little garlic as well). Bake beets in foil packet for at least 1 hour at 350 degrees. Beets take a long time to cook and I find that often longer is better, and it makes it easier to peel off the skins. After you pull the beets out of the oven, slice open the packet and let the beets cool. 

Remember that no other vegetable has the chromatic perseverance of beets. Beware any surface, be it cutting board or fingers, that you don’t want stained. The color is sensuous and vibrant. Enjoy it. Rub off the skins with a paper towel. Cut beets into wedges. Toss in a bowl with 1 tbsp oil and 1 tbsp. white vinegar, salt and pepper. In another bowl, toss sliced cucumber, 2 tbsp sour cream, 1 tbsp chopped dill, and 2 tsp white vinegar. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Place beets on a platter and top with cucumbers.

 This recipe is courtesy of Tina Smith of HomeGrown Nevada Farms, who writes the newsletter for the Great Basin Basket. The Great Basin Basket is a local CSA (community supported agriculture) that provides local organic fruits and vegetables to those in the greater Reno-Sparks area for 18 weeks every summer.

Evesdropping

Setting: Mr. A and Crazy Towhead are making breakfast. CT is standing on her kid’s chair, surveying the array of vegetables and ingredients they have spread out on the counter.
CT: What do we do now?
Mr. A: I’m gonna pick my nose. Wanna help?
CT: Sure.

Setting: After breakfast, we are all sitting at the table. I’ve gotten up to get a drink of water when I hear the following.
CT: Now what are we gonna do?
Mr. A: Now I’m gonna eat your nose.
CT: But how will I smell?

Happiness

I have so much to write about today. But having just returned from a week-long vacation, I have a list of things to do that just can’t wait. However, I logged onto my computer this morning and this quote was waiting for me:

The main things which seem to me important on their own account, and not merely as means to other things, are knowledge, art, instinctive happiness, and relations of friendship or affection.
  – Bertrand Russell

This quote seemed to resonate with me and reflect a number of things going on in my life right now. One, I am editing a master’s thesis at the moment that explores Aristotle’s notion of happiness as outlined in his Nicomachean Ethics. This quote closely parallels what I have been reading, which has been really interesting thus far. Two, I spent this weekend putting together a list of “things I am grateful for” as part of a contest of sorts. In truth, it was a fabulous exercise that made me further realize what matters most and of all the blessings I have received in my short time here. We’ve also just come back from a week of visiting family and close friends, all of whom I love so much. Seeing them filled me with such good energy and happiness it was hard to leave.

I have more stories about our trip, but they have to wait. I’m off to the grocery store, the post office, the gym, and to pick up my glasses. Oh, and I’m canning apricots this afternoon. Will someone teach me how to slow down?!!