A few of my favorite cookbooks along with some pumpkin peanut butter bread

Open my cookbook cupboard with caution. If you move too quickly, you’ll be deluged with recipe clippings. Because though I have a good many cookbooks, I’m always hungry to try something new.

My mother had a similar cupboard stuffed full of both cookbooks and loose clippings. An enthusiastic cook with a large family to feed, she loved supplementing favorite recipes from the red-and-white checked cooking bible of her era: The Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook.

My go-to cookbook–The Fanny Farmer Cookbook–was the first gift I ever gave my then future husband. He’d learned to cook from a paperback edition found in a drawer of a Korean apartment he lived in as a young Mormon missionary. Valentine’s Day came around a few months into our courtship and not wanting to play my hand too broadly, I figured a cookbook he’d mentioned with fond feelings might convey just enough interest in heating up our relationship.

After our marriage, Fanny was joined by other staples of the ‘80s – Julee Rosso and Sheila Lukins’ The Silver Palate Cookbooks, Martha Stewart’s Entertaining and Maida Heatter’s Book of Great Desserts.

Cookbooks by celebrated local chef/authors like Alice Waters, Deborah Madison and Marion Cunningham (who would revise Fanny) would eventually fill up my cookbook cupboard.

I also added clippings from the San Francisco Chronicle and the Los Angeles Times. Reading their weekly food sections was a treat I looked forward to consuming.

As a new college graduate and young bride, I worked as a receptionist in the management office of the neo-Gothic Russ Building in downtown San Francisco. Across the hall from my office was a spacious “Ladies Lounge” filled with couches and chairs left over from the Mad Men era. Secretaries would retreat there during their lunch hours to nibble on sack lunches and read paperback novels.

I remember devouring a range of literary pleasures there—Pride & Prejudice and The Far Pavilions are two titles that come to mind. But every Wednesday, I would buy the Times at the lobby newsstand and quickly turn to its food section, having already read the Chronicle’s on my morning commute.

One of the recipes that I clipped during that period is still a fall favorite. Its ingredients are as varied as my reading tastes—pumpkin and peanut butter chips. But the result is surprisingly good—like a mix of classic literature and contemporary romance.

I wish I still had the original clipping so I could credit the contributor and discover this quick bread’s origin, but alas, all I have is my own handwritten notes that attribute it to the Chronicle without a date. Seems I wasn’t as devoted to historical accuracy then as I am now.

Over this pandemic year, I developed an increased appetite for newspaper recipes. The New York Times temporarily replaced its Sunday Travel section with a new section called “At Home.” Each week it featured five simple recipes to help us all survive sheltering in place. Once things opened up this summer, the section closed down. I miss that weekly feast.

However, a regular diet of newspaper clippings over the pandemic didn’t keep me from indulging in a few new cookbooks –Joanne Chang’s Pastry Love and Claire Saffitz’s Dessert Person are favorites. They came to my attention through reviews and sample recipes in newspaper food sections. Which is why I’ll keep clipping and you should be careful if you ever open my cookbook cupboard.

PUMPKIN BREAD WITH PEANUT BUTTER CHIPS

3 1/2 c. unsifted all-purpose flour

3 c. sugar

2 tsp. baking soda

1 1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. cinnamon

2 c. cooked or canned pumpkin

2/3 c. water

1 c. vegetable oil

4 eggs

2 c. (12 oz pkg) peanut butter chips

1 c. chopped nuts

1 c. raisins (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour three 8 1/2 x 4 1/2 x 2 1/2-inch loaf pans (or two larger pans.) Blend dry ingredients in a medium mixing bowl. In a large bowl blend pumpkin, oil, water and eggs.

Gradually add dry ingredients until well blended. Stir in peanut butter chips, nuts and raisins. Pour into greased and floured pans. Bake for 50-60 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean.  Cool in pan ten minutes and remove from pan to cool completely.

Note: My husband and several of my kids prefer this without raisins. Go figure. It’s still good. Especially toasted and slathered with butter. Peanut butter chips can sometimes be hard to find. Do not be tempted to substitute butterscotch chips—they’re too sweet.

This essay originally appeared on paperlanternwriters.com

As I began to backstroke, I noted that the clouds were exceptionally big and ominous. The swim team was in the middle of their workout and I remember how noisy it was—the air filled with the sound of kids laughing and splashing and throwing each other into the deep end. That was the last time I heard a group of kids goofing off.

The pool and most of my world shut down the next day. March 16 became more than a square on a calendar page; it was a stop sign, marking a division between what came Before and what has happened After.

Before SIP, my last plane ride was on February 26 from Washington D.C. to Oakland. I was returning from a legislative conference where there’d been some talk of a new virus found in China. I remember being extra aware of my fellow passengers and thoroughly wiping down my armrests and tray table and that little air vent above my seat with lavender-scented anti-bacterial wipes. Upon my return, I learned that one of the other conference delegates had been diagnosed with COVID-19. Turned out that I was the airline passenger who was a potential carrier.

My last trip to a live performance was on March 11 by way of a ghostly BART car where my sister and I were the only occupants. We arrived to find a nearly empty theater and were soon encouraged to move to the front by Sting, his broken arm in a sling. We were there to see his musical “The Last Ship.” That night the production sailed for the last time.

The next day, on March 12, I met up with friends for a planned outing to the UC Botanical Garden. By then the news was alerting us that we were only safe if we gathered outside and at a distance. We did our best to keep somewhat seperated, but we hadn’t yet learned that six feet was the approximate length of a shopping cart. We spread out for a group photo and nervously chattered about what was to come.

On March 16, when I was taking those few last laps in the pool, my husband went into the office for the last time, coming home with a few files, just in case. We’d soon spend more time together than we’d ever spent in our forty years of marriage. But we wouldn’t celebrate our milestone anniversary with our family as planned.

A friend tells me she’ll never forget her last handshake, but I don’t remember whose hand I last shook. I can’t pinpoint my last meal inside a restaurant. I don’t recall the last movie I saw in a theater. I can’t hum the last hymn I sang at in-person church. I wish I could.

But if I’m counting the lasts, I must also tally the firsts.

Like my first mask, hand-sewn by my sister. The first time I wore that mask to a store and my glasses were so foggy I gave up before acquiring half the things on my list. The first time I sanitized those same groceries before putting them away.

The first time our kids drove up from L.A., not sure what to do now that their baby’s daycare had closed, and they still had full-time jobs that would now happen from home where they were suddenly full-time parenting—so, maybe moving back home would be the answer? At least they could go shopping for us.

(A week of our chilly spring weather convinced them to return to sunnier climes and figure stuff out.)

The first time I had a multi-generational, multi-location surprise birthday party via zoom. The first remote funeral I attended, broadcast from a funeral home several states away.

The first COVID test administered in a Kaiser parking lot; done so thoroughly that my eyes watered for an hour. The first (and thankfully only) time the raccoons got to the DoorDash dinner on our porch before we did.

I think about those early After months of confusion and isolation and want to weep. But I also recall how the fog of COVID-times created space to pursue new things. A Zoom lecture taught me how to sketch the birds that kept me company. A tweet tipped me off to an online book group that spurred me to finally read “War and Peace.” An Instagram post led me to a writing workshop that birthed my second novel.

Speaking of births, we just welcomed our fourth grandchild. He will hopefully be the first and the last baby born into our family during a pandemic. He is one of the gifts of this year; something I will treasure even when I’m once again backstroking to the sound of children at play.

A version of this essay first appeared in the Piedmont Exedra.

A photo of my local gas station made it into the New York Times this week. It showed a bunch of cars lined up for gas as residents prepared for what’s become the deadliest month of the year. October is always warm and dry, but in the last few years things have gotten worse as “devil” winds fuel firestorm infernos.

In order to forestall another disaster, Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) turned off the power to nearly 600,000 residents. We were one of the chosen.

With ample texts and emails this week alerting us that this was going to happen, we couldn’t claim we weren’t warned. But that doesn’t mean I felt prepared when the lights went out.

I’d gathered batteries and flashlights, cooked up some perishables and pantry items so they wouldn’t go to waste, scored some elusive ice to keep everything cool if not cold, filled the bathtub just in case we didn’t have water, charged portable batteries and printed work documents I might need off my computer. I made sure there was gas in the car; did all the laundry.

No stranger to power outages—I grew up in the wilds of Idaho, after all—I still fretted over what was to come.

When would the power go off? When would it come back on again? We were told it could be off for as long as five days. Did I have enough canned tuna and almond M&M’s for five days?

The thing is—we knew this would be a selective power shortage. I could likely drive down a few miles away where there wasn’t a shortage and buy anything I needed. I could drop by my sister’s or a friend’s place and charge my phone. Worse come to worse, I’d go watch Renee Zellweger warble “Come Rain or Come Shine.”

What I couldn’t do was work on my desktop computer or catch up on my DVR listings.  I also hesitated to listen to podcasts or make calls in case I ran down my old iPhone 6 battery.

Stranded in the silence, I made a list of analog activities to fill my day:

Read a book

Read an e-book

Write by hand

Knit

Don’t check your phone

Cut out a new quilt

Go for a walk in the woods

Play the piano

Garden

Meditate

Journal

Don’t check your phone.

This was starting to look like a list of My Favorite Things.

Add to that some long-delayed tasks like:

Sort out the laundry closet

Clear off your desk

Donate old clothes

Don’t check your phone

It seemed that PG&E was gifting me the Zen lifestyle I aspire to.

The pinch was getting all that done in the daylight. When daylight lasts less than twelve hours, one must ‘hop to.’ The sun waits for no one.

I discovered that being forced to pay attention to the sun meant I couldn’t ignore a glorious sunset. After spending a quiet day reading, sorting, and noshing through my emergency Halloween candy, I was rewarded with a sky aflame as we left the dark house for the back deck, ate rosemary beans on grilled bread, buttered turnips and apple cake, grateful there had been no firestorm to disrupt the silence.

Thinking of all those in SoCal who are suffering the fall fires now. May they be safe and comforted.

Other older friends tell me to “jump on in, the water’s fine.” Having known them for years I love that they’re more curious and engaged with the world than they’ve ever been. More secure. Less distracted by others’ expectations. They continue to create and connect in ways that I admire and aspire to.

We’re all a little bit broken which paradoxically makes us a lot more whole. We share recommendations for fix-it folk: doctors, dentists, acupuncturists, nutritionists.  We commiserate over the things that don’t have a quick fix—mostly our kids and the world they’re inheriting. Now that some loved ones are gone, we comfort each other about the things beyond repair.

The older we get, the more we celebrate each passing year.  Not with the perfect dinner party or the splashiest bash, but with spontaneous lunches and casual suppers built around take-out menus.

For my sixtieth, I was lucky enough to have several of these intimate events including a small gathering of girlfriends at my friend Pauline’s incredible backyard built behind a warehouse over train tracks in West Oakland. In lieu of gifts I asked  the guests—whose ages happily spanned six decades—to each bring a single flower to make a bouquet that I’d take home to remind me of my good fortune in having such colorful, entertaining friends.  In return I passed out temporary floral tattoos to signify that I’m sixty and anything goes! (Gabby Blair was one of the guests and did a nice write-up here.)

That night, I enjoyed a beautiful dinner with MJ at Chez Panisse. We first moved to the Bay Area thirty-eight years ago and attended church right around the corner.  My birthday dinner was a pilgrimage not only to the birthplace of California cuisine, but to our own California roots. Opting for something other than the pre-fix offering, I chose an eggplant fritter over a lamb chop having never acquired a taste for lamb since my dad was a cattle rancher.

We would travel home to Idaho for the 4th of July and had plans for a farther-flung birthday trip later on this year, but I also wanted to spend some time on my own around my birthday to ponder how far I’d come.

So, the weekend after I turned sixty, I drove south to Mt. Madonna, a mountaintop retreat center built on ground sacred to the native American Ohlone indians next to a forest where Italian stone masons saw an apparition of the Madonna. I went for a yoga retreat—my first—and soon discovered there was very little time for solitary assessment. What with sage smudging, sound bathing, essential oils tutelage, an astrological natal chart reading, chakra-clearing yoga,  a summer solstice ritual, worship services at the on-sight Hindu temple and heavy doses of Aleve to keep up with the younger yogis, I was practically levitating by the time the weekend was over.  My ayurvedic massage therapist anointed me with so much sunflower oil spiked with sandalwood, lavender and frankincense that it was a miracle I didn’t spontaneously ignite in the 100-degree weather.

Regarding the natal chart reading. . .for weeks I’d been searching for my birth hour in order to find out where the stars were at the time of my birth—a requirement to have my astrological natal chart read. Given that my official birth certificate didn’t list it, the hospital I was born in doesn’t exist anymore and my mom’s recollection was somewhat vague (I’m the oldest of nine children, after all), I was pretty much out of luck.  But then I made one last phone call to the nursing home that had bought the old hospital building and discovered that they were in possession of the records.  Blessings on the staff member who took the time to set up a microfiche machine, hunt down the info about my birth and then called me On My Birthday with my birth time (3:50 p.m.) so that I could become acquainted with my celestial birth map. Gemini Sun/Libra Moon/Scorpio Ascending—that’s me!

The night I arrived at Mt. Madonna, a large turtle emerged from the pond across from my spartan dorm room. I swear he or she was calling to me, though do turtles make noises? I confess to knowing almost nothing about turtles. Still, one of my earliest memories is of a big turtle crawling into my Idaho backyard. It must have been in the summer—perhaps near my birthday—because there was no snow on the ground. Dad said it probably came up from the Snake River about a mile away. I wonder whatever happened to that star-crossed turtle. I don’t remember now if our little black dog was there then but I suspect if he was he wouldn’t have left that alien creature alone as it crawled slowly—silently?—through the stubby lawn. (I bear a faint scar on my palm  from when “Blackie” bit me on what I now know is a very long life line.)

I descended from the mountain well-moisturized and well-versed in practices that have lingered since my Age of Aquarius childhood. I also came back with sore knees and a little turtle trinket from the retreat center bookstore. Inscribed on the back is an admonition for patience–good advice as my flexibility wanes and my goals now take on a certain urgency. I’ve since read that in many cultures, turtles are seen as an emblem of longevity and stability due to their long lifespan, slow movement, sturdiness and wrinkled appearance. At sixty, I’m grateful to have these–and so many other lovely things–in abundance.

]]> http://thingselemental.com/2018/08/on-turning-60/feed/ 2 http://thingselemental.com/2018/01/winter-reads/ http://thingselemental.com/2018/01/winter-reads/#comments Wed, 17 Jan 2018 01:36:15 +0000 kathryn http://thingselemental.com/?p=5857 The sun is hiding today.  Taking a rest from all those brilliant days and exquisite sunsets we had through the holidays.  I peeked outside at the mauve hellebores barely visible in the fog before scurrying back inside to pick up a new book someone thought I’d like for Christmas or an old favorite that nobody else quite gets. I’m enjoying browsing through a gift, Preserving the Japanese Way: Traditions of Salting, Fermenting and Pickling for the Modern Kitchen by Nancy Singleton Hachisu while rooting for the displaced heroine and pickle-maker Sunja in Min Jin Lee’s Pachinko.  I’m also dreaming of warmer places through the sunny SoCal and South of France interiors in designer Kathryn Ireland’s Kathryn at Home and fascinated by the domestic doings Inside the Victorian Home: A Portrait of Domestic Life in Victorian England by Judith Flanders. Something I put under the tree for myself.

But today isn’t all about snuggling up and staying in. I’m also packing for some winter adventures.  The first is this weekend to Utah to do some novel research and attend a conference on Mormon Arts.  I’m packing with one eye on the chilly weather there and one on the frigid weather of our just-booked trip to Korea next month to attend the Winter Olympics.  A good friend who has been part of the Olympics going back to the Salt Lake City games in 2002 says the Pyeongchang Olympics will be the coldest Olympics in modern history.

Winter sports enthusiasts says that if you can keep your feet warm, you’ll be fine.  So last week I swung by REI to look at some Serious Snow Boots.  Alas, I have Seriously Long Feet and even the few size 11s they had in stock scrunched my toes.  Assuming I’ll need boots big enough to accomodate thick socks and maybe some of those little packets of feet warmers that skiers use, I went to the Sorel website and discovered that they had a few size 12s still available. Of course, this time of year the pickings are slim, but I was able to order this All-American looking pair with the Italian name. My toes have plenty of wiggle-room which means these boots are getting a trial run in Utah.

They will certainly be far superior to the footwear my characters wore while homesteading in 19^th century Utah and Idaho.  Even the fancy folk in Victoria’s court never had it so good. And poor Sunja making pickles and battling the cold in Japan and Korea would never have dreamt of the affordable yet luxurious footwear that for me is just a click away.

What are you reading this winter?  Does a change in season affect what you read?

Though we’re likely to get just a handful of trick-or-treaters tonight, it didn’t seem right not to have candy at the door.  So, I swung by the local CVS and wandered the aisles looking for something to serve the brave ghouls and goblins who navigated their way to us. If I had a skeletal metabolism I would have stocked up on Midnight Milky Ways but having a bowlful around the house is just too scary.  I could have chosen something MJ likes, like Smartees, but he’s trying to keep those devilish pounds away as well. I finally settled on a pack of assorted Tootsie Roll products.  They’re not that tempting to me and wouldn’t induce a house egging from an intrepid trick-or-treater (I came all the way here for Dum Dums?) More than that, Tootsie Rolls were my dad’s signature candy. He always carried them in his pocket to hand out to kids at church or grandkids visiting the farm.  If All Hallows Eve followed by All Saints Day and All Souls Day is a season for remembering our dead, I can’t think of a better way to honor my dearly departed dad than with a bowl full of Tootsie Rolls.

Happy Halloween!

When my brother Bruce sent an email to the whole family telling us that this summer there would be a total eclipse of the sun visible from mom’s backyard, I thought “big whoop.”  I mean, I’d seen a few partial lunar eclipses before and they were interesting but not life-changing.  Nevertheless, a major celestial event seemed like as good an excuse as any to head home to Idaho for a few days so I booked tickets and didn’t think much more about it.

Gradually, the light dawned on me and I figured out this was going to be a Really Big Deal.  Several people recommended Annie Dillard’s essay “Total Eclipse” so I read it and was intrigued–and a little spooked–by her apocalyptic recollections of seeing a total solar eclipse.  I also read an interview with astronomer Neil DeGrass Tyson  who, when asked about one travel destination that everyone should see, replied “a total solar eclipse, wherever in the world that may take you. . .the ‘destination’ is the event, not the location.” Maybe seeing a total eclipse was a bucket list item after all.

Helen Macdonald’s essay “How to Stay Sane During A Total Solar Eclipse” convinced me that experiencing the event with my extended family was going to be memorable despite the attendant inconveniences of travel, housing, bathrooms, meals, etc.  “When you stand and watch the death of the sun and see it reborn, there can be no them, only us,” she wrote.  What better bonding activity could there be than to experience a total eclipse with my Loosli-related clan?

As it turned out, forty-one members of my family gathered at mom’s place—a farm located eight miles outside of small town Ashton, Idaho. In order to accommodate everyone a small tent city rose up in the back yard. Fortunately, only one of the tents got completely soaked by a large rolling irrigation sprinkler in the adjacent field and had to be moved at 3:00 a.m.

The night before the eclipse we kicked things off with a “Light & Dark” opening ceremony where we sang songs both sacred (“Lead Kindly Light”) and silly (“You Light Up My Life”), did interpretative dance to “Total Eclipse of the Heart” and played an eclipse-themed game of charades.  My brother Joel’s contribution was a dramatic reading from Stephanie Meyers’s Twilight volume “Eclipse” while other family members acted out the purple prose.  The program concluded with a scientific explanation by my brother Bruce, a Boeing engineer, about what we would experience the next day.

Everyone was up early the next morning to feast on Joel’s pancakes decorated with pink hearts. (Joel and his wife Barb raised four girls which is why he knows a thing or two about heart pancakes and the Twilight series.) I put on my Pink Floyd “Dark Side of the Moon” T-shirt and an eclipse necklace featuring a charcoal labrodite disc surrounded by tiny diamonds. We all pulled out our goofy paper eclipse glasses.

Bruce set up a demonstration area where we could use a colander to see moon-shaped shadows on white board and look through a telescope with special reflective coating on the lenses. We cranked up the eclipse playlist our daughter Sydney had put together  featuring tunes like “The Sound of Silence,” “Moon River,” and “Ring of Fire.” Everyone laid out blankets or set up chairs facing the Grand Tetons in the east.  We knew something was up when the cows in the nearby pasture all stood at attention and stared at Sydney’s husband Dan, a PhD candidate in atmospheric chemistry.  What cosmic knowledge were they trying to convey to him?

As we moved from the demonstration area to the driveway to watch crescent shadows filter past the leaves or arc through our interlocking fingers, we’d occasionally put on our eclipse glasses to check out the progress of the moon across the sun. The temperature grew distinctly cooler, enough so that MJ slipped on a sweatshirt. Mosquitoes swarmed at midday. The air grew matte and wavy. I wanted to clean my glasses. Or switch on the sky.

Then at 11:33 a.m., just as predicted, the last tangerine sliver of sun disappeared and the lights went out. Though not completely.  A band of orange at the horizon created a 360 degree sunset that silhouetted the Tetons. The big black hole where the sun had been was surrounded by a feathery white light and the sky beyond that was a pleasing purple—less Twilight magenta and more Crayola blue-violet.

We all cheered. Dan, normally so reserved, threw his arms in the air and spun around yelling at the ebony moon.  I, too, raised my hands to the indigo sky and cried “Wow!”  I wish I’d been more articulate, but “wow” pretty much summed up how it felt to be inside your own sci-fi movie.

Both Dillard and MacDonald wrote that their eclipse experience was terrifying.  Dillard said that “seeing this black body was like seeing a mushroom cloud. . .it obliterated meaning itself.”  MacDonald, too, referenced atomic tests and said her reaction was “shock . . . and a sense of creeping dread.”

As for me, when the heavens dimmed I was elated, awestruck, transported to another place. It seemed like the travails of this world were behind me and a new frontier lay ahead.  I’ve continued to tell people, only half-joking, that I saw the face of God.

Afterwards someone noted that none of us had been taken up in the rapture. (So what did that say about our clan?)  Everyone grinned at the sight of each other.  MJ kissed me and said, “We made it.”

A couple of family members left almost immediately to sit in the terrible traffic that everyone had anticipated for months but which didn’t materialize until the sun began to fill out again. Joel and his family were some of the unlucky travelers. “Worth it,” he texted at midnight after it took twelve hours to make his normal four hour journey back to Salt Lake. “Totally worth it.”

We toasted the eclipse with Tang. Later we’d share an orb-themed dinner of spaghetti and meatballs, frozen peas, melon balls and Moon Pies.  When I asked MJ what word he’d use to describe the experience, he said, “Something old fashioned . . . like ‘sublime.’”

Thanks to my brother-in-law David Kimball for the beautiful opening shot of the Great American Eclipse as seen from Ashton, Idaho on August 21, 2017.

Independence Day demands a barbecue, don’t you think?  A few weeks ago I saw a recipe for barbecued ribs smoked in a spicy sauce featuring the Korean red chili paste “gochujang.”  Gochujang is certainly popular right now—seems like it’s a weekly ingredient in our Blue Apron kits—but we’ve used it a lot over the years because MJ was a Mormon missionary way back when in Korea.  Any chance to use gochujang makes MJ happy and since we also celebrate our anniversary this week I decided to build a simple 4^th of July barbecue around the ribs.

The menu fulfills some basic categories  while incorporating flavors from around the world. Along with the Korean ribs, it includes potato salad with a German twist, Persian melons, All-American corn-on-the-cob and red, white & blue Italian tiramisu.  Or, for those who like chocolate, a globally appealing chocolate cake.

Here are the links to the recipes along with some thoughts about each.

Gochujang Ribs with Scallions and Peanuts  It took the better part of the afternoon to smoke these ribs, but my, were they tasty.  Having to stoke the fire through the afternoon added a “slow food” comfort element to the day—the equivalent of having a stew bubbling on the stove in the winter–even if MJ did come to the table smelling like a lumberjack.  I especially liked the crunch of the peanuts and scallions.

Barefoot Contessa Potato Salad  Though this uses a mayonnaise-based dressing for the potato salad, the addition of two types of mustard and dill gave it the flavors of a traditional German potato salad.  I like this flavor profile but preferred the mayonnaise verses the usual oil-based dressing for a German potato salad as a counterpoint to the spicy ribs.  Made with new potatoes from our Full Belly CSA box, it was dynamite.

Mixed Berry Tiramisu  I’m not a big fan of traditional coffee-flavored tiramisu—especially for a mid-summer meal.  This mixed berry version is both lighter and fits the Independence Day theme.  Note that though there’s nothing difficult about the recipe it does take some time to assemble.  However, it’s definitely better after sitting for awhile so you can make it the day before.

Chocolate Cake with Mocha Frosting  I know, I know. I just said I don’t like coffee flavored desserts in the summer (with the exception of  Jamoca Almond Fudge ice cream, which is delicious all year round) but the bit of espresso powder and Kahlua added to this chocolate cake recipe does enhance the chocolate flavor.  Watch the cake closely at the end, however.  It’s easy to overbake and then it’s a little dry. Which can, of course, be remedied with vanilla (or Jamaica Almond Fudge) ice cream.

Happy 4th, Everyone!

“I wanted to see a woman lead the great nation, so my own spine could be straighter this blustery sunny morning.” Hilary Mantel

The unthinkable—at least from inside my bright blue bubble—has happened and now Donald Trump is going to be our next president.  As you may recall I was am a Hillary fan girl.  A week ago I put on my suffragist whites and drove to my local polling place to turn in my ballot. As well as MJ’s. Because when he’d offered to drop mine off earlier that morning I’d said no, that this was an historic day and even though we’d filled out absentee ballots in advance I was going to go to a polling place in person and vote for the first woman president!

I went out to lunch with my sister to celebrate.  We ordered the dessert sampler because it was a day to pull out all the stops.  Both of my girls called and we happily chatted about the election night parties they were either throwing or attending that night.  MJ had a class to teach so I settled in by myself to watch the results. But since it wasn’t even dusk here in California I decided I’d catch up on Jane the Virgin and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend until the news called it for Hillary.  The ultimate Girls Night In.

Then my phone started pinging. “What the heck is going on with this election?” texted my sister, coming as close to swearing as a good Mormon girl can come.  “Is this the way elections always go?” from my son who was voting in a presidential election for the first time.  “YOUR DAUGHTERS ARE NOT IN A GOOD PLACE RIGHT NOW,” from one daughter.  “Apparently I know nothing,” from the other referencing our earlier conversation where she’d blithely said she wasn’t worried at all about the election outcome.

I quickly turned over to the news coverage and saw that, indeed, very few of the people I regularly read or listen to knew anything about how 47.5% of Americans who voted would vote.

The morning after the election I was as dazed and disoriented as Barron Trump had appeared when his father accepted the presidency. I forced myself to attend a demonstration about decorating with materials foraged from wild spaces.  But first I consoled the woman who comes every other week to clean my house about the possibility of her husband being deported, his papers filled out but never filed, or maybe even her daughter who was born here in America.  At the demonstration, tearful women cautiously sidled up to each other trying not to offend those in the group who might also be quietly celebrating that day.  Everyone cheered when I won one of the raffled floral arrangements—a crown-like succulent sitting on top of a black and white vase.

The rest of the week I kvetched and commiserated and sought out chagrined experts analyzing what went wrong.  I read about country vs. city folk and thought of the boarded up main street of my hometown in Idaho.  I teared up at the earnestness of  “Leslie Knope” when she loses an elementary school election to a cartoon character named Dr. Farts.  I  agreed that Trump had superior storytelling strategies (even if I hated the tales he told) and realized that though I supported Hillary, I couldn’t find a message in her campaign that would comfortably fit on a ball cap—which is, according to filmmaker Michael Moore, what this election was all about.

I know people who voted for Trump.  I’m related to some of them.  One chided me the night before the election for posting a selfie in a Hillary t-shirt. “You were raised better than this.” Others are friends that are some of the kindest, most generous people I know.  It remains a mystery to me how they can compartmentalize Trump’s misogynistic, xenophobic, bigoted statements the way they do.  But then, they probably think I’m just as blind when it comes to Hillary’s foibles.  And yet, if we’re in the business of weighing sins, I can see no parity.  And if we’re going to use a separate scale to judge competency and  experience, in my mind there’s no contest.

But those calculations are in the past—and now what do we do going forward?  I’m starting with small acts of kindness like welcoming an older woman who moved in next door, writing a yelp review for my El Salvadoran handyman, and sending money to charities that work to protect our planet and support refugee and womens’ rights. I’m keeping my ears and eyes open for larger ways to contribute from my clearly privileged perch. All the while noting the beauty that continues to manifest even in the darkest times—dogwood leaves glowing red against the blue November sky, pockets of orange pyracantha berries revealing themselves along the freeways, an amber super moon rising above the greening hills.

This past Sunday I drove down to Lake Merritt—a heart-shaped lagoon in the middle of Oakland—and stood with thousands of mourners as we clapped and held hands and sang “Imagine” on a beautiful fall day when it seemed like nothing bad could ever happen in this world. Kumbaya! Hallelujah! As I returned to my car a family carrying a large American flag walked ahead of me.  The father held his young son’s hand as his daughter skipped a few steps behind, the red and white stripes flowing over her. We’d all done what we could that day to give peace a chance.

Because two friends I walk with in the early morning have been out of town for the past few weeks—summer travel has begun!—I’ve switched up my morning exercise routine by taking more yoga classes at the swim club down the road. Not entirely awake I stumble over to the sound of bird-song and the rhythmic splash of swimmers doing their laps.   In the winter a fog-shrouded sun rises in the east behind the yoga instructor, but now we turn our mats south to avoid being blinded by the fully exposed orb.  Post-namaste I spend time in the garden dead-heading daisies and supplementing the irrigation with a little hand-watering now that the drought restrictions have been (temporarily) lifted.  The lizards scatter and the hummingbirds come in for a sip. Such a lovely way to start my day. Has your daily routine changed much now that summer is here?

 Here are some other things I’ve enjoyed of late.

 A wonderful Career Code profile of our daughter Claire over at WhoWhatWear.

Dress codes for travel (while you’re there, check out the travel uniforms videos at the bottom of the article).

The corrective lenses of travel. 

Maybe you have more time than you think.

To write software, read novels.

Despite all the naysayers, life has never been better.

Elizabeth Gilbert on letting our light shine.

A pretty bar cookie featuring rhubarb. 

Jumping Jetsons! A revolving planter that levitates! 

A new album from The Monkees – “Good Times.”

“I was so full of music I had to play.”—Grandma Lo-Fi

Grandma Lo-fi: The Basement Tapes of Sigrídur Níelsdóttir from Republik Film Productions on Vimeo.

Happy Weekend All!