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Archives for July 2020

Meals in the Time of Covid

July 28, 2020 By admin

Foodcentric. Is that really a word? Whether it is or isn’t, we are all thinking more about food, and most likely eating more as well. Avid chefs and bakers have been with us forever. They share recipes, post their food porn on Facebook, and are talking about food all the time.

Along comes a pandemic forcing everyone to shelter in place and the next thing I know, everyone is making hand-made pasta, inventing new muffins or perfecting their naan bread. It’s like the food fairy came down and sprinkled magic cooking dust over the entire world. Now everyone you know is talking about what they are cooking and baking.

When restaurants were forced to shut down, it left millions of people jonesing for the sociability and entertainment that was central to going out to eat. If you could no longer meet friends for dinner out, the next best option was to cook at home for loved ones. Early on in the shutdown, you would go to a grocery store and realize that eggs and flour were sold out…shelves were emptied. The baking and cooking had begun and pity the cooks who did not get their supplies in time.

The supply chain recovered and we’re all taking advantage of carry-out food, as a break from our own cooking, but also to try and support hard-hit restaurants that are doing everything they can to hang on. Stuck at home for much of the time, we’re turning to dead tree cookbooks and recipe websites to come up with new ideas for mealtime, and we’re not looking for fruity pancakes or tuna casseroles. No ma’am. We’re going for the hard stuff. Exotic Indian food, empanadas, lobster ravioli, shaksuka, and lemon merengue pie. Seven days a week, 3 meals a day. It’s a lot of pressure. Try not repeating the same meal for a month or more.

I’m not sure where all this is going to end, but it’s safe to say that meals in your house have either gotten a lot more interesting or there’s a huge pile of used take-out containers to go to recycling.

Jay Harrison is a graphic designer and writer whose work can be seen at DesignConcept. His mystery novel, Head Above Water, is available on Amazon and Kindle. You can also visit his author page here.

Filed Under: ESSAY

Visible

July 28, 2020 By admin

I’m an old man, okay? I’m finally starting to realize that. Slowly. One loss at a time. For instance, I used to run to and around a neighborhood park before breakfast three times a week. Now I walk there and sit on a bench before heading back. That kind of thing. That, and then there’s a young woman who walks by, briskly, probably on her way to work. I say young. Well not that young, maybe in her thirties. Late thirties. But to a guy in his late seventies, that’s young.

My head snaps when she passes. That’s hard-wiring from an earlier age and an aesthetic judgment. She’s art on the hoof. And I’ve always appreciated art so don’t think I’m a horny old fart coasting on fumes of hormones past. I’m not. My attitude with this particular lady is a different thing. I have tried saying, “Hi,” as she cruises by. She never answers. Just keeps going. I find that annoying and even insulting. I just want her to say “Hi” back. Or even just wave her hand to acknowledge that I’m alive, to affirm my presence among the living. You get overlooked a lot when you’re older…fade into the woodwork of life.

One morning, before the woman came by, there was a young dog running loose, scared, excited, chasing here and there looking for something, for someone. I walked near him. Knelt. Held out my hand with a piece of my bagel. He was cute, short, mostly beagle with maybe some Jack Russell. I spoke softly, crooning. “Here, boy. Don’t be frightened.” He stopped five feet from me, head down nose forward. No collar. As he inched forward to snatch the treat, a woman spoke behind me. “He must be lost, poor baby.” I looked over my shoulder. It was my ice lady. “Look,” she began, like she was used to command…maybe in an office or a bank, “why don’t you stay by your bench with him and I’ll contact the shelter.” She pulled out her cell phone, punching digits, talking, before hurrying away.

‘Your bench’, she called it. Like I owned it. So, she has noticed me there. Hmm. She just could never be bothered to stop and say hello.

A week later, I’m sitting on my bench, Mylo on a leash…the shelter let me adopt him. The woman stops to pet my dog, scratch behind his ears. She smiles at me, says “Hi.” I don’t answer. That’s all I ever wanted from her.

Retired trainer, and writing instructor, Joe Novara and his wife live in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Writings include novels, short stories, a memoir and various poems, plays, anthologies and articles. Read more at https://freefloatingstories.wordpress.com/

Filed Under: ESSAY

Conjurer

July 28, 2020 By admin

My goal at this stage of life is to move closer to my true self. To shake off the shackles of past regrets and sorrows; to challenge what the world expects of me as a woman in her 60’s; to let go of concern about what people might think of my antics. I am free now, after all. I can try different jobs, since my value as a person is no longer defined by what I do or how much I earn. Maybe I’ll work on a lavender farm, or in a bookstore, or in a shop that sells crystals and beads. Maybe I’ll learn something new and start a small business. Maybe I’ll dress in wild outfits, let my hair grow out, keep my own hours.

I have so many choices now, but I can’t decide what word best describes me as I embark on this path of elderhood. The ones available for an older woman have her ugly, grumpy, or wicked: Crone, Sorceress, Hellcat, Shrew, Virago, Hag, Beldam. There are others, such as Wise Woman or Wisdom Keeper, but they seem presumptuous. I have learned some things along the way, but age is not an automatic granter of wisdom.

I see myself as like one of the witches in Macbeth, stirring a cauldron of magic potions to cast a spell: “Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn and caldron bubble. Cool it with a baboon’s blood, Then the charm is firm and good.” Well, not quite like one of those witches, since they are described in Macbeth as withered and wild unearthly beings bent on harm. My magic, my stirring of the pot and conjuring will be done for the good of others. Mixing herbs into teas and salves for healing and health. Weaving stories out of gossamer threads of thoughts and dreams to amuse, comfort, and cause readers to say yes that’s how it is. Spinning straw into gold. Speaking out and performing deeds that reap good in the world.

I settle on conjurer for the word that best describes me as I go forward from here. There is a power to it, an energy. It is the power women have always had and that men have always known and feared. Why else would words like Sorceress, Witch, Siren and all the others have come down through the ages? I plan to make the most of it.

Lee Stevens is conjuring and enjoying life in Hendersonville, NC

Filed Under: ESSAY

Coming for You

July 9, 2020 By admin

They’re not trying to kill us. It’s not their intention but it may be the result. Many millennials and Gen Z’ers have the attitude that they are invulnerable to Covid-19, so it’s time to party on. It does not occur to them that they could be bringing the infection to their boomer grandmother the next time they drop in for a family dinner.

Were we really any different when we were that young? Of course not. We took risks without thinking about the consequences. We drove too fast. We drank too much alcohol. We took drugs even when we didn’t know what they were or what effects they might have. We had unsafe sex. You would have to admit we were young and dumb.

Maybe then, it’s a little disingenuous for us to complain that younger generations are acting irresponsibly. What really disturbs us is that their complacency could kill us. We were looking forward (and this is going to sound strange) to growing old and dying in bed at, oh, let’s say 93. Give or take a few years. Now we have to contemplate not making it out of our 70s because some whippersnapper (not sure where that term is coming from) has to hang out with his 200 friends at a bar downtown while not wearing a mask.

You could look at this as karma coming back to bite us in the ass. We got away with taking all those risks in our 20’s and 30’s but our destiny may be that we will be brought down too soon by a kid who just wanted to party with friends. It almost makes you want to give up and join the party. I said ALMOST. We need to keep our distance from these party goers, wear the mask at all times, and keep washing our hands. Our fate should remain in our hands as long as we can hold onto it. If your twenty-something grandkid or nephew wants to come by the house, JUST SAY NO.

Jay Harrison is a graphic designer and writer whose work can be seen at DesignConcept. His mystery novel, Head Above Water, is available on Amazon and Kindle. You can also visit his author page here.

Filed Under: ESSAY

Roots

July 9, 2020 By admin

As a child, I wanted my family to be more interesting. To have foods and traditions that defined us as something other than yet another 1960’s suburban family with four kids, two parents, and a station wagon with wood-grained trim. I wanted to at least be like the neighbors, who were Italian. Their pot of spaghetti sauce made from an ancestral recipe simmered on the stove all day, with aromas of garlic, onions, meat, and herbs reaching my nose through their open windows.

“I danced the Highland Fling as a child at the Scottish Club,” my mother offered me, as she demonstrated a few moves in the kitchen.

Occasionally lefse would appear in our refrigerator, a Norwegian potato flatbread that my father would smear with butter, sprinkle with sugar, and proclaim heaven sent as he ate it. And he always wanted my mother to make fattigman, also known as poor man cookies, at the holidays, but she resisted because she was health conscious and they are deep fried.

Her resistance to frying fattigman paled, though, in comparison to the father-son battles over rutabagas that were waged at every holiday meal. After the turkey was carved, and the side dishes were passed around, my father would insist that my brother have some of the mashed rutabaga that was always on the menu. Orange and slightly bitter, I liked the taste and its contrast to the sweeter side dishes, but my brother, usually an adventurous eater, hated it.

I don’t know my father’s history with rutabaga – perhaps it was a connection to his mother who died when he was 11 – or maybe it was a food his Norwegian grandparents served. Rutabaga is a popular staple on the Scandinavian table – mashed with carrots and potatoes, baked into casseroles, made into soup. A cross between a cabbage and a turnip, it can be grown in cold climates and stored through long winters.

Whatever the source of my father’s love for rutabagas, he had a strong need for us all to appreciate them at every Thanksgiving and Christmas meal. But my brother’s equally strong resistance to eating them turned every holiday meal into a battle scene. I guess family traditions can come in all flavors, and ours was bittersweet. Today, I continue to enjoy rutabagas, and my brother reports that he likes them too, so this tradition anyway, has not stood the test of time.

Lee Stevens appreciates her Scottish and Norwegian roots as she writes and enjoys like in Hendersonville, NC

 

Filed Under: ESSAY

BORE-RING

July 9, 2020 By admin

Are you bored yet? I’m not, but it’s worse.

I’m boring.

Sometimes it feels like my range of thoughts and emotions is increasingly smaller, less invigorating, numbing.

It’s not as though my life was filled with a cornucopia of exciting activities before the lockdown began, but that was by design. I don’t want an action-packed life. Still, the simple things I used to do with my time and micro-interactions with people kept me interested and interesting. I had lots of things to write about.

My brain can only hold so much, and my “interested and interesting” brain cells went on idle to make room for COVID-19, a bad tenant trashing the cheap real estate in my head. I want to evict him and make room for happy and creative thoughts.

Sadly, COVID-19, in some form or fashion, is most likely here for the long haul … which means I can’t completely evict him from my brain. My goal is to lock him in the basement and only let him out when I need critical information.

Perhaps we can all free up happy space in our brains as we get closer to a new normal that in some way approximates how we used to live. I feel like we’re on the cusp of getting some of it back.

Social animals may not find the new normal acceptable, but I can see how it might work for us. Dale and I don’t do large gatherings anyway. Our “normal” includes trips to the grocery store, golf, wine tasting. The occasional road trip.

Seriously, I could wear a mask and be socially distant forever if I have to. Masks are cool. Have you noticed the anti-aging effects? It’s like wrinkles be gone. You’ll look 10 years younger!

Donna Pekar is an aging badass (for real) who lives in California and writes Retirement Confidential.

 

Filed Under: ESSAY

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