Wedding Vows

Forty-six years ago, we said the words:
"For better or worse".
I'm not sure we understood
what we said: those glib words
that had no meaning
to the people we were then--
young, irresponsible,
indestructible.

What we've found is that everything
is better...AND worse...
irrevocably twined together:
no plus without a minus,
no defeat without a victory.
The people we were then
were too black and white,
and life itself
tends toward gray.

There have been exciting times:
new experiences--chldren,
travel, moves, and adventures.
We've had firsts
and lasts
and boring in-betweens,
but there has always been us,
for better and worse, together.
as long as we both shall live.

Dog Star Days

August.
The AC’s not working, and
the washer died. The fireplace people
say there’s naught to be done
but rip it out and start again.
The garden’s on life support—
even the mint, which has a life of its own
(mostly)
which makes even making iced tea a chore.
The escalators are out at
the supermarket
and the mail is late.
My dentist wants to pull four wisdom teeth
despite my fervent “not now!”
and every meal for which I have ingredients
is one I have no taste for.
Everything in my closet is
frumpy
and my hair is an exploding dandelion.
I am reminded at the pharmacy
that I need
a shingles shot
a flu shot
a hepatitis A booster.
My laptop’s inundated with
files to delete
files to organize
files to destroy

And I am tired.
Too tired to fight the dentist.
Too tired to establish order in my disordered life.
Too worn down to see
that better days are coming.
October.
Maybe.

Cookbooks

All right. Nobody cooks anymore, it seems. But for those of us who do, there are cookbooks. Whether we follow them religiously, or use them solely as a jumping-off point, we all have favorites. It might be The Joy of Cooking, the grande dame of cookbooks. It might be the old red-and-white-checked Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook, or the looseleaf Betty Crocker classic. My go-to is The Good Housekeeping Cookbook. Inside those covers, I found my beef stew, my grasshopper pie, my orange chiffon cake, and innumerable other favorites. It's easy to find the book on my shelf: the spine has been replaced by bands of white duct tape that hold the covers together. Southern Living's Best Recipes is equally ragged: think tuna casserole with cheese biscuits, or wilted lettuce salad.

If I were honest, however, I'd have to say that my tastes extend beyond one or two books. Mike Roy gave me teriyaki beef; Julia Child is my resource for chicken salad and lamb chops--and recently, for JC's grandmother's boiled custard, although Julia calls it creme anglaise. Chicken and dumplings calls for Betty Crocker--the ragged red book--and I can also find chocolate cake roll and seven-minute frosting in her collection. Erma Rombauer is the waffle lady, and the old Cooking for Two book is where I go for pancakes and stuffed peppers and meatloaf, for lemon souffles,  and the smallest scratch chocolate cake I know. I suppose that makes me eclectic, which is a 50-cent word for choosy.

Also in my collection are the multitude of "Can I have that recipe?"gleanings from family and friends. I regret to say that some of the recipes have outlived the friendships (though not all, by any means...) BUT whenever I make them, I have fond memories of the giver. I cannot make pepper relish without remembering my mother-in-law--or, for that matter, broccoli casserole, grits casserole, chocolate tarts, and many others. JC's aunt Ann has a place in my memory--and my box of recipes too: chess tarts and vegetable soup and easy chocolate mousse, and an asparagus casserole. Then, there's Ida Mae's dinner rolls, and I can still see JC's mom popping them into the oven in that little rectangular pan, blackened with the residue of years of use. (That pan is still in MY cupboard and still gets used..) Which shows that recipes feed memories as well as people. If I want to whip up my 1980 friends, there's the Wellesley Coffeecake from Marilyn Eastwood that conjures up that sewing group; my aunt Joan's funnel cakes, and Pauline Klunk's apple fritters do the same for visits to my Pennsylvania grandmother's house. Friends may come and go, but recipes are forever. Susan Hapgood, wherever you are, your strawberry pie lives on!

I have a recipe box. A gorgeous wooden box that was supposed to corral all my cards and slips of paper and be indexed properly so I could easily locate whatever I was inspired to make. I never completed the copying required to print all those neat little cards, but at least now, many of those recipes are on my computer--a few keystrokes away from a hard copy. I will always be lagging behind--every day, it seems, I see a new idea online and copy and paste it to my folder on GoogleDrive. Someday, I just may try it... if it doesn't get lost in my personal black hole of copied recipes.

I have compiled a cookbook that includes my favorites (with commentary), but having printed and distributed several to my family, I find (nearly every day) that I have omitted some. I religiously copy them into the book, in case I ever print a second edition, but it's really just to make my favorites easier to find. Also, others may not know that my waffles are from Irma Rombauer, and Betty Crocker has the ice cream cake roll, and the Dreamsicle frozen dessert came from that Better Homes & Gardens magazine that's crammed onto the shelf. And there are the little things--like I always sprinkle cinnamon sugar on my French toast before I flip it, so that it has a little crunch..maybe I should do an appendix.

Jera

Today the sun came up too early; 

I’m out of cereal, 

and cream for my tea. 

My hair is a mess, and 

I can’t find a thing in my closet 

that doesn’t make me look 

frumpy and fat.  

Traffic is terrible, 

and in the endless stop-and-go, 

I mutter and curse 

about the time I’m losing. 

I should stop myself 

with a reminder that  

all my frustrations are 

temporary,  

but today’s not the day for that. 

I skim unnoticing  

by the new green  

that decorates the trees,  

the magenta of redbuds 

blooming with abandon,  

and pink and white dogwoods 

in their annual renewal. 

There is no beauty. 

Not today. 

Last night I heard there had been a fire 

on the street where we used to live: 

someone died; a man was rescued. 

The dog and cat, too. 

It was my friend Jera who died, 

and I woke up to that 

this ugly spring morning,
filled with frustration, and anger, and tears. 

I woke up,

but Jera sleeps. 

Tomatoes

Tomatoes

Globes, teardrops, kidney shapes.

scarred, pleated, cracked with brown,

gold and green and mottled red,

striped and parti-colored

that peculiar green tomato smell

(the smell of a summer garden)

fuzzy stems

yellow flowers

sun and earth and seed:

heirlooms.

Mourning the China

I guess if you could characterize my mood today, it would be sad. I just read an article about baby-boomers and their need to dispose of their accumulated belongings, and the outlook isn’t brilliant. I am, I suppose, a permanent resident of Mudville, and mighty Casey has been dealt a deathblow.

I have—like most of my generation—a lot of stuff. I guess it would be expected: parents who survived the Depression by making do and doing without, their limited ability to indulge their children, the economic boom we experienced when we grew to adulthood…the rise of advertising and its partner, self-indulgence. We were all primed to become shoppers extraordinaire, to fill our ever-more-elaborate houses with fine things: antiques, china, crystal, collections of various types—all the things we wished for and would like to pass down to our children. In addition, some of us possess the fine things that our own parents left behind. So here we are, up to our necks in stuff, ready to hand things off to the next generation.

The kicker is: they don’t want it. No china, no silver, no crystal. No antique linens, or tables to put them on. “Brown furniture” has become a term of derision, while mid-century modern is on the ascendant. If it’s blond, if it’s low-slung and clean-lined, if it’s aluminum tubing and minimalistic, it’s okay by them. But I lived through the ‘50s and found it cold.

I like wood. It’s warm. People touched it and shaped it into being. I like my china and silver and crystal. It tells stories of holiday meals and careful washing and drying afterwards. So it sits in a cupboard most of the year. It doesn’t have to. There’s something celebratory about setting the table with grandma’s place-settings: the heft of the silver, the sparkle of the water goblets, the tracery of the dinner plates. Even if it only happens once or twice a year.

I could stand in my house and weep over the precious cut glass bowls (how pretty they are!) or my assortment of turned-wood bowls (the artistry! The hours of work!) I could marvel at the creamware I’ve acquired over the years (the teapot’s pierced design, the braided handle, the delicate curves of the sugar bowl)—to no avail. Who will keep them when I am gone? Who will treasure my collection of monsters, my books, my Ogden Nash poems? Who will love the things I’ve loved? I am haunted by estate sales I’ve attended, where lovely, cherished things are dismissed , or picked over by hordes of bargain-hunters, looking for the recent past, the chilly enamel kitchen table, the Swedish chair, the lean, the spare, the space-age relics that have captured their imaginations and their pocketbooks today.

It is, I fear, a waiting game that no one wants to play. Fashion changes, and as surely as refrigerators will change from stainless to white to avocado green or harvest gold, all these things may return. Brides may once again select china and silver patterns; grandma’s furniture may enjoy a resurgence, and someone, somewhere, may one day open an attic box and gasp at the wonder of my creamware and cut glass, my turned wood, my lovely dishes….But there are no assurances that that someone will be anyone I recognize or am related to. No one will say, “This belonged to your great-grandma…” or “I remember where it used to sit on her shelf..” The memories they hold will have worn away, and there will be nothing of me, or my predecessors, remaining. No wonder we weep.

Hospitality

The word itself is indefinable,

but, like all art, you know it when you see it:

hospitality.

It sounds old-fashioned now, 

relegated to ads for old hotels

and brand-new B&Bs

with shadings of Southern charm.

But it still exists,

exuding warmth, and care, and comfort.

Good food, chilled wine,  

the chime of ice in a glass of sweet tea, 

the soft hum of conversation,

and laughter, always laughter—

the front porch music

we make with friends and family.

Some say it’s a lost art

in today’s harried chaos—

and for most, it may be—

but we know where to find it:

your house, 

your hands, 

your heart.

Thanks for having us.