A Dangerous New World

I'm very honored to have had my essay, "'Persistence' Is the Thing with Fins," selected to be included in the forthcoming anthology, A Dangerous New World: Maine Voices on the Climate Crisis, which will be published next month by Littoral Books. It was a difficult piece for me to write because my default reaction to all talk of climate change is denial—not the "let's make as much money off of fossil fuels while creating a massive smoke screen—both literally and figuratively—and pretend everything is fine while the earth as we know it melts down" Exxon-Mobil-style denial, but the "oh my god we're all going to die will my children even have a future there's a nice sand hole to stick my head into" ostrich-style denial. But I'm glad I powered through and wrote it, and I'm glad I focused on someone making a real, positive difference in the world for my piece.

If you're intrigued, there will be a book launch party on December 8th at Space Gallery in Portland. I'd love to see you there!

Birthday Week Success

We survived another Birthday Season (aka, Second Christmas).



We took E and Z out for Mexican food on Tuesday night (their actual birthday), where they got sombreros and a very gringo birthday song to go with their fried ice cream and sopapillas.

Wednesday and Thursday were just normal days (i.e. baseball games).  And then Friday, M's birthday, we had grandparents over for pizza and ice cream (M requested Ben and Jerry's and no cake. Easy peasy). After the grands left and the brothers went to bed, M and I watched The Terminator, as a kind of rite of passage. I've been so excited to watch that movie with him. Now I can't wait to see #2 and 3.

Then Saturday more baseball and Sunday E and Z's party. I told them I would bake a cake and get ice cream, but that they were in charge of the activities. They had seven friends over and there was a lot of running around outside. They wanted to have a Nerf gun battle, which I tried to divert into a squirt gun battle (i.e., outside). The squirt guns didn't get much use, but the Nerf war started close enough to the end of the party that it was over before anything broke. E wanted to have blackberry vanilla cake, and I found a recipe online that uses blackberry jam (of course I can't find it now, but I see several dozen other blackberry jam bundt cakes, and now I want to try them all). The frosting is jam + powdered sugar...brilliant and easy and delicious and I'll never try to fold berries into buttercream again. There wasn't even an iota of objection to it being purple.

I found that I took Birthday Season much more in stride than I used to. In years past, it was cause of month's-long stress and anxiety. I guess I've calmed down over the years. Or lowered my expectations. Or maybe it comes of having kids old enough to write and distribute their own invitations and organize the party activities without me having to be cruise director. I think 11 is going to be a good year (and 15, too, of course).

Fourteen!

This picture was taken almost exactly 13 years ago, when M fell madly in love with this golf cart while we were at our friends' wedding in Western Massachusetts. I love the sweet earnestness of his expression, and the possessiveness of his hand on the steering column.

That very same boy turned 14 today. He still wants a golf cart and he still has those arresting blue eyes. But not much else is the same.

We celebrated his birthday in the waiting room of the music school, between Z's drum lesson and his guitar lesson. Poor kid has had his birthday "party" in the lounge of the hospital maternity ward after his brothers were born and in a park with Subway sandwiches before a baseball game (though he did score the only run that whole game, so maybe it was good luck) and all manner of afterthought, squeezed in when we can do it celebrations. He's a pretty easygoing dude, though, and doesn't seem to mind, and he says he doesn't really like parties.

I had a moment in Target earlier today, where I was last minute birthday shopping, when, as I made my way from the desk lamp to the Beastie Boys t-shirt, I walked down a baby clothes aisle and stopped in my tracks. I looked at all the teeny-tiny onesies and t-shirts and stretchy pants and beanie hats and felt downright dizzy as I tried to grasp the fact that 14 years ago we were in the hospital with this little (okay, big--he was 9 lb. 1/2 oz.) baby. And now? Now look at him. I know it's the most cliche thing ever, but truly, where did all those years go? He's such a great, fun, smart, funny, awesome kid, and I wouldn't change one single thing, but sometimes I wish I could just visit that little guy on the golf cart, for maybe an afternoon. Is that so wrong?

Happenings ~ Everything But the Kitchen Sink

I've taken a little unplanned break from blogging--and reading blogs and social media in general--partly because we've had a lot going on (appointments and events and rescheduling) and partly because sometimes I just need to step back from the "Another Perfectly Perfect Day in My Perfect Life" vibe that bloglandia sometimes projects. I know that I run in danger of projecting the same vibe, and so know it's not reality, or intention, but sometimes my self-esteem just needs a  little time away.

While I was out, we had a party. A big, wild fiesta. My friend Tina came over and helped me make a mountain of tamales, and we also cooked up enchiladas, quesadillas, black beans, red tomato rice, guacamole, and Mexican chocolate cupcakes. And mixed up Margaritas, of which I may have imbibed a little too liberally (note to self for next year: more lime juice, less tequila).

I didn't take any pictures before or during the party (which I guess is a sign I was having too good a time), but the next day, I took a few of our decorations--papel picado (which I'm keeping up in our living room until they fall apart) and a couple of my Southwestern tablecloths (let's face it, at least 25% of the motivation for a fiesta is to display my tablecloth collection--another 25% to cook and eat really good Mexican food and 50% to enjoy time with friends and lift spirits in the middle of a long, cold winter).

In other news, I registered M for high school last week. And I don't even feel the tiniest bit weepy or nostalgic about it. He outgrew his little K-8 school long ago, and I'm so looking forward to seeing him stretch his wings in an environment that will offer new challenges and opportunities. It's been a rocky road to get to this point--our town does not have a high school and so we have the choice of at least six area schools, each of which is almost exactly the same distance (a 25-minute drive) from our home. M's first choice was in the exact opposite direction from where I work, with no bus to our town, while my first choice is roughly ten miles out of the way of my office and has a bus that stops at the end of our road. I played the "I'm the mom and I know what's best" card. This has been really the only source of conflict between M and me since he became a teenager (knock on wood), but I think he's finally come around, or at least resigned himself. It's really a wonderful school and, like I said, I'm excited for him to move on.

I also finished E's replacement mitten before February ran out, which means I don't have to count a tiny heart as my February knit. I threw it in with several loads of wash and got it to kind-of, sort-of felt. We have a front-loading washer, which does not do a very good job of felting (though it has managed to shrink a couple of hand-knits that accidentally got tossed in with the laundry). I'm hoping that if E wears it in enough wet snow, it will shrink naturally.

We got our first harvest from this cool oyster mushroom growing kit we got for Christmas. We've been patiently moving it around the house, trying to find the optimal growing place (turns out ignoring it in the basement in bright sun did the trick). The harvest was small, but that's a good thing in this family where 3-4 people out of five hate mushrooms. In looking for recipes, I learned that oyster mushrooms are among the most widely-cultivated, however recipes were hard to find (though there were numerous recipes for mushrooms plus oysters, which sounds revolting), so I just sautéed them with a little butter and salt and put them on toasted baguette, which was delicious.

Over the weekend, I also went to a paint night out at my friend Helene's art gallery. It was so much fun. I could have just kept piling paint on my canvas all night long. I'm afraid I've found another hobby I don't have time to keep up with (by the way, the painting looks much better in a teeny, tiny photo than it does in real life). I bought supplies to repeat the lesson with the boys, if they'll let me. I'll keep you posted on how that goes.

February's frigid temperatures carried right through to the end (we woke up March 1, to -13 degrees F). Getting dressed in the morning takes a good half hour just to pile on the layers and snow pants have become acceptable office wear (for me at least).

But we got a couple of Sundays in a row where temperatures topped the freezing point: 34, even 37 degrees F.

We've carried on snowshoeing right through the winter, regardless of cold or wind, but what a difference 20 or 30 degrees makes.

I just feel so much more alive when I walk through the woods and don't feel like my face is going to freeze and fall off.

We found another trail of otter tracks on the river this past weekend, complete with holes where they enter and exit the cold, dark water below and a little scat present (this one appeared to come out of its water hole and leap a couple dozen feet to poop; very tidy of it). 

The scat was all crawdad parts and maybe a few fish scales. Mmm.

I spent a little time in the gravel pit, sitting on a log and writing in my journal, which is something it's just been too cold to do all winter. I even found this tiny patch of green moss (cohabiting with a purple liverwort). A sign of spring?

Over the weekend, I also cleared away all of the hearts and snowflakes and other signs of winter inside, replacing them with green wherever I could. And now it's March. My least favorite month. I always get depressed in March. This one is going to be extra challenging because C has to travel a lot for work, which means I have to double-up on duties: getting the kids on the bus, cooking and cleaning up, keeping the house warm (this is a terrible role for me; I'm much more apt to just keep adding sweaters rather than start a fire). And I can't believe Daylight Savings Time starts this weekend. The thought of having to wake up in the dark when it just started getting light out by six a.m. in the last few weeks fills me with murderous rage. Do you think I could just hibernate until April?

Oh, wait that IS my kitchen sink.

Birthday Party Redux

On Sunday, we threw E and Z a Lord of the Flies Rings birthday party.

I had gone onto Pinterest to look for ideas and witnessed all manner of craziness. I really think we need to call an armistice in the birthday party arms race, don't you? Of course, if you really love spending a month turning your living room into a Hobbit Hole for a two-hour party, then who am I to judge?

I did NOT make our house into a Hobbit Hole, but I did make a ring-shaped cake (a good excuse to buy a bundt pan on Etsy). I was surprised to find none of my cookbooks had a bundt cake recipe, so I found one online (somewhere in the middle of the spectrum that ranges from cake mix to eight hundred ingredients). It took a lot longer to cook than advertised, and I forgot to pay attention near the end, so it came out more brown than golden, but a little goat milk caramel sauce helped out. I even bought one of those disgusting tubes of frosting gel and wrote the elvish words around the outside.

The cake, along with some elf food (fruit and matzo crackers--a stand-in for that dry elf bread) and Hobbit food (bread, cheese, popcorn, pretzels--hey we're modern hobbits) made up the "feast"

To start the party, the boys (yes, they were all boys) decorated cardboard shields, and then they went to Elf Training School.

Slack line.

Balance board.

Bow and arrow.

And sword fighting.

After cake and ice cream, they separated into two "teams" and ran through our woods trail in opposite directions, twice (I had suggested that C dress up like an orc and let them all chase him, but I guess the thought of being run down by seven nine-year-olds armed with sticks did not appeal to him). After that, the party was over. 

For party favors, I made these "hand kites" which I called The Ring of Mordor, using wooden rings and satin ribbon in volcano colors, as well as a small piece of polished quartz (the arkenstone) and a small amethyst (a special elf crystal), as well as their shields, of course. 

E and Z's best friend stayed the night, and they all watched The Fellowship of the Ring (talking through the whole thing!!). Monday C's dad brought over presents, and I finally made M's birthday peppermint bark (not quite a week late!). Now I think we are finally through Birthday Season. Phew.

Weekend Things--Taquisa

We had a little taco party Saturday night.

I had meant to have a party before I started grad school, to say goodbye to my friends before sequestering myself in the library for two years.

But I never quite got around to it, and two years had gone by. It was time.

Perhaps it was just an excuse to buy fresh flowers and use all of my Southwest-themed tablecloths and make Margaritas in the middle of winter.

In any case, it was great fun to cook up lots of delicious, spicy food.

Mexican food is really the only type of food I enjoy cooking.

Partly because I figured out long ago that if I wanted to eat good Mexican food in Maine, I'd have to cook it myself, and partly because I actually do make fairly decent Mexican food, whereas my Thai, Chinese, Indian, or African food is only so-so (and American food interests me not at all!).

Mostly, though, it's that I love to eat really good Mexican food. For the menu, I enlisted my boyfriend, Rick Bayless, and we cooked up: tomatillo chicken, potato and chorizo (both pork and vegetarian), spicy garlic portobello mushrooms, red tomato rice, Mexican pot beans. Plus cheese quesadillas (for the children and less adventurous types), fruit salad, and Mexican chocolate cake (with goat milk caramel sauce instead of frosting, because I ran out of energy and time before I made the frosting, and happened to have a jar of caramel sauce in the fridge).

M and our friend Kevin gave us a preview of their upcoming open mic performance (and this week's earworm) of The Eagles' "Take it Easy."

Z set up a Van Halen and Queen dance party in the basement.

Due to another Snowmageddon event, we didn't get quite as many guests as I had planned for.

But I'm not sure how many more people our house could have taken--plus we ran out of limes (but in a mid-winter miracle, we ended up the night with exactly as much tequila as we had started it with--I think it's a sign that we need to have another taquisa sooner than later).