Deep – November PaD, day 23

The prompt today is “Deep,” and just in time. Today is the day I make Thanksgiving dinner, rather than Thursday, And yesterday I was depressed all day, silly, I know, but tradition is a big part of me, I suppose, more than I really knew. I had hoped to bring my son (stationed in southern Arizona with the Army) up to spend the holiday with the family, and got the news that he was unable to. Very sad. Decided to stick to the Friday dinner idea to insure the other son and daughter-in-law would be able to come to dinner, as well as one of their friends.

I pulled myself out of my depression by last evening, and bounced out of bed today to start pie, rolls, etc., so all will be ready for dinner at 7:30 p.m.  But that gloom was the beginning of the idea of the Double Fibonacci poem that follows:

Bartola by Ardenrey

Deep,
dank
the wily,
smoky, lonesome dark
of this mental dungeon where I always seem to go.
How long before I
finally
just let
it
go?

Gathering and Letting Go – November PaD day 20

The prompt is a dual prompt for Tuesday – to write about two subjects – Gathering and Letting Go. For me, this time of year is filled with baking. Baking lots and lots of pie.

Pie

1) Preparation

Gathering supplies,
sweet potatoes, apples, flour
pumpkin, mincemeat, cherries
lemon, custard, coconut.

Rolling dough,
filling pie shells
baking
baking
baking

Fragrant scents rising
from the ovens, then
cooling on the counter
lined up circles of
edible bliss.

2) Letting them go

Two to the office
luncheon,
two to go home with
co-workers,
four to the homeless shelter,
and two
to the sergeant in charge
of my soldier-son’s four-day pass for
Thanksgiving.

Just keep three or four to the side
to feed the holiday guests.

Letters and Recipes – PaD day 13

Tuesday, of course, is the day we get a dual prompt. Today’s prompts were to write about letters and recipes. We have the option to write two poems or one poem with both topics. I chose the latter this time.

Lovely Ann Sheridan

A Pinch of Cayenne

Darling,

I know you mean well,
but sometimes I wonder if you realize
just what a hot pepper you have
in me.

Don’t think this is a complaint,
exactly,
but sometimes a girl needs
a little more spice,
a little more fire,
a little more hachachacha.

Recipe:
you and me
fireplace,
glass of wine,
and a bear skin (bare skin?) rug,
and tonight after the kids are asleep
we cook.

What do you say?

Your loving wife,

Cayenne

Southern Cooking, Part III

After visiting Myrtle Beach we had no recourse but to drive through state highways in South Carolina to get back to Charlotte, North Carolina, in order to leave from Charlotte the next day. It wasn’t that far in miles, but it was endless in traffic. I am surprised there are no interstates that go to Myrtle Beach, but perhaps that is part of the charm? We drove forever at slow-traffic speeds in the tree tunnels (see previous post for reference) and we weary travelers when we made it back to the hotel that evening.

But we still had to eat and we went (on the advice of the hotel clerk, Ferlandos) to a soul food place called “LuWan’s.”

La’Wan’s Soul Food, Charlotte, NC

The waiter was hilarious, he loved talking, and when I told him I was going to post the food on my blog, he insisted in holding up my dinner for me to take the picture. (I had catfish, collards, and mashed potatoes and gravy.)

Mmm, yummy catfish!

T had whitefish, and okra instead of collards. (The collards were PERFECT, by the way!! Just a little spicy and a little bacony and a little sweet. Yum!)

Whitefish, Okra, soul food is fantastic!

T likes okra much better than fried pickles. ^_^ He says it doesn’t need any sauce to make it palatable, but I just say ewww, okra is slimy. :p

And for one last picture, a picture of a boat we saw in Georgetown, SC. Its name was funny, to me at least.

Not such a bad “Plan B” I’m thinking

 

Southern Cooking

Went to Sauceman’s BBQ in Charlotte last night for dinner. I had the Shrimp and Grits, T had a bbq sandwich and fried pickles. (Okay, he didn’t pick those, I urged them on him because it sounded weird and fun.)

Here are some pics:

Shrimp & Grits at Sauceman’s BBQ in Charlotte, NC

I like grits, but these were heavenly! The texture was creamy and delicious. The only thing I didn’t like was that the shrimps were too salty. I liked the cajun spices on them, but there was just too much salt. Thankfully, the cheesy grits helped compensate for the salt. Yum.

Fried Pickles; Sauceman’s BBQ, Charlotte, NC

The fried pickles were good by themselves, if a little harsh. But once they were dipped in the ranch dressing, it was an explosion of flavor. Even T got to like them after he dipped in the ranch dressing.

Sauceman’s BBQ, Charlotte, NC

Sorry for the blurriness of this picture – it was a cell phone. My REAL camera is charged now!! Hopefully any more pictures will be much better.

And yes, it was rainy when we arrived. It is rainy as I type this in our hotel room in Charlotte. We hear the weather will be clearing up a little later in the week.

Until next time!

April 20, Let’s Make Jam

Prompt today was another fill-in-the-blank prompt: “Let’s ______.” I think yesterday’s poem got me reminiscing, so the first is about Blackberry jam. The second will follow momentarily!

###

Let’s Make Jam

The blackberries are ready,
go get some buckets
we’ll strip those vines clean
in no time!

Grandma has sugar,
she’s boiling the jars
and went do the store for
some lids and some pectin.

And with buckets of berries
we wash ‘em all clean,
the scratches on our legs
and arms throbbing
quietly,
our lips blue with
blackberry juice.

And we put the ingredients
in the pot grandma
uses for canning,
stained golden
brown by all the years
and all the fruit
and vegetables that
have passed through,
ghosts of summers past.

Cooking and stirring,
we take turns, skimming
the foam
but only grandma knows how long
to cook the berries,
and when they’re ready, the
jars lined up like soldiers
she dips the jam and
ladles the jam,
with hardly a spill.

Once the lids are on the waiting
begins. We usually don’t get a taste until
the next day. The jar that didn’t
seal right is our lawful prey.

And if we’re lucky,
Grandma has fresh bread to go
with the jam,
and it vanishes just as quickly
as we did when it
was time to wash up.

Fear

I’ve come to a conclusion: Most of my adult fears have to do with tales my mother told me to make me behave.

Seriously.

For instance, she told me that the pressure cooker was a highly dangerous pot and to merely touch it would cause it to explode. When I asked why it never exploded when she touched it, she said that she knew how to touch it properly. And so I was afraid of pressure cookers for the rest of my life.

And we were also told (when we lived on a street next to railroad tracks) that they were electrified. Randomly. We would never know when the ZAP would come, we would just be dead. Of course, this was to prevent us from putting quarters and pennies on the tracks to have the train mash them, and it didn’t really work for the other kids, though it worked very well on me. (Gullible? Me? Probably should have been my middle name.)

I’m going to be 50 this year, and this is the year I finally got over my fear of pressure cookers, which is ridiculous, but there you have it. I feel there will be more explorations of fears, and if I find the root of said fears are tales from my mother or some other trusted adult, I will have to reconsider.
As I always say, being a grown-up ain’t what it’s cracked up to be.

Two for Tuesday – Fruits/Veggies

The prompt today,  as a Tuesday prompt, is a duo. Write one poem with a fruit title and another with a vegetable title. I wrote about two veggies, though, because the fruit one was long and I thought the veggies should have equal time. (And now that I’m done, I notice that my trio all begin with “B.” I wonder why?)

Blackberries

In Oregon, blackberry vines
are everywhere.
If they can get a toehold,
they take over.

Some of my earliest memories
involve my great-grandma
in her sunbonnet (!)
using her grub-hoe
to banish the unwelcome
visitors.

She had some
tenderly cultivated
vines
and she didn’t appreciate the
wild interlopers
trying to cross-breed
with her babies,
making them produce,
seedy
sour
fruit.

At harvest time, the briar patch
was immense.
We took buckets and
cautiously
wound
wended
crept
through the vines,
accumulating
berries
scratched arms
and legs
and purple
lips.

And the jam was
the best I’ve ever had.

# # #
Brussels Sprouts

Oh, oft-maligned and
somewhat seasonal sprout of
Brussels. I’ll eat you.

Broccoli

Eat your broccoli trees!
Best way to get kids to eat?
Just be dinosaurs.

Excess

The prompt for the Poem-a-Day challenge today is “Excess.” This was a relief. I was so distressed over yesterday’s math prompt I was relieved to have a normal prompt. I wrote two poems about excess: One is about my own difficulties and another is about other people. You’ll see what I mean.

 

Too Much Food

Pot roast made for six or eight

Dessert as well, you’d wager

The hearty appetites to sate

of two or three teenagers.

 

Homemade lasagna, oven baked

with garlic bread all toasty

This kind of cooking can’t be faked

and that’s not being boasty.

 

Since nine or ten I’ve baked the bread

I was my mom’s apprentice

My sibs and then my kids were fed

Mountainous meals momentous.

 

And so you see why now I find

myself in a bit of trouble.

My recipes all seem so blind

to cook for just a couple.

 

I try to make the meals more small

Enough for two is plenty

But always fall under the thrall

of food for more than twenty.

 

I watch my waistline with concern

It’s having such a high time.

I think with practice I can learn

to cook meals for two this lifetime.

 

In the meanwhile the neighborhood

stray cats and dogs are thriving

on all the leftover meals and such

on my front porch arriving.

 

###

 

Dumpster Diving

In our neighborhood

we find

so many people

are so wasteful

as to throw things

away

when they are perfectly

good

items.

 

This may sound gross

and I’m sure

someone

will think it

disgusting,

but

sometimes

I go

dumpster diving.

 

It’s not for me,

it’s just that

I can’t abide things

landing

in a landfill

when local

charities

can surely use

and sell

those things.

 

Though I admit,

I did find

a perfectly lovely

steamer trunk

from 1919 one time

and now

it is my living room

coffee table.

Addiction

Wow, today’s prompt was kind of a shock at first glance. Addiction? Seriously? But that’s because of my first thought: drug addiction and all the baggage that goes with that. So then I thought about other ways to be addicted. I think I’ve come up with a whimsical-enough solution to suit my nature. ^_^

My Crafty Addiction

It started with cooking

to help mom save time

helping with dinner

at about age nine.

That turned to baking.

I just love to bake:

cookies and candy

bread, pie and cake.

As a young woman

I learned how to sew

I worked at a theater

making costumes to go.

Then I took up knitting

and crochet and more:

Yoga and ceramics

and camping galore.

And writing, wow, writing

Now that is so fun!

Novels and poetry;

I’ve only begun!

Lately I’ve looked at

making jewelry too.

Cliff diving? Gardening?

I’ll just add a few.

But I have a question

It’s not that hard to see:

Am I running my life,

or is it running me?