Thursday, December 24, 2009

If... (& Hetero/Orthodoxy)

Sidenote: I made molasses cookies, the recipe of which I will probably post tomorrow.

***

If I were a woman, there is very little chance I would attend the vast majority of traditional religious services. Sitting in midnight mass with my family, sans the father figure, with our proudly Polish priest telling us about the holy family, it occurred to me that Mary really gets a short stick. She may be the Reverend Mother of one of the dominant religions on the planet, but she was essentially told to not worry about being made involuntarily pregnant at thirteen or fourteen then ushered into marriage in which she is--according to contemporary Catholic dogma--never, ever to have a sexual experience that would impinge on her immaculate soul. After parenting a young carpenter with, essentially, a significantly older male roommate who ruined her chances with any boyfriends, she watches him die, buries him, and then witnesses his resurrection.

Now, I have read a few comic books now and then, and the character of Jean Grey/Phoenix stands out. As was shown in the recent X-Men film trilogy, this character dies and returns to life not just once or twice, but frequently. So repetitive have her resurrections been, that her family doesn't want to hear about it anymore and just thinks of her as definitively passed on. Mary may have been exposed to a few foreign myths with resurrections and their is the passage that inspired "Them Bones, Them Bones," but a resurrection would be pretty harrowing for a poor, uneducated Hebrew woman getting up in years.

What my thoughts were getting to was that why emulate Mary when you can learn about Lilith and the Furies who are pretty badass female characters. Lilith, one of Adam's pre-Eve wives, refuses to lay down with a man (or just to lay down beneath a man, i.e. strictly missionary) and is exiled by God. Some stories say she went on to mother demons with Lucifer--which plays into some of the Vampire: The Masquerade mythos--while others just give her a sort of demi-divine status as a potent, untarnished, decisive person. The latter shows up in the comic epic of The Sandman where she gets to play the mother figure to a dreaming babe and provides guidance to a struggling young woman.

The Furies come to mind as well--incidentally, they also show up in The Sandman. The Furies are simply sweet. They are embodiments of all those emotions women are generally told to suppress; anger, bitterness, frustration, spite, etc. all get some amount of say in this or that interpretation of the Furies. I want to say a bit more on the Furies than that. I am of the opinion that feelings, even those intensely negative emotions that are given to the Furies, are meaningful. Once, I explained to a friend that the neurochemistry for fear, surprise, anger, and excitement are all very similar, but with the agent undergoing the simultaneous neurochemical and perceptual reality, the event sort of falls into place; that is, by placing our own interpretation on the event, we sort of get to do what we want with it. Something very similar applies to the feelings of the Furies; anger is as much a feeling of creation as of destruction, bitterness can both embrace and repel.

Love, adoration, and magnanimity are potential destroyers as much as hatred, bitterness, and spite. Raymond Carver's What We Talk About When We Talk About Love highlights the confusing, even diabolical reality of love for some people some of the time--or maybe everyone some of the time. Or, it can be out of adoration that we can create obsession, that we can smother and ruin the lives of friends and family. It is important to dote now and then on those we care about, but adoration can be confusing and it can manifest in disastrous realities. As for magnanimity, it can become coddling and spoiling, manifesting in greed and egotism if untempered.

So, perhaps participating in a faith tradition I find so... uninspiring if not downright degrading as a male when I would not if I were female is hypocritical. Such a claim is warranted, and I choose to deflect rather than to disagree. My deflection is to the notion of heterodoxy, or non-orthodox beliefs. I was raised Roman Catholic and I am happy for it, though it has weighed on my life stronger than at others in ways I do not now appreciate. The word catholic--lower case, but the root of the upper variant--means universal; the Catholic Church was intended to be the universal, the all-encompassing church. The idea, for me, remains: A faith that covers all. The problem is that such a faith cannot be a dogmatic faith, it cannot be bound by rigid orthodoxy and regulation or even by specific spiritual notions; if we do so, it means that those who find the orthodoxy, regulation, or structure does not describe their reality, then it must not be correct. By allowing for heterodoxy, a universal or catholic faith supports the legitimacy of individual realities in the context of a single pursuit or articulation of our living world. Ultimately, a faith tradition has the responsibility of providing something for its practitioners; with a catholic faith, it allows for everyone to participate in that dialogue of description, experience, and enrichment together.
"If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need."

Cicero

See this.

In a short while, I have a few musings to share, but for now, it is Christmas Eve and my sister and mother are making pomegranate margaritas--to the best of their ability.

Many blessings to all, and to all a good night.

Monday, December 21, 2009

Family, Holidays, and Our Quiet Langage

My father has made it here, while my sister and brother-in-law have not. My mother and I prepared the house for their arrival, but were unprepared for foul weather and flight complications that slowed trips. Erin & Joe won't be getting here until Wednesday, three days later than they had planned. Such is the way of winter, flights, and frustrations.

...

The company of family means playing card games, watching a movie here and there, conversational strolls, and shopping. My friends will attest that I do not often speak of my family, who have often been surprised that my father is around and that I have a brother and a sister. It is not that I deny or ignore or disregard my family, it is more that the reality of my family--even when it comes to conversing with the family--is a quiet one. Most of the weight of raising my siblings and I fell on my mother--which is not surprising--and to here we owe the willingness to see children become creative, insightful, and dedicated in our own ways and to our own degrees. Here on out, I will probably write and then delete, and the reconsider my words for just the aforementioned reasons.

What I mean to put into words here, I suppose, is that we all care for each other. Each of us shows our affection in different ways, with different skills and intentions, but to any clever observer, we each care very much for one another. As my siblings and I have left behind our adolescence, we have become more regular and out front with our hugs, kind words, and gift-giving. This, I would say, is a happy development in our camaraderie. It replaced a more, shall we say, aggressive manifestation of our bonds; my sister once left a hand-shaped bruise on my back and my brother once tackled me from behind just because he could not ignore a golden opportunity to do so. As I said, an improvement.

As for our parents, it is slightly more confusing and also somewhat similar. With time, we have learned to lovingly embrace and tolerate what we must; often taking what we can with genuine gratitude. My mother has always kept a space warm for her children and whatever company we bring into her home, even housing three young Gustavian women on choir tour for a few nights. I was not around, but I was sure to hear about it from all parties the subsequent months. Meanwhile, my globe-trotting father more often than not means well, but gets in the way of himself. If I could easily put into words how I relate to him, I would. On the other hand, I would not dare record how the rest of my family gets along and fails to get along with him; such is not my business nor my territory.

And that is one way to understand my family: business and territory. For the past few months, my mother and I have been able to share a good deal of territory. That territory has involved movies, TV shows, card games, dinners, walks, conversations and so on. Except under private, conversational situations, I would not share those experiences; they are our business. Similarly, I might joke about this or that episode with my brother or my father, but don't expect an exhortation or personal essay concerning them posted here. What I have mentioned thus far is long past and has been described in brief. That is, my family values discretion.

That, though, is not the note on which I mean to close. What I mean is that, despite the sometimes deceptive quiet of my family, we have spent years learning, interpreting, and speaking in a language all our own. That language is suffused with our own brand of reserved affection. In certain situations--the more extravagant or grievous, mostly--we become more verbose in our sentiments and our frustrations. More often than not, though, we are quietly exchanging glances, sly words, and happy recollections out of the range of our company. We hug good night when no one is looking, or rest our weight gently on another's shoulder, inquiring as we do so about the day, or catch a phone call and plan about the next expedition here or there. We speak a happy, quiet language, sometimes furtively slipped between the more common lines of day-to-day dialect. At the end of a long day, I know that and am thankful for it.

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Obligatory Melancholy Post

Many of my friends share some familiarity with a story to which I now allude. A particular person, with whom I have long been acquainted, once received a good deal of affectionate attention from me despite frustrations of distance and timing. Mind you, I never intended to address such a memory, but a parcel I recently opened prompted me. Following the escapades of my summer spent counseling at Duke University, I wrote to her very frequently. During much of that time, she was out of the country and it takes quite a while for international mail to be "returned to sender," so to speak. In the aforementioned parcel, I found a collection of short letters I wrote to her as well as a three volume compilation. In reference to a late night watching and humorously analyzing George Romero's Night of the Living Dead, as well as a number of subsequent jests, I titled the collection Zombie Slumber Part Massacre. I now bring you the complete playlist of ZSPM. I might add that this includes a rather vast range of my tastes, but generally, I still enjoy turning my attention back to these tunes.

ZSPM I: Gratuitous Sex Scene
1. Drink to me Babe Then by AC Newman
2. Semi-Charmed Life by Third Eye Blind
3. Summerbaby by Polaris
4. Nocturna by Glovertango
5. Gamble Everything for Love by Ben Lee
6. Silence Teaches You How to Sing by Underwater Sleeping Society
7. Girl by Beck
8. Hospital Rooms Aren't for Lovers by Bear Colony
9. I'm Still in Love With You by Al Green
10. Red Letter Day by the Get Up Kids
11. Me on Your Front Porch by Criteria
12. All is Full of Love by Bjork
13. Easy to be Around by Diane Cluck
14. Feed of Clay by Vashti Bunyan
15. Kissing my Love by Bill Withers
16. Reno Dakota by the Magnetic Fields
17. The Leanover by Life Without Buildings
18. Memphis & 53rd by Minus the Bear
19. Playgirl by Ladytron
20. Peach, Plum, Pear by Joanna Newsom
21. Walking Out of Stride by Badly Drawn Boy
22. Here Comes My Baby by Cat Stevens

[Note: This is an unusual note for me to end on in a compilation, but that is because the three mixes are intended to be played continuously. So, for my own sort of rules, consider this an intermission, not the end of an playlist.]

ZSPM II: Absurdly Gory Death
1. Shadow Stabbing by Cake
2. My Beloved Monster by the Eels
3. The World's Gone Mad by Handsome Boy Modeling School
4. Who Could Win a Rabbit by Animal Collective
5. Hollow You by Antelope
6. Undone (the Sweater Song) by Weezer
7. Geeky Pop Song by the Capricorns
8. Staring at the Sun by TV on the Radio
9. Stretch (You are all Right) by Tortoise
10. Dracula From Houston by the Butthole Surfers
11. Don't Be Shallow by Sondre Lerche
12. Eugene, Oregon (Manifest Destiny) by Jayber Crow
13. The High Snow by Brazz Tree
14. Frontier Psychiatrist by the Avalanches
15. After Dark by Le Tigre
16. No Rain by Blind Melon
17. Vampires by Fastball
18. The Freshman by The Verve Pipe
19. Mary Jane's Last Dance by Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers
20. Jack the Ripper by Colin Meloy

ZSPM III: Sweet Revenge
1. Feel Good Inc. by Gorillaz
2. Hey Jealousy by Gin Blossoms
3. The Old Apartment by Barenaked Ladies
4. I Threw it All Away by Yo La Tengo
5. A Long December by Counting Crows
6. Angel Won't You Call Me by the Decemberists
7. See Saw by the Weeds
8. Teen Titans Theme by Puffy AmiYumi
9. Where Does the Good Go? by Tegan and Sara
10. Begin Again by Ellis
11. Not Quite Paradise by Bliss 66
12. Astronomy (8th Light) by Black Star
13. Hide Me From Next February by Les Savy Fav
14. Fearless Vampire Killers by Bad Brains
15. In the Absence of Strong Evidence to the Contrary, One May Step Out of the Way of a Charging Bull by Don Caballero
16. Mastermind by Deltron
17. A Boy Like Me by Patrick Wolf
18. It's My Turn to Fly by the Urge
19. Moondance by Van Morrison
20. The Sound of Silence by Simon and Garfunkel
21. In Spite of All the Damage by the Be Good Tanyas
22. Eyes by Rogue Wave

[Note: If I recall accurately, the jarring nature of this final volume was intentional, though I would not regret putting some of these more kitschy songs on a playlist--especially closing with them--I cannot deny that I still have a soft spot for most of these songs. Also, if she ever happens upon this weblog and this post, the influence of Miss Dana Reinoos's mix, Like A Walk in the Park, she gave me is obvious. Generally, I am hesitant to use songs from others' mixes on my own, but her mix is of such quality and my love of those songs was so great, that I couldn't resist. Most notably are See Saw by the Weeds and Geeky Pop Song by the Capricorns.]

I cannot say exactly what I mean to accomplish in writing this. The person for whom I compiled these mixes is pretty thoroughly out of my life. Such is not the case for which I had hoped. Still, she means a good deal to me in the face of the consternation she has caused me. For a while, she was more to me that I could have hoped, and far more than she wanted; at least more than she wanted when we were not around one another. To yearn for a space in someone's life, to aspire for just some pocket of time in the proximity of someone you care about, and then to be denied that by a method of absence, silence, and refusal... It leaves one with such a dastardly unended sentence, nagging at you until you put it away somewhere without realizing it. I have kept it in envelopes, in folders, tied up behind the surfaces of the gifts she gave me that lay still in my closet.

Eventually, I come around to laughing at my own worn out tales. The telling, retelling, forgetting, and re-discovery of my own memories fiddles them down into the nearest thing to nothing. They do not vanish; you cannot burn up or throwaway a memory. Rather, I find in an old envelope, in the lyrics of a once familiar song, the knot, the stone, the unredeemed bone of a person, a time, our places together, seasoned with the pressure of our contact; and then I smile, perhaps chuckle, and slip it away again.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Fine Company and Home Cooking

On 10 December, I invited a number of friends over for dinner, company, and conversation. I have already posted the menu--which may excite a few friends' fancies--and want to say a little on the night and its success.

Since I have come home from school, I have tried a few times to rediscover the lovely comfort and pleasure of late nights in with familiar faces. A handful of soirees were arranged, but not until the tenth did anything come of them. Such turns of fortune dismayed me because despite apparent commitment and with all the places in order, my exertions were for naught. My last year at Gustavus allowed my friends and I to make a distinctly special and welcoming space. More often than not, we would gather at the end of the day, chatter, sip our beverages, watch this or that DVD, joke about, and make something of the evening that was fortifying and refreshing. I acknowledge and appreciate the cooperation of proximity, amicability, and space that allowed my last year to have such a space, but making something of my current situation should not have been so fraught with difficulty.

All the same it has been. I am a good deal further away from where most of my friends live in Lincoln, schedules are more convoluted than ever, organization and transportation are regular issues, and I do not have as much familiarity with the people hear. So thorough did I think these problems were, that I could not even guarantee my guests' attendance to myself until they started showing up. Almost immediately, though, their attendance rejuvenated me in a wonderfully familiar way. We gathered around fresh, home cooked food, a few glasses of wine (which grew beyond a few as the night wore on), and so easily warmed to one another's presence. In at least one way, the night was particular; particular such that my company's attendance meant more than the usual. In another way, the night took on a distinct variety of particularity; that is, as we sat, conversing by the fire over glasses of wine, we all came to recognize that feeling for which I had been yearning, that knowledge of our shared joy because of and respect for each other.

My guest list extended beyond attendees, but I want to thank Miss Kim Moser, Miss Abbey Coleman, Miss Ashley Buck, Mr Ryan Hansen, and the late but well-received Miss Adrienne Lemmer for coming to my birthday party. My mother's assistance and attendance ought also be respectfully recognized and appreciated, as well. Over the past few years--perhaps with their emphasis on finals schedules and that interest in twenty-first anniversaries--I have become uninterested in the celebration of my own birthday, but wanted to take the opportunity to celebrate something all the same. The subject of my birthday was of little notice during the dinner, though wine and a bag of baking supplies were generously given, and in its way, that was the best of possible outcomes. I was not engaged in celebrating my own birth, in picking up trinkets from friends (however heartfelt they would certainly be), but in appreciating and sharing their kindness and friendship.

After much gustatory delight and enlivened engagement, we moved ourselves to the family room to share in the glow and warmth of the fire and the comfort of softer furniture. Many attendees are acquainted with the study and practice of education, and following our own anecdotes, we began to introspect more seriously on the subject of pedagogy. Education, one might recognize, is a rather easy subject over which to engage because we share in both its successes and its shortcoming so thoroughly. The systems we experienced blessed and impeded us in different ways, some of us more severely than others, and it supported an intimacy in our storytelling and consideration that was uncommonly close to home. Childhood, schooling, the ins and outs of cliques and friendships, interactions with teachers, each open into--even without our knowing--onto our private psyches and traumas, our challenges and warm-hearted successes. I was happily overwhelmed--in no physically obvious way, my guests might have noted--by the conversational affection with which we came to regard one another in order to open up so intensely.

The night languorously wore on, marked by the opening of another bottle and the slow lisp of fatigue eking into our voices. After much leaning, yawning, and gentle support from one another, I sent my friends off with little packages of leftover food--I certainly didn't want a half lasagna taking up space in my refrigerator. Mr Hansen stayed a while longer so that we might play long delayed video games, shooting down the menace of zombies an hour or so later. He too left with a few pieces of lasagna and I lay down to enjoy the end of Franklyn which I had started in my cleaning and tidying of the house but had not finished. Given that I was unaware of attendance, I was awake longer than I had supposed, but happily so, and slept late into the following day. The next day, each item cluttered on tables, counters, and the floor seemed a quiet, happy testament to the past night.

Friday, December 11, 2009

Too Much Alt History

I have been reading alternate history stories; that is, narratives in which a different historical even took place at some point thus altering things significantly in the future. (See The Yiddish Policeman's Union by Michael Chabon.) For some reason, this includes a lot of Jewish-themed material. (See the above and Philip Roth's The Plot Against America which I am planning to read.) I was reading Cat and Girl comics and thought of a title called The Compromised Land and want someone to roll with it. It would be a sarcastic take, full of witty, dry banter and social commentary. I don't think I am up to the task, but I want someone else to be.

Dinner Party Menu and Recipes

Last night, I hosted a celebratory dinner and came up with a rather well-received menu. Below, I provide the menu and the recipes I used (or modified) to put it together. Soon, I will post some meditations on the night as a whole, but I wanted to provide something tasty first. I have also made pumpkin spice quick bread, which I will post soon-ish as well. I have been baking regularly for my mother's co-workers, to the delight of many. I have also been gravely procrastinating on more graduate school forms and essays, generally ignoring the unfinished essays that taunt me from my computer.

...

Sherried Mushroom Soup (from Southern Living Magazine, or something similar)

I substituted mushroom blends for both the dried and fresh mushrooms, and used only half the dried amount because dried mushrooms are expensive! It was pretty darn good all the same.

Broth

2 Tbsp butter
1 Tbsp fresh thyme (I used 1/2 Tbsp dried)
1 pound shallots, coarsely chopped (I used 3/4 pound)
6 cans, low sodium broth (I used 5 1/2 cups veggie broth because I used boxes, but this may have been too little)
2 oz dried procini mushrooms

Melt butter in a medium or large pot, add thyme and shallots; cook for 10 minutes. Stir in broth and dried mushrooms (I let the dried mushrooms sit in 1 c of the broth before cooking) and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer uncovered for 1 hour

Spinach, Pomegranate, and Goat Cheese Salad

My mom made this. It had mostly spinach and lettuce, with pomegranate, goat cheese, cranberries, and bell peppers mixed in. I liked it with olive oil and vinegar.

Butternut Squash and Pumpkin Lasagna (Also from a Southern Living type magazine)

3 & 1/2 pounds butternut squash, seeded, peeled, and chopped into small pieces
2 Tbsp olive oil
salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 425 F, toss squash with olive oil, salt, and pepper, and bake for 25-30 minutes, until tender. I was one pound short so I also used some creamed pumpkin I had already made later on. Allow to cool. When you are done baking the squash, reduce temperature to 375.

1 pound ricotta
1/2 c cream
2 egg yolks
1/2 pound mozzarella
a pinch of nutmeg
a pinch of salt

Mix together in a large bowl.

2 Tbsp unsalted butter
1/3 c fresh sage

Saute sage leaves in butter for 3 or 4 minutes, remove from heat.

1 & 1/4 c low sodium (veggie) stock

In a medium bowl, mash about half of the squash (which I didn't do because I had the creamed pumpkin), stir in the sauteed sage and veggie stock.

About ten Fresh lasagna leaves
4 oz Parmesan cheese

I made these from scratch, by gradually combining two eggs & two tsp olive oil with one cup white flour and 1/2 cup whole wheat flour and rolling them out on a counter, cutting them, and boiling the leaves for 3-5 minutes before baking them in the lasagna. I needed a bit more than this so would probably add a few spoons more of olive oil and flour.

In a 9 cup baking dish, spread 3/4 c ricotta mixture, top with noodles, spread half of the squash mixture, then noodle layer, and 1 cup ricotta mixture; repeat with the remaining ingredients. Sprinkle with 4 oz shredded Parmesan cheese and bake at 375 for 30-40 minutes, allow to cool 10-15 minutes before serving. Serves 8-10.

Baked Pear Crumble a la Mode

5 pears; peeled, seeded, de-stemmed, and halved
1 c white flour
1/2 c sliced almonds
1/2 c brown sugar
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground, dried ginger
1 tsp cloves
1/2 tsp nutmeg
4 Tbsp butter, soft
about 1/2 c cream (or something lighter, like half & half or milk)

Preheat oven to 350. Place the pears on parchment paper on a pan. In a medium bowl, combine flour, almonds, and sugar, then, cut in the soft butter and mix with your fingers. Gradually add cream until you have a crumbly consistency. Spoon or pinch crumble over pears and bake for 15-25 minutes until browned and cooked through. Serve immediately with a scoop of ice cream. (Use Ivanna Cone's vanilla bean for best results!)

The City of Winter (i)

I have been writing pretty regularly, but mostly in partial stories or brief episodes. Following watching Franklyn and my strolls following the blizzard from earlier this week, I have begun writing an odd story. It may be more a collection of characters, a setting of place than a story, but I expect it to evolve in certain sort of way. Shortly I will be posting a few more things, but I have a good feeling about The City of Winter and wanted to share what I have of it.

...

The City of Winter
11 December 2009

Everyone in this city calls it by a different name. I call it Winter and I have been here longer than I can say. Snow piles higher than my head on each side of the street and with each snowfall, moraines gradually ascending by successive glaciations. At the end of Winter are endless deserts of drifted snow and ice, carved by wind into towers that compete with the city. One day they will reach above the city and crash down on us, burying it suddenly, quietly, and I do not know if I will bother to leave.

We are all émigrés here, with broken recollections of other places. The snow wipes it away over time and Winter becomes our ill-fitting home. In its center, tall spires of black metal pipes and half-corroded chimneys weave together and more than once I have imagined, half-waking, of a web made to catch dreams made by a people from another place. Beyond the heart, one can find comfort and even beauty in the city. Over steaming coffee or next to a fiery hearth, one finds company and we all share our stories.

No one refers to the city by the same name. To each, the name one uses is obvious. The expanses of snow outside, the chill air, the blinding sun on the clear days, the crisp sharp darkness of nights gave me the name of the city. Others, though, have found other names by which to refer to this hostel for refugees. A tall, thin, bent man with his unkempt beard and scraggy hair has been here longer than anyone I know. A woman with whom I was close believed he was an architect of the city, one of its first inhabitants; but the old man, Giorgio, denies he can recall. He calls the city by a first name, Francesca, when he is in good, amiable spirits, and di Roma, when he is sour. Upon inquiry, he said that the city has many moods to which he attends, as one attends to a woman; cordiality in certain times, politeness at others secures a man to a woman, or a man to his city. Once, I saw him shouting profanities to the high, industrial towers at the center of the city, but they were in a language of which I was unfamiliar.

Loraina always curses the city. She has one name for Winter that she tells no one. It is a name she curses under her breath and defames with her fists. When she can find it, she wields aerosol cans of paint and bottles with rags that she lights and heaves over the fences at the edge of the dark heart of the city. We were once close, but now I feel that she regards me like she regards the city, speaking not of my name but only of despicable appellations. Sooner or later, I will find her bricks come through my window. Loraina is a woman not to cross but who, upon meeting, one will eventually cross. Like most citizens of Winter, I move from place to place frequently; I have more reason to than most.

Iosef collects what he finds on the streets of Winter. He sets up residence in old homes with broken ceilings and sagging floors—of which, there are plenty in Winter. He plasters his walls with newspapers and grocery lists, creates furniture from empty milk crates and discarded appliances, the structure haphazardly reinforced by recovered wooden beams and sides of automobiles. Few people speak with Iosef because his name for Winter is Not-City and argues that somewhere one might find a the true City which is Not-City's opposite, but that the faraway City and Not-City cannot both exist. Iosef's explanations are broken, as he speaks another language than no one else understands. Over his headline wallpaper he scrawls its characters: Letters punctuated by arrows going between them, brackets and parentheses demarcating groups within groups. When the walls and floors and ceiling of his home become overfull with the traces of the city, he leaves. Once, his departure was marked by a neighbor burning the house to the ground. When I told Iosef, he only tapped his head, saying he had all of it in his head already and that house was not so flammable.

The arsonist behind Iosef's burned down home, I believe to be Andre who refuses to wear clothes. His nudity is unassuming, though he eats prodigiously and walks with an unapologetic quiver about him. Andre's eating is remorseful, quick, and distant; it is a chore to him. Andre despises the city and calls it Gehenna, the trash heap. He cannot articulate his hatred into an argument or statement, only that he wishes to purge Gehenna from himself, that in it, he sees his own reflection and that by destroying it piecemeal he hopes to establish something purer. I am fearful of Andre, I have seen him kill men who have earned his disgust.

Teresa came to Winter not long ago. Her recollections from her other place were still strong and she began to recreate them here. She opened a restaurant, a diner, and began to serve people food from it. She hired a cook named Julio and cleaned a modest, red and white striped dress which she wears to wait the counter and tables. She calls the city San Fernando, saying that that is where she always lived and figured that that is where she must still live. Teresa serves coffee endlessly and her candor is unlike anyone else in the city. Sometimes her presence is painful for its contrast to most others I know, but Teresa has changed Winter, has changed San Fernando into something else.

Julio, who has lived here longer, paints when he is not working, painting the scenes from out his window down the street from the diner. He looks at the paintings from before Teresa came and after, showing that the sun is brighter, the snow thinner, the windows cleaner. Julio sometimes calls the city San Fernando when talking with Teresa, but his name for it is long and beautiful and comes from a name for a goddess he no longer understands, Coyolxauhqui. He has made an altar in his apartment, around which he places certain paintings of the night sky and a powerful, female mystic. I have seen him through the window enacting potent ceremonies.

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Giving Thanks & Having Misgivings

At school, Thanksgiving meant something a little different. Without the weight of television and the occupation that comes with retail store, Thanksgiving as it was celebrated at school felt simpler, more straightforwardly celebratory. Now, I cannot help but second guess the holiday. With the abundance and ornamentation of the holiday abounding in shop windows and grocery store aisles, I think all the more of the pseudo-mythic origins of the holiday.

In some ways, it would make more sense for it to be a simple fertility festival. Instead, it is layered with history that has been obfuscated and forgotten. In one case, it would mean a celebration of family, harvest, and even of hard labor and subsequent satisfaction. In the actual case, it is more complicated, filtered first through the strange policies that legitimized, then the methods to commercialize the holiday. Without a doubt, the day means something very important; it is a day to bring people together, even to heal and reinforce bonds between them with food and shared activities--cooking, football, evening movies, etc.

Simultaneous to that is the reality of a holiday that refers to a myth of cooperation and mutuality. Such a myth not only misleads the historical reality, it conceals the significant history and conflicts that proceeded. It seems like national holidays have that dual reality: celebration and obfuscation. Some people might argue that celebration in this case is just another form of confusion, that it is a thin, shallow veil. I disagree. Usually, time with the family together is enriching and enjoyed, particularly since my family is so far-flung. Nevertheless, by confounding the history for a myth, a dangerous myth, and submitting to regular reinterpretation by organizations which benefit from our ignorance, the myth supplants the reality and breaks whatever honest foundation we might have.

Some may celebrate their national holidays in particular, even dissenting ways. A festival so gastro-centric obviously lends itself to establishing sound food ways and the richness of a meaningful food culture. I obviously love making food from scratch and being in fine company only adds to that pleasure. Thanksgiving food in particular identifies the delights of New World food in this increasingly dislocated gustatory marketplace. The supper table is usually replete with pumpkins and pecans, cranberries and turkey, all of which were unfamiliar fixings to the Europeans. What you get it something distinctly regional, something based on real food from a real place, grown from soil and not assembled in factories. For this, I am thankful.

Friday, November 20, 2009

Reflections: Applications

By applying to a program, a job, a school, I say in a sort of formal but firm way, "Why yes, I do think you should accept me." This is a strange place for me. The jobs that I have had have either involved a deliberate choice to be there because of a personal interest--i.e., my job at Ivanna Cone--or because of personal need--such as my first job at Hy-Vee, a regional supermarket. When I applied for colleges some time ago, I felt the necessity to act differently; in such a case, I was hedging my bets on this or that institution. Wherever I went, the tour guide or someone else with whom I spoke claimed a profound, guttural draw to their school. I never got that pull in my stomach. Instead, I chose my schools loosely, and then decided in a calculated way--balancing cost, scholarships, programs, and size essentially. Presently, I don't even feel like I have much of that to go on.

Graduate programs and their success with students seems to be based on some harmony between the two. A student attends a program or school, expecting the support and cooperation of a particular academic to guide the student's research. Researching graduate school often or ought to mean researching the professors with whom one might work, noticing some of the school's specialities or the course that alumni have taken following their education there. So far, my graduate school research has focused on the programs themselves and I have been attracted to the subject matter and courses, such as Northern Arizona University's Sustainable Communities program. Another session of research and application will come, attending to the work of professors of philosophy and how my inquests do or do not mesh with those. At the moment, such an endeavor is frustratingly nebulous and I can't draw my attention to such a task without pulling it away from completing to some appreciable degree the labor of application to the cadre of programs I already have.

In most of the applications, I am expected to rehash my work and accomplishments, which runs into two difficulties. First, I do not have particular interest in running through a list of accomplishments as such. My work is my own, but it relates to what I have done for a classroom, literature I have read, films and even games I have encountered. With only a title and a date, it is difficult for me to take in much of a meaning for the work I have done. Second, that list isn't expansive. Gustavus generally offers a tiered academic scholarship, so you get one that represents their desire for you to attend, so I do not have many to offer. As for other accomplishments or awards, Gustavus is in many ways insulated from the need to excel in those categories; though it offers plentiful opportunities in its own environment, the application processes and deadlines never made it into my schedule. Instead, I established my own expectations and went for those. I am not one to rely on the praise of others to satisfy my own sense of self.

For these applications, I must suck it up--in one way--and work with what I know. I cannot say that I enjoy lamely accepting the expectations of institutions, I am too hardheaded for that, I suppose. Here I am, though, setting my own deadlines for applications that are generally due next spring. The work of application has provided notable tasks, like forming a resume and a curriculum vitae, neither of which I have done before, at least in any way that matters. To do that, I have collected just about all of the work I have done over the past four or more years in one place--which is actually two places, my computer and my external harddrive. If nothing else, this process has been a worthy challenge, one that demands perspective in unexpected ways. After most of the busywork is over, I plan to return to my paper on xenia which is intended to respond to Appiah's Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers which we read in the philosophy senior seminar. I also discovered the handful of short pieces I wrote wile in Brazil, which are mostly autobiographical fiction. This has become an exercise in reflection, which I probably need now more than I would have predicted.

Friday, November 13, 2009

Focaccia, Ciabatta, & Muffins

I am trudging diligently through graduate school applications, and am getting nearly everything completed despite--or in response to--my computer difficulties earlier this week. In the meantime, I have been dabbling with muffins, something I have never done before. Also, I hope to spend some quality time mending my bicycle today. It will be a pretty full day, but a good one. The gray skies have returned, which makes suggests that deadlines are approaching (at least for me). Here are a few recipes to enjoy.

...

Focaccia

Starter - Mix these ingredients together thoroughly and allow to sit for at least an hour.

1 Tbsp dry yeast
1/2 cup white flour
1 Tbsp honey
1/2 c water

Dry ingredients - Blend the following in a large mixing bowl.

2 c white flour
1/2 c polenta (corn grits)
1/2 c whole wheat flour
2 tsp salt
1 tsp rosemary
2 tsp thyme
1 tsp black pepper

Wet ingredients - In a small bowl, stir together:

1/4 c olive oil
3 cloves garlic, minced or chopped
2-3 tomatoes or 1 small can of tomatoes (strained)
1/2 c warm water

Will also need:

1-2 Tbsp olive oil
1 teaspoon coarse sea salt

Mix together the starter and the wet ingredients until pretty even, then add we ingredients to dry and stir until nice a doughy. You may want to add up to 1/2 cup more warm water. Allow to rest for an hour, then turn out on floured counter and knead until smooth. Return dough to bowl and allow to rest for about 45 minutes. Preheat oven to 450 F with baking sheets inside. Test dough, the tomatoes will continue to release their water and will make doughy spots if they remain too wet. Knead further, incorporating just enough flour to allow to handle easily. Divide in two and pat into flat rounds or ovals. Rub loaves with oil on both sides and sprinkle with coarse salt on one side, then set on hot baking sheets, salt side up. Bake 10-20 minutes until golden brown and serve.

...

Ciabatta

Starter - mix these ingredients until even, then allow to sit for 12-24 hours
Note: I made both the starters at the same time and made the ciabatta the following morning.

1 Tbsp yeast
1/2 cup white flour
1 Tbsp honey
1/2 cup water

Dry ingredients - blend together in a large bowl

3 cups white flour
1 teaspoon salt
2-4 Tbsp olive oil

You will also need:

1-2 Tbsp olive oil
1 Tbsp white flour or polenta
1/4 - 1/2 cup blue cheese or other to top (optional)

Mix starter with dry ingredients, adding about 1 cup warm water to make a dough, then allow to rest one hour. Turn out onto lightly floured counter and knead until smooth, then let rest about 45 minutes--though the dough should remain slightly sticky and wet to allow for fluffier loaves. Preheat oven to 450 F with baking sheets inside. Break dough into two, kneading each and shaping into long ovals, rub with olive oil and pat with flour; pull out baking sheets and place loaves on them and allow to proof 20-30 minutes. Before placing in oven, indent the top with your fingers and sprinkle cheese over (indent even if you don't add cheese). Allow to bake for 15-25 minutes, allow cheese to cool somewhat before serving.

...

These muffins are hearty with their thick oats and whole wheat flour, sweet but not overly so, and are pretty easy. So far, I have made mini, medium, and large varieties, the large version having the best internal texture. The yogurt is an important ingredient; nonfat makes them too dry, while lowfat works pretty well, but I would love to make them with regular or creamy yogurt. For a different texture, use quick oats or grind them and make a coarse oat flour. Also, these can bake fast or unevenly, so the first or second batch may have some burn spots; the mini muffins bakes in about 12-15 minutes, which I missed and were burnt.

Peanut Butter Oat Muffins

Dry ingredients - mix in a large bowl.

1 c whole wheat flour
1 c thick oats
1/2 Tbsp baking powder

Wet ingredients - combine until even, but not necessarily smooth.

1 c yogurt
3 Tbsp ground flax
1/3 c peanut butter
1/4 c honey
1 Tbsp molasses

Add wet ingredients to try and stir until flour and oats are moistened/incorporated. Spoon muffins into greased muffin tins, bake at 400 F for 13-18 minutes. Serve immediately.

...

Cranberry-Coconut-Walnut Muffins

Dry ingredients - mix 'em up!

1/2 c white flour
1 c whole wheat flour
1/2 c thick oats
1/2 Tbsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt

Wet ingredients - stir it together!

1 c yogurt
1/4 c honey
1/2 c dry cranberries
1/4 c walnut pieces
1/4 c coconut
1/4 c ground flax
a squirt or squeeze of lemon juice

Add wet ingredients to dry and stir until moistened, then bake at 400 F for about 13-18 minutes. Serve immediately!

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Twenty-Four Hours & a Headache Later

For those who don't know, Linux is an open-source operating system, available to all, with a vast community of contributors, fans, programmers, and users. This past summer, I chose to purchase a Linux-ready machine from System76, a company that builds computers specifically for open-source programs. What does open-source mean? Well, it means that all the little whatsits and widgets in a given product--usually a piece of software--are available to users to work with free of charge (though some open source software is not free to use, most often it is). Linux and similar open-source projects provide some measure of competitive counterweight to the proprietary operating systems and programs of Microsoft and Apple; and, with the recent release of Windows 7, they need it.

Generally speaking, most popular Linux distributions are just as if not more reliable than, at the very least, whatever Microsoft operating system you are using. I currently use the new distribution of Ubuntu kernel 9.10. Adapting, using, and understanding Ubuntu has been an interesting and satisfying challenge, as I sort of just dove into it. I was tired of running Windows and running in to bugs and viruses and shutdowns. And, up until yesterday, I happily chugged along without a hitch. However, in my attempt to dabble, I overshot my reach and ran into trouble. As a result, I lost some photos and some documents--most of such work is backed up elsewhere--and had to reload the new kernel. I may not be out of the ditch of trouble, but I would rather get some work done while I know I can and back it up (thank you GoogleDocs).

What I am getting at is that I have had a frustrating last twenty-four hours, but the problem exploded when I made unwise choices concerning the system administration tools. Then again, I have been forced to reorient my graduate school application method and feel that--like starting a book over again--I am doing so with more clarity and precision. This is not all good and happy, as it has taken far longer than I would have even expected had I known in advance, but I am trying very hard to take it all in stride. A story in Zen Shorts narrated by my favorite panda, Stillwater, tells of a farmer who experiences both curses (i.e. his son breaks his leg) and subsequent blessings (the broken leg means he does not have to go to war).

We experiment all the time, even when we don't fiddle with things we don't quite understand--as in the situation at hand. Our experiments involve our bodies, our friends, our families, our jobs, our homes, and our world; our experiments are everywhere and all the time. If one relied on complete knowledge to accomplish tasks, very little would get done; we are fated to act with only incomplete data. Such a fate, though, is not to be misunderstood itself; that is, if given the possibility of having complete data all the time, would you accept it? Such a situation suggests, at least to me, that only a select few courses of action would be viable and we would lose both the ability to experience and learn as well as the virtues of overcoming our selves. I suppose our experiments, wherever they take place, incorporate at least one factor: ourselves. This factor is the one we can know most deeply, but often blind ourselves to. Taking difficulties in stride, examining them mindfully, and respecting the choices that follow mean we can use our absence of knowledge, put it to these tests, and examine it as if it were under a microscope. I hope that I have learned something from my headache.

...

I made focaccia yesterday and blue cheese ciabatta today. I might have time to post recipes after lunch and some reading. This afternoon, I am attending a lecture of a family friend.

...

Another note, what qualities do you look for in a notable film? I commented yesterday that I prefer The Orphanage to Pan's Labyrinth because, though they share many, many qualities, I feel that the potential for innocence and earnest mystery is stronger in The Orphanage than in Pan's Labyrinth, even if the latter uses more imagery than the former. What do you think?

Thursday, November 5, 2009

Feeling for the Wake

Most of my thought-space has been occupied by applications for, procrastination of, and worries about graduate schools. As those of you who listened to me this past academic year, particularly in the spring, a good part of me is increasingly invested in breaking out and starting a bakery, where I might put some community and environmental ethical experiments into play or practice (they both feel appropriate). Unfortunately, or perhaps it is for the better, I was unable to find housing away from home and such a venture requires new, fertile ground on which to grow. Now, I am finding my roots and leaves reaching further and further away from my present locale, though I adore the time I get to spend with my mother, and my time on the aforementioned tasks is subtly painful. The plan as it stands is to go to graduate school, write and work some amazingly brilliant academic tomfoolery, then look a bit more thoroughly about me and open up a bakery for a few year. Such is the aim, one I wouldn't mind starting now if my situation were more appropriate.

For the moment, my energy waxes and wanes as I explore programs, scholarships, and the potential destinations that may lie ahead. I seem to have found myself in one of those parts of the story that gets glossed over in the film version or sticks around a little too long in the book. What I need to do right now is put my life, accomplishments, and aims into a short, concise, and encouraging narrative that conveniently fills a handful of text boxes and uploaded documents. Meanwhile, I bake pumpkin cakes and can pear preserves and refine a seedy bread recipe, much to the excitement and kind words of friends like Miss Kalisa and Miss Adrienne, and therein finding the calm, reflective, sociable joy that I presently have difficulty embracing. A small tug-of-war goes on, one side pulling me toward the future, the other dragging me to the present--odd as it may sound, I don't feel encumbered by the past. Neither side feels inexorable nor dull, it is only that each prevents me from the accomplishments of the other. What I want is one, or the other, or both; but I feel a bit like I get none of the above--which the GRE study books tell you is an unlikely answer.

I missed much of the lovely, uncommonly warm and sunny autumn day because I was determined to work on applications. I would happily work on them outside, if it weren't for screen glare, and happily meander about on a walk or bike downtown to find fine company or even dig a bit in the yard before the real cold gets settled in; but it was almost gone before I knew it. With the time change, the sun sets early enough to knock me off my feet. Had I had my way, I would have probably fallen asleep by 8:30 yesterday evening, with the sun vanished hours ago. Although, I may toss this off as fading vestiges of that particular kind of loneliness that sets in with missed (or nonexistent) opportunities of shared blankets, warm drinks, evening movies, and bundled up strolls. If so, I might enjoy the coming cold just as a change of heart, a change that locks me up inside with plenty of writing and reading to accomplish--such transition is pretty familiar and might be helpful this time around.

The day has closed in a positively wonderful way. I continue to work on canning, this time a far greater success than the previous attempt, and with the excitable company of Miss Adrienne, it felt new and... vigorous or vitalizing or rejuvenating in some way. With Kalisa's further company, we fawned over foodstuffs and chatted this way and that, eventually reading Jo Ann Beard's The Fourth State of Matter aloud on the deck. Now, with a rough resume (which I prefer spelled with accents) in digital hand, more than a little work accomplished with the applications, and a warm fire at my side, the day seems recovered in spite of my own shortcomings.

I began writing this consider the idea of "the wake," where other travelers leave their disturbances behind them, but provide an easier route for those behind. The wake caused by boats also disrupts the surroundings and can be trouble in urban waterways. The wake has a dual reality: the reality of the traveler or pathfinder identifying and responding to the behavior of others, & the reality of the traveler's disruption and difficulty for those around her/him/hir. I had planned to lead into something insightful about this dual reality, but now the synthesis of my own writing and this characterization fades. I do not know if I am following and enjoying wisdom of others, the watcher from the coast observing and feeling the perturbations, or one who is making the wake behind me and simultaneously confounding and enlightening those behind or around. It is a strange lost-ness to feel such. For now though, perhaps my own ignorance may serve as a blessing, for I certainly feel blessed this fine evening in this fine house.

Pumpkin & Pears

I have been canning pears and baking with pumpkin. In the wake of Hallowe'en, I have had two pumpkin or related squash to bake and keep (refrigerated or frozen) for baking. Yesterday, I made these:

Pumpkin Cake (or bars)

4 eggs
1 & 2/3 cups brown sugar (or white, or a blend, but I will use all brown next time)
1 cup vegetable oil
1 pound creamed pumpkin

Mix until smooth and bubbly in an electric mixer.

2 cups all purpose flour, scant or sifted
1/2 c thick oats
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground clove
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda

Combine and blend dry ingredients, then gradually sprinkle over pumpkin mixture and blend. When beaten thoroughly, pour into 9x13 baking pan (greased) and bake for 30 minutes.

Cream Cheese Frosting

8 oz softened cream cheese
1/2 cup butter

Blend together until even with an electric mixer.

2 cups powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract

Add to cream cheese and butter, then mix until even. Spread when cake is cooled completely.

* Taken mostly from a magazine recipe card without identifying features. That recipe uses 15 oz of pumpkin (a can), all white sugar, and lacks nutmeg, clove, and oats.

...

I am still trying to figure out canning fruit. I want to make fruit spread (just fruit, maybe some fruit juice or pectin, but little or no sugar), but my preserves are too wet or have too little pectin. Such work takes some expertise that I wish to obtain.

Soon--later today--I will write some film reviews and some other comments. I know that I have not been writing in here the way I would have hoped to do. Mostly, my mind meanders about the duty of filling out graduate school applications. More later.

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Whole Wheat Pumpkin Bread

This is a quick attempt to make whole wheat pumpkin bread with my puree pumpkin supply. Also, my sourdough starter isn't as up to snuff as I would like it to be, unfortunately.

...

Whole Wheat Pumpkin Bread

1 c warm water
1-2 Tbs dry yeast
1 c white flour

Mix until even in a bowl, allow to rest

2-3 cups puree'd pumpkin
2-3 Tbs molasses
about 1/3 cup honey
3-4 Tbs pumpkin spices (cloves, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, etc.)
6 Tbs butter
1 & 1/2 Tbs salt

Add to a small or medium pan, heat at medium until butter is melted and mixture is warm. Blend starter and pumpkin mixture in a large mixing bowl.

1-2 cups white flour
3-5 cups wheat flour

Gradually add flour and mix until you have a soft but not particularly wet dough. You can also make a sweeter, whiter loaf or a heavier, heartier, whole wheat loaf. Allow to rest at least thirty minutes, then turn out and knead until smooth. Separate into loaves (three medium loaves, or two rounds; I am doing a small braid and a full loaf) and shape, place on greased sheet or loaf pan, allow to rise for about thirty minutes or until size has doubled, then bake at 350 F for (probably) 30-40 minutes (they're in the oven now). Hopefully it turns out!

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Granola Bars & Bird Seed Bread

Last summer I bought a small food scale that was on clearance. I didn't use it much at all at school, but I broke it out the other day to work on brownies and sort of fell in love with it. It is a simple, analogue dial readout with a medium sized boat-shaped bowl, that can hold a surprisingly large amount. My mom and I have also used it for weighing fruit for preserves. If you can find one for a modest price, or a used one, I would suggest it. I have stuck with weights for these, which may be inconvenient without one.

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Nut Chocolate Granola Bars

Toast at 350 F for 15 minutes:

8 oz thick oats
3 oz sunflower seeds
4 oz walnuts
4 oz almonds
4 oz cashews
3 oz pecans (optional)
4 oz millet
2 oz sesame seeds
1/2 c (or 2 oz) wheat germ

While the above are toasting, in a medium sauce pan on low to medium heat, melt and blend:

3/4 c honey
1/4 c molasses
1 c creamy peanut butter
8 oz bittersweet or unsweetened chocolate (at least 65% cacao)
2 tsp vanilla
1 Tbs cinnamon

Separately, measure out and put into a large mixing bowl:

4 oz flax seed
4 oz sweetened flake coconut

Mix the dry ingredients into the mixing bowl and blend until even, then mix in the dry ingredients (you can allow them to cool, first). After the dry ingredients are blended, stir in honey-peanut butter mixture and mix until even; be sure to check the bottom for remainder. Turn out onto lightly greased 9x13 pan (I use the same pan as In toasted them in, so the butter glides right on) and press to the pan with wax paper. Bake at 300 F for 25 minutes, allow to cool entirely and cut into squares. They'll last a while (no ingredients to spoil), but I've wrapped them up to avoid drying out further. Undermixing makes some parts too dry to stick together, but the wet ingredients and coconut generally make a solid batch.

...

I started with the same base and made some with dried fruit.

Fruit Granola Bars

Toast at 350 F for 15 minutes:

8 oz thick oats
3 oz sunflower seeds
4 oz walnuts
4 oz millet
2 oz sesame seeds
1/2 c (or 2 oz) wheat germ

While the above are toasting, in a medium sauce pan on low to medium heat, melt and blend:

3/4 c honey
1/4 c molasses
1 c creamy peanut butter
2 tsp vanilla
1 Tbs cinnamon

Weigh out and mix:

6 oz dried cranberries
4 oz dried apricots (cut into small pieces)
4 oz shredded, sweetened coconut
2 oz dried papaya

The specific choice of fruit is up to you, these ingredients will likely change over time.

Put dried fruit into mixing bowl, then add toasted ingredients and blend until even. Add in the honey-peanut butter mixture and mix until even. Turn out onto lightly greased 9x13 pan, pressing even with wax paper, and bake at 300 F for 25 minutes. Allow to cool before cutting.

...

Bird Seed Bread

2 c white flour
2 c wheat flour
1 c oats
1/3 c sunflower seeds
1/3 c millet
1/3 c wheat bran
1/3 c flax seed
1/4 c sesame seeds
2-3 Tbs dried yeast

Blend together in a large mixing bowl. Then add:

1/8-1/4 c molasses
1/3 c honey
4 Tbsp butter (room temperature)
2 tsp salt

(The honey and molasses I sort of just drip over and estimate to help with an even consistency, so those measurements are flexible.) Mix the above together and add enough water to make a wet dough (1 & 1/2 to 2 & 1/2 cups).

Allow dough to rest at least 45 minutes in the bowl. Turn out on floured counter and knead with whole wheat flour until smooth. Return to bowl and allow to rest for another hour.

Punch down, roll out, and shape. I favor four small rounds, but can be made into fewer or more loaves. Optionally dress the loaves with a mixture of 1 Tbs each of oats, bran, and sesame before proofing; proof for at least one hour. Preheat oven to 350 F and bake for about 25-35 minutes until crust is firm and crisp, sounding hollow when tapped.

Enjoy!

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Recipes to Post

Sometime in the next 36 hours I will post these recipes. I had planned on doing so today, but a little misadventure prevented that

Chocolate and nut granola bars,
Dried fruit granola bars,
& Bird seed bread;
and in the near future
Pumpkin bars,
Whole wheat pumpkin oat cookies,
& Whole wheat pumpkin spice bread.

Notes on "Droplets"

The story I have just finished posting is still in its rough. I have been reading through it--I just finished doing so myself a few days ago--and have already begun to iron out inconsistencies. Overall, though, I am pretty satisfied with the tale. Kalisa refered to it as a novella, which may be saying a little much, but then again, it may not be. The story is definitely slightly macabre, but the suspense is intended to be subtle, a gradual building rather than something cacophonous. That has been taking up a bit of my time, particularly because the style is one I am rather attached to. Generally speaking, I feel that we ignore some of the mystery that pervades our world in order to make it feel solid. The introduction of George touches on the mysterious even in the world of science; it is only upon reflection that I think of "the miracle" as really tying into the story as a whole. (The science joke about the miracle is based on something a chemistry teacher brought up in high school, by the by.) Upon rereading, I feel that the story does tie into itself surprisingly well, the bits and pieces of background lending to the overall story in a way I had not predicted. I hope that it is an enjoyable read for those who have finished it, and mind that it has a few more drafts to undergo before I set it down for a while. In the meantime, I have a short story that I look forward to playing with in the near future which I will post here as well, probably in two parts.

The Fate of Droplets (x, and final)

It was some time later, about three weeks, that I saw George again. As no body had yet been found, the case had become a missing persons rather than a homicide and George had been released from custody, though she was expected to stay in town. She had not yet continued work, though with the expectation that she would cover all the ground once she returned. She had called, uncharacteristically quiet and timid, and we had set up a rendezvous at a coffeeshop near her apartment. It was a familiar place in which we both felt at ease despite the bizarre circumstances.
“I have had difficulty assembling the pieces,” she stated plainly, humbly.
“Do you think that they can be?”
She looked up at me, holding her mug tightly despite its heat. I caught myself staring at her partially amputated digit. Something crossed my mind and vanished again, leaving an emptiness in my head where it had been.
“I have always lived and worked under the pretense that experience is explicable. If I lose that, what do I have left?”
I was quiet, stewing over the words, of George's axiomatic principle. According to all accounts, I had apparently lost Henry, but I had no deeply rooted suppositions about the world as George had. Now, she was losing that well out of which she had always functioned, from which she was nurtured.
“Henry amazed me,” she said. “I couldn't help but envy him, envy his contact with something outside of his own questions, outside of their answers. I wanted it, whatever he had found. He touched, he tasted something I have yearned for my entire life. One day, he comes back with it and doesn't know what to do with it.” George spoke calmly, quietly, and I shied from her tone which was neither passionate nor angry, but analytic and uncompromising.
“Can you say anymore about that night?”
“No,” she said into her mug, and then looked up at me, her eyes oddly soft. “By then,” she stared at me, then past me, “by then whatever was happening was happening through me, not by me. My God, Lex, all I could do was squirm as it played me. I would never believe it if it weren't for the feeling it gave me. It felt like something had reached up inside me, something ancient and viscous, the way...” and she whispered such that I couldn't hear. Her conviction, her sentiment shook me. I had continued to wonder if she had been at least somehow part of the action, that she might have stopped it somehow. Then, and I still maintain, that she had made some decision before all these events that sided with that malevolent curiosity, that drive that had led to Henry's death or disappearance; but all the same she was mute to its control, left unable to combat or complain until after.
“I have heard something else,” I eventually added. “Brother James, Henry's spiritual tutor, he seems to have vanished as well. He packed up odds and ends, but his suitcase was found in a ditch outside of town. Do you know anything else?”
“No, but I have heard that, too. What do you think it means?”
“Well, he would have been the most knowledgeable person of Henry's state of mind. If anything, it points to a higher order, that what happened involved more agents than just you, or whatever was coming through you.”
Each of us meditated on this. The space was at first uncomfortable, then smoothed again and we sipped the last of our drinks. We parted, unclear of all that was around us. I sensed a sort of frequency, a vibration in the air as if cracks were forming. Late autumn was upon us, and a gust of chill air can do that with or without the bizarre circumstances. That evening, I met with Mona and she shared something she had heard from others that had slipped her mind up until then. It seems that Thomas, my party-time interlocutor, had been seized by something like an epileptic fit and hospitalized. He woke the next day and could recall nothing of the past two or three weeks. His doctors call it temporary amnesia, with some minor neurological damage showing up in this scan or that. This tidbit struck me silent as I thought of how he had acted on the porch of Jessica's, and I did not enjoy the weight of knowing only I could recall the words spoken there.

The Fate of Droplets (ix)

Two days later, the police allowed me to see George. I had undergone a gamut of inquiry the day following, as well as a series of psychological evaluations, which were not particularly satisfying. The morning before seeing George, I tried to visit the scene. Damage had been done to the floor below and the top floor just above, all of which was taped off and two guard were posted, mostly to fend off media and gawkers. The displaced residents were put up in a hotel at the time. I explained who I was, but all they allowed was for me to see in from the hallway. The scene had been swept over for clues, samples of blood and wax and hair, some fine powder marked spots on the floor and wall. I noticed a strange smudge, like a wide, rounded footpad, as if of an elephant or something was incompletely described by some of the powder. Some trace of that smell like burning plastic remained, but it had been dismissed as residue from the fire. I maintained that Henry avoided synthetic material as part of his study, but no one listened.
I suppose what I went to see was any sign of the portal from the fire. Though ash and charred fabric lay about the room, as well as marks where the fire had nearly spread to the destroyed furnishings, I could determine nothing peculiar relating to the blaze. Other witnesses confirmed the weird, bewitching hue of the flame, but it was explained away by certain metals mixed with the fire, like those in firework displays. This was also to account for the odor that firefighters and other residents had emphasized in their tellings.
When I arrived at George's hospital door, I was still recovering but felt doubly drained by the unsurprising nature of the scene we had left. The furniture, though torn apart had lost the qualities I had seen in that altered state. I had omitted any mention of the strange properties I had seen exhibited on the wall while the fire I limited my story to the chromatic intensity. The silverware had shown some strange magnetism, but most of it, it seemed, had been forced into the yielding plaster of the wall; and the magnetism quickly faded, suggesting it had never been sufficiently potent to hold anything to it.
Seeing George for the first time since, I felt demolished. She was held as the primary suspect—I was set apart thanks to witnesses who saw me enter following the events—responsible for the disappearance and likely homicide of Henry Carnes. The blood on the wall was cross-checked with hair samples from a comb and confirmed to be his, and the quantity found suggested a severe or lengthy bleeding. In the apartment, police found George's backpack, the one I had seen her with days before, filled with pieces of wax and some odd, indecipherable scribbles of which neither officers nor George could make heads or tails.
But here was George, strung up and guarded, wounded and accused. I had, almost off-handedly, assumed George's guilt, particularly with the oddities I had witnessed and Henry had described. All the same, I could not deny my curiosity and the absurdity of the situation, so I chose to think of George as a friend first, and as somehow involved in the probably demise of Henry second or third. (This, too, felt absurd, but the profound difficulty in shaping the experience to anything that fits in my life has allowed some strange flexibility in my choices.) And so, I came to speak with her.
“How are you feeling?”
“They drug me, but not enough. I can feel my bruises whenever I fidget. I think the nurses refuse to give me more out of disgust.” She peered at me, suspicious and clever; later, I understood that she was considering if I might be acting the stooge for the police, but she must have thought better of me. “Why are you here?”
“To see you. To try and make sense of it.” We sized one another up, and for a moment, I felt exceedingly dishonest. “I went to the apartment this morning.”
“How was it?”
“It felt and appeared pretty normal. Normal for a crime scene. Normal for tables and rugs torn in two.” I looked at my feet and muttered, “Normal for Henry being dead.”
“You don't know that, there's no body.”
“But you do. You know.”
George stared at me, her face turned cold and bloodless.
“George, you were there.”
“No, I wasn't exactly there.”
“Henry called while it was happening. He mentioned you.”
“What did he tell you?”
Then I thought of his words, I pulled them out and felt them, realizing I had misspoken before saying them again.
“Through me, he said. It wasn't me, it was through me.”
“What does that mean, George?”
“Henry knew while I didn't. Most of my actions were numb, dream like. I couldn't feel myself as I did them and then they would fade from memory. You saw me. I was in no state to have done anything.”
“I know, George; but what happened?”
“Henry told you that he was channeling something, that whatever he had gone into was still with him. Well, when he punctured the veil—that is what he called it when I spoke with him—it must have weakened something, triggered something. I was curious and then obsessed by his experience. Before I knew it, I wasn't in control of my actions or my words. I remember, vaguely but I remember, spying on the two of you, then on him. Lex, if I was so obsessed with Henry, why can't I remember anything specific?”
“How do you know so much, though?”
“I have had two, under-medicated days of surgery and thinking. All I have been doing is piecing it together as best as I can.” George's face reddened and I saw her in rigid, furious pain; “It was in me, Lex. It took my curiosity and twisted it into obsession, madness, and that was like a beacon through the hole Henry made. When I came to, I felt its absence, like emptiness, like it had carved me out so that it could fit, like I was some, some costume. Lex, I feel caved in, my body feels polluted, toxic.”
I moved to her, to reach out and touch her and she shifted as best as she could away from me. The guard turned and saw me approach her. George made a noise I could not discern. The guard ordered me out. I obeyed. In the hall I sat and thought for a long time before leaving.

The Fate of Droplets (viii)

I had very little in the way of warning when I picked up the receiver the next night. Before I heard distinct words, a clanging hymn or prayer carried over the line. Behind that, were noises I do not care to describe, although even now they bring to mind an immense drain or vacancy, like pressure gathering in one's ears and pulling at the back of one's throat. Eventually, Henry said something over the cacophony.
“Lex, are you there?”
“What is wrong? It sounds terrible—“
“It came again, Lex. I knew but could do nothing.”
“Who? What?”
“Through, her, through Georgia.”
And he began shouting incomprehensibly into the room. The speaker clattered as it hit something. I strained to understand as I slipped on shoes. On the other end of the line, as I walked out the door, something foul and deep and guttural, noisome and fiendish bellowed. The menace was diluted by the phone, but I with my door open, it seemed to taunt me as a raced to Henry. My pulse pounded with primitive fear and dread. It sounds mad, but I felt that howl chase me from within my head, receding only as I breathlessly reached Henry's apartment. Some residents had fled the building and gawked above, seeing queer blue and yellow lights swirl and flash. The lights recalled images of space, of stars burning impossibly brilliant and hot; plasma and energy and nuclei dislodged from the normal laws.
The air in the stairwell was noxious and horrible, oppressive in its density. In it were the scents of ozone, freshly crackled into being by lightning, as well as the acrid odor of burning polymers, and something more indescribable, something that once overpowered me and I stopped, only steps from the door swung wide. I became ill and the colors, the space, the steps and walls swam around me; someone seemed to slither by, though it felt infinitely difficult in my psychedelic state; the colors only parted to welcome something in and then shed them again as easily. With the passing of the unknown figure, I recuperated some—though how I cannot say, even the later police could hardly breathe amidst the stink—and forced my way through the air that seemed aqueous or mercurial. At the portal—which the doorway had surely become—I stalled and felt something that had been loosened, become entirely unhinged in my mind.
The floor swam from side to side, as if all the floorboards and rug, even the shredded furniture and curtains, had transmuted into the desk ornament sloshing colored water back and forth. On my right—which slithered above me as much as to one side or another—the kitchen tiles and counters, the sink and refrigerator door were all riven and shattered; metal objects seemed magnetized together and forced into a crater in the wall, though many seemed to stand on end from the floor. In the main room, sundered tables lay against either wall, marked as if they had been twigs, split and tossed by monstrous, diabolic children. In the tabletops, on the floorboards, and upon the wall was the unmistakable hue of blood, but blended with various unknown substances, exhibiting the most horrific properties under these altered physical laws. I saw strange hieroglyphs and fluid scribbles shudder into and out of form, sometimes the macabre media blending and other times separating into clear red, black, blue, and waxy pearl colors. Some candles were overturned from the center of the floor and some scraps of rug and tapestry had caught fire, but the fire rolled about and glowed awfully, casting the light seen from outside. All of this I saw suddenly, as if through a wider lens of viewing and all in focus, in horrible, attentive detail.
Within the fire was something dark and deep. Though something deep and instinctual urged me out again, my hand reached out for it. Unbalanced and horribly fatigued, I fell, and thankful I am for that. I heard then the sucking sound and the laugh again. It originated—I felt from my shaken bones outward—from that depth within the plasma blaze in the center of the room. Against my face, blood splattered and seeped, though already I could sense the return of normal gravity, of the laws around which we have built our psyches as well as our cities. Something in the room blinked, as if something powerful and cosmic had swept its hand over to smooth the ruffles in the fabric. I could see the horrible walls: gibberish scrawled in deep scratches and dripping, malevolent blood and wax, but the former dribbled and the latter cooled as I once felt they always would.
A scraggly sob came to my ear and I pushed myself up. My limbs and mind were drained beyond any stamina of which I was familiar, but I was unharmed. Down the hallway, hiding within Henry's meditation room sad a broken and horrified Georgia. She had been made fragile and was obviously in both physical and psyhic pain. I came to her and fell next to her, holding her as lightly as I could. Beneath my hand, in her skin, I felt damage I am not trained to describe, though later she would be diagnosed with a shattered arm, a handful of broken ribs, and three broken fingers, as well as a concussion and many minor lacerations. All I could do, though, was hold her and push the fear down, swallow that horrible uncertainty of her involvement and the fate of Henry, who I had neither the energy nor the motivation to discover.

Saturday, October 17, 2009

The Fate of Droplets (vii)

I was awake when Henry called, though the house had been silent and the ringing startled me.
“Alexis, have I waken you?”
“No Henry, you're fine.” I had not been sleeping, but felt heavy and groggy. A small glass of whiskey sat next to my computer and I contemplated it before Henry spoke again.
“Georgia visited.”
“I saw her in the stairwell.”
“She did not mention that. She had made it sound like happenstance that she was in the neighborhood. I did not know she knew where I lived.”
“I think I showed her yesterday.” Something in his tone struck me, and I reached for the whiskey, sipping slowly from it.
“Georgia, she asked me about my experience. She refered to as 'the incident,' which sounded strange to me.”
“She is very scientific. It is a word she would use.” The motion of the drink in the glass caught my attention, it wavered back and forth, small but majestic. “What did you tell her?”
“Well, I was open to her at first. I tried to focus on details, which is what she asked of me to do. She asked certain questions, questions that surprised me.”
“What do you mean?”
“She asked about the city I saw, or what I could say was a city but also wasn't. The place I saw flowed in many directions like a city, but there were no obvious barrier, nothing that did and did not flow, only everything at a different pace. I did not tell you everything, nor did I tell Georgia. What I told both of you was only the beginning. At the beginning and at the end was the city, but Brother James and I discussed what was beyond that, what I felt and touched was much deeper, much older. Brother James knows words for that place, words I cannot now explain. When I mentioned the smell in my dreams, that was the smell of the deeper place. Georgia asked about the scent, about my dreams, about much more than she ought to have thought of to ask.”
“George has a very inquisitive mind. Might that have been part of it? Could she just have noticed details more so than me?” Agitation hinted at his voice, which bled into mine; my voice wavered as I spoke.
“That is unlikely. In the hospital, her presence moved me, it manipulated the momentum around me, the motions to which I have become sensitive. All people seem to change the energies in the room, it is only natural with how we are bound up—life and tissue and pulse and electricity—but she has a different frequency. I believe I ought to fear her.”
“You ought to fear her? Henry, I have known George for years. She is pragmatic, even opportunistic, but I have never known her to harm anyone.”
“I hope that you are right. Speaking with you calms me. Perhaps I sound a little bewildered. I am very much not myself, so much around me feels novel. Georgia does have a potent personality, and her inquisitiveness is unusual.” Henry spoke distantly, removed from his own thoughts. This was his attempt to calm me despite his own concerns. Then, I accepted it in a lackluster way. The days had worn on me heavily and I had hoped, yearned for some return to normality. Now, Henry was implying something malevolent in George, and I did not have the energy to hear it. “Visit me tomorrow or the day after. If you see Georgia, tell her I am with my parents. I do not wish to see her for some time. Good night, Alexis. Thank you.”
“Good night, Henry.”
With the click of the phone, I sighed and reached for my drink, but found it already empty. I walked into the kitchen and poured myself another glass and plunked in an ice cube, which clattered against its base and then its walls. On the refrigerator was a note from Mona, a little handwritten invitation to Jessica's party. I thought of Thomas and the conversation that had intrigued Henry earlier. As I sat down at my desk again, I picked up the my phone and called Mona. It rang a while, but she eventually answered.
“Hey Lex,” she answered, neither unhappy nor enthused.
“Would you want to get coffee tomorrow?”
“Sure, but I can't. I have work and then a class in the afternoon and am studying with friends through dinner. What about Tuesday?”
“That's fine, I'd like that.” I paused, feeling the silence on the line and wondering what to say. “Something else. Have you known Thomas for a long time?”
“A while. He dated Jessica for a while, that's how we met. Why?”
“Something about him from that night sticks out. When he and I were on the patio, he acted funny.”
“He acted strange? You had to walk Henry home.” At this, I could hear the reluctant smile in her voice, and I could not help but smile, blushing mildly. “But I know what you mean. He likes to pick arguments, but that was a weird one for him to go after. You two were still talking about it out there, weren't you?”
“We were. I wanted to nail down his opinion on his argument.”
“He can dodge around just to see what everyone's thinking without saying much himself. What did you learn?”
“He mentioned that he thinks politics or culture or whatever are impacted by something we can't figure out. How he acted as I asked him was strange, almost paranoid.”
“What? How? Thomas is so confident, that doesn't make sense.”
“He kept scanning the backyard, as if he was seeing things. It”—and here I faltered, pausing sharply—“reminded me of someone.”
“Well, I don't know anything about it.”
“I didn't suspect you to, but I wanted to talk to someone about it. Sorry for leaving so suddenly.”
“Henry needed your attention. It was good of you. It was nice that you came, I liked seeing you in that jacket.”
“Thanks. You looked pretty phenomenal.”
We both were smiling, perhaps even blushing, and a warm silence circulated.
“I have work in the morning. So, good night, Lex.”
“Good night, Mona. I'll see you Tuesday.”
“Tuesday, I look forward to it,” and shortly after, the phone clicked.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Reading The Road, and Apocalyptic Fiction

Apocalyptic story telling has always captivated me. I think I own three anthologies of end of the world short stories. This is a somewhat embarrassing interest since it is a niche few writers can pull off well. Who, after all, has experience with the end of the world and how people act?

As it turns out, Cormac McCarthy seems to know people just that well. The Road follows a man and his son in the gray, damp, and ashen wastes of a world breathing its last. Few other characters besides these two exist in the book, save for savage, cannibalistic marauders and strangers secretively passed at night. One character, though, breaks into the lives in an uncannily potent manner. I encourage the read and will say little, but do want to share some of my reflections on the encounter.

The man--usually, but not always, a self-removed narrator--ponders in the text, "Maybe he is a god and he will turn us into trees." The line, as well as others in the episode, suggest a certain divinity, a sort of heightened reality going on, one enmeshed in mythology or spirituality or--what McCarthy seems to imply--simple but uncommon humanity that is otherwise ambiguous or lacking both in the book and amongst the audience. What McCarthy hits on in his post-apocalyptic tale is the simultaneous transformation, degradation, and elevation of humanity and character under such tribulations.

Some scenes are profoundly troubling, haunting in their suggestive horror. The man often attempts to shield his son from the markings of an increasingly desolate world, saying and later repeating that, "Once something is in your head it stays there." All the while, the boy and man adhere to being the good guys, distinct from the bad guys, who carry the flame. The episode alluded to above is obviously a manifestation for the boy concerning being the good guys. It, against the backdrop of decay and death, shines all the more clearly as beautiful and enlightened.

What McCarthy deftly expresses is what any setting like that of The Road ought to capture: In the presence of unforeseeable and unpredictable upheaval, it is possible to find humanity shine against the dark. It is obvious to the man in the book that his role is not just as protector and sojourner, but as sentinel to the light that most others--though living--have already lost. Such radiance casts subtle, remarkable, and beautiful hues around the setting; hues we are not always prepared to witness, but hues that we long for all the time.

Monday, October 12, 2009

The Fate of Droplets (vi)

I returned to the hospital the following morning. George had taken me home and joined me for some coffee. She asked about Henry, about his condition and what had been going on. She sounded, at the time, genuinely concerned and I was happy to shake the strangeness of her meeting with Henry. I could not then make sense of why she would probe except out of sincerity or some earnest curiosity. I informed her as best as I could, avoiding only those details which fit poorly with my own memory, the ones that lacked coherency with the remaining story—though I would have omitted the feeling of transmission or broadcast that Henry had emitted on his return home following Jessica's party.
At the hospital, Henry and I filed the appropriate records and left, at which point I asked about the meeting with Brother James.
“We spoke of my experience, that which I tried to articulate when you visited. Brother James assisted me in finding words for it, though words will remain lacking for describing it. Brother James referred to a Japanese term, kakugai, or 'world beyond conditions or understanding;” he said that I had reached perception of such a place, that I had returned from a backward journey.”
“What does that mean, 'a world beyond understanding?'”
“It is hard to say, my memory of the experience slips in and out of my own thoughts; it evades my ability to place it anywhere, not in experience, memory, or intellect will it stay.”
“You're speaking differently. Is that from Brother James or from the experience?”
“I do not know. I feel uncomfortable, cramped, as if this space I am now in has changed, too.”
“Are you worried? What will you do next?”
We had walked passed the hospital parking lot and entered the neighborhoods surrounding it. I felt alarmed, but in an intellectual, academic way, as if a research subject were describing unusual responses, not presumed by any preceding research. I was also rapt by Henry's telling, though his tone lacked luster and finesse, but spoke plainly and courteously, as if he were offering it all to me. Henry replied after a moment of contemplation.
“I feel beyond concern. Seeing 'world beyond conditions' was like seeing a city from an airplane or an antfarm from outside, but every detail is illuminated: What I sensed were underlying patterns, motions, energies that revealed that which one cannot see from within. It was all clear and crisp, unpolluted. I smelled it, even in my sleep last night it came back to me; I smelled the world, both the richness and the foulness, neither beautiful nor disgusting, but certainly, sharply. I feel the pressure of waves—the secretive momentum of the world—urging me forward or backward or to stay put, walking is not exertion so much as flowing. In that tide, in the tingling sensation on my calves and at the base of my neck, I can ascertain danger, danger keeping itself hidden, but I cannot fear it. Do you worry for me, Alexis? Perhaps you are frightened.”
He turned to me then, with those words, and I saw in his eyes some hint of the foreignness he had experienced, some exquisite depth and volume that does not reside in our eyes normally. I thought then of Brother James and the droplets on the window pane. The recollection swelled up stolid and powerful, like a wave gathering at the edge of sight.
“You have been where others cannot ponder, where you yourself cannot understand. Yes, I am frightened, but not exactly of you, but of what you now are.” I trembled then, and he reached out and touched my shoulder, heavily, with the palm of his hand pressing against me, warming me and cooling my fears. I knew then that he had returned not only as himself, but also as an avatar of this world of an illuminated, majestic city, of that place beyond understanding. He calmed me with something in his touch.
“That is good, that you do not fear me, and likely wise, that you fear the what of me.” He turned ahead again, toward his home. "Tell me of the party, of when I felt far away. I remember leaving with you, but that feel vaporous and thin. How did the evening go.”
This change startled me because it so directly connected the two entities that were and became of Henry. I did not expect him, I know realize, to be interested in the events before. Now, I see that it may have been a ploy to further calm me, a sort of theatre to assure me that Henry remained Henry. All the same, I recovered myself and told him of his discomfort and described my aspirations concerning Mona. When it came to the telling of the conversation with Thomas, I began to pause and stutter. It felt foreign on my lips, like someone else's story I had adopted.
“This Thomas, had you met him before? Have you spoken with him since?”
It struck me heavily that so much had occurred in the time since the party only two nights before. I had heard mention of Thomas, but never in detail, and that night had been our first meeting—as it had been for me with Mona's other friends. “No, why do you ask?”
“I wonder if something else is about, something that revealed itself in him. I wonder about those patterns I witnessed. They revealed layers, incomprehensible depths, each working in itself and between the layers.” Henry's words tapered off into his own quiet thought. We were nearly to his place when he began to speak again. “Please, tell me what else happened?”
And so, I concluded the tale, the walk home, saying as little as I could about his murmurings. At the end, I asked him about the accident, if he recalled it at all.
“I do. That is what drew me back. It was like a cord, tugging on me back to myself. I believe the physicians thought me far gone as I worked my way back. When we left for the party, I had been at the end of a lengthy meditation session, during which I had felt an increasing and profound distance from my familiar characteristics. With the accident, those accoutrements were brought sharply back into focus. First I felt my legs, then my feet, then my fingertips. It was like my body was shipped back to itself piecemeal.” I winced at the idea, which Henry noticed and added, “It felt more scientific than painful, I enjoyed the novelty of waking bit by bit.”
We were at his door when I asked, “I am a bit worn out. Do you mind if a stay a while?”
“Not at all. I'll make tea. You can lay down if you would like.”
“Tea first, then perhaps I'll lay down for a moment.”
Up the stairs and in the apartment we went, but the tea sat untouched as I nodded off on his simple but comforting furniture. When I woke, I found the cup of tea cooled, but I drank it quickly. I heard nothing at all in the apartment and so stealthily searched the rooms. One of the doors was closed, so I checked the others first. Each was tidy, though the bed had been hastily made, with the edges of the blanket ruffled near the single pillow at the head. Finally, I peaked into the room with the closed door, cracking it just so slightly. The room was completely unfurnished, but in the center of it sat Henry in full-lotus position with two firm cushions underneath him. I nodded and left, hoping that I might not disturb him. I pulled a scrap of paper and pen from my pocket and wrote him a note, thanking him mostly, and hoped to hear from him soon. Quietly, I laughed at myself because finding an appropriate place to put the note was difficult, as anywhere I might place it seemed to clutter the whole room. In the end, I set it on the table, next to my empty teacup and left, easing the door closed on my way out.
On the stairs, I heard and then saw George. She was mildly frazzled, a typical look for her between her own questions and the work she did, but her presence in the setting befuddled me.
“George, what are you doing here?”
“Oh, Lex, I wanted to see Henry. I wanted to hear more about his incident.”
“How do you know where he lives?”
“You mentioned it to me on the ride to the hospital. You pointed it out in case we were going to take him home.” This, I very well could have done, and it had been on the way, but I could not at all recall the ride to the hospital with George the day before. Nor, it might be said, did I recall not bringing up Henry's apartment.
“Well, he's in the middle of something. I would suggest coming back in an hour. I just left and the door locks on its own. I don't know if he would hear you if you knocked anyway.”
“Oh, alright.” George's face turned pink, and faintly red, as if she had made plans for this rendez-vous and now they were spoiled. “Where are you off to?”
“I need to take care of a few things at home today before work tomorrow.”
George stared at me, then around the stairwell, and back at me, waiting for a cue or hint.
“Are you coming down, then?” I asked.
“Oh, of course.” And so I walked her to her car, out of which she grabbed a bag heavy with this or that. We said goodbye to one another and I began to walk home, retracing some of the course to the hospital on the way. It was a longer walk home, but in the time I was able to consider all the strangeness my life had entertained over the past few days. The wind was sharp and whipped my face. I felt satisfied in the motion of dried leaves and the rustling of grass; somewhere, a lawnmower hummed and as I walked, the scent of the grass wafted over. Some semblance of peace, even a hint of tranquility had made its way into my mind, and I sincerely believed that the worst of it had passed.

(Un)Seasonal Rejuvenation

It has been some time since I spent autumn in Lincoln. The season seems affectionate, but fickle. Days of sunlight and wet warmth follow a few days of cloudy chill, and then the reverse. I may be learning how to read the season as much as it is learning to respond to me as I have been trudging out on my bicycle everyday after the early--and rather perturbing--snowfall on Friday; that day I spent almost exclusively inside, hoping that it would disappear if I just ignored it long enough, which it actually did. Now, though, I bundle up with sweatshirt, jacket, scarf, hat, wool socks, and gloves, get on my bicycle, and pedal away despite the changing season and its occasional bite. I have been rewarded, I feel, for embracing it.

On Saturday and the days since, I have been surprised and enlivened by the scents and hues abounding. Autumn is a season for harvest, preservation, and expectation for the winter to come; it is not a season that particularly celebrates new life and rejuvenation. All the same, I take profound satisfaction in overrunning a carpet of soggy yellow leaves on 27th Street, crackling and crinkling as my wheels crash over them, stimulating a mouldy, squash-y sort of scent that is so characteristic of this time of year. If I were at school, I would likely have begun my long internments in the library, happily shuffling through this or that cultural studies book, Wired and Utne magazines, a science fiction book or something I had uncovered by happenstance, and working away on whatever classes I would be taking. For the first time in years, I feel like I am really paying attention to the shift out of summer, as I am removed from all those distractions of academia. (I might add, that I do have quite a bit of fondness for such distractions, but right now I am enjoying new items to dote over.)

Ruby red leaves and warm, filtered light; soft, wet soil and its accompanying odor; the corresponding cool, saturated air and dry, wintry gusts all find their ways to captivate me. I sense a secretive abundance, the stores of energy and life in plants and the soil, bustling creatures and people, each with their movements, scents, sights, and textures. While my mother and I create cookbooks replete with squash soups and peanut butter bars, beet salads and pecan pies, savory apple bakes and sprouted wheat loaves, and I anticipate their use, their taste, their times for ripeness and richness. I doubt if ever I have felt so strongly the importance of harvest and storage, the role of life in this time when the living already anticipate the anxieties of the winter. I know the cold ahead, the ice and snow and wind that can bare down ruthlessly, that snaps trees in half but brings out blankets to share, cuts out power but ignites fireplaces, that paves roads in ice but allows for sledding and snowball fights. I was tempted by the first snow to brood on the frustrations ahead. Now, I cannot help but be excited by the significance, the uncanny liveliness of autumn and winter, of their own, somehow less obvious celebrations. And again, I am made warm by such thoughts.