Posted on December 3, 2004
Breakfast is Earl’s favorite meal; and, in the time we’ve lived in St. Joseph, he has scouted the restaurants, cafes, diners, and fast food chains for the best eggs in town. Of course, he has his requirements.
It must be a sit-down place (which actually omits fast food) where the server shows up with coffee while Earl is still taking off his coat. Water can come later. It must have a special on the menu, such as the 2 by 2 by 2 by 2. For the uninitiated, that’s two eggs, two pieces of bacon, two sausages, and two pancakes. Earl is into a hearty breakfast, not necessarily to be confused with a healthy one.
This morning, I went off to breakfast with him. I don’t go often, since it’s my least favorite meal. (Remember opposites attract here.) We went to Jimmy’s Buffet where you can have all you can eat for a mere six dollars. Steam tables gleamed with pancakes, waffles, eggs, biscuits, gravy, bacon, sausage and the token piece of fruit to assuage guilt feelings.
I settled for ordering off the menu, since buffets intimidate me. I can’t eat enough to feel as if I got my money’s worth. So I ordered one poached egg, an English muffin, and sliced tomatoes in place of hash browns. Undaunted by my effort to eat smart, Earl ordered the 2 by 2 etc.
In minutes, the waitress returned with our orders and we dug in. I managed to leave food, but Earl in true fashion cleaned his plate. He’s been to Jimmy’s so often that when the waitress came to remove the dishes she asked, “How was everything?” “Didn’t like it,” replied Earl. “I can see,” said the server, “you left some yolk stuck there.”
I think Earl’s final criteria for a breakfast place is the ability to tease the waitress.
See more 10 Minutes in category Dining/Food, Small Town Life
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Posted on December 1, 2004
I haven’t written anything creative in two days, which is something of a record. It felt strange, not as if something were missing but as if I had a lot more time on my hands to pursue other things.
I finished decorating our house for the holidays and cleaned the mess made by exploding beer bottles in our beverage refrigerator. (Note to self: Make sure the temperature in the frig is set differently in the future.) I sorted my winter clothing and organized the end-of-the-month bills.
None of these activities is particularly creative or inventive. Rather they simply needed to be done. But what I noticed is that my brain really took a break from its writing chores without feeling guilty. The thought crossed my mind that maybe I should give up writing, since I didn’t miss it all that much and there are so many other things I’m interested in (Second note to self: Things that need to be done are not the same as things I’m interested in.)
For instance, there’s my piano, and the little book I’m writing about taking lessons for the first time in late middle age. There are the couple thousand photos I want to organize . . . which reminds me of the essay I’m writing about them. There are my crochet projects . . . and – yes – I’m writing about them too.
(Final note to self: I can’t stop writing because it’s tied to everything I do.) I guess these two days were the equivalent of a lovers’ spat without the spit. My alter-ego writer person walked out on me. But, now she is back, and we’re ready to take up where we left off.
See more 10 Minutes in category Writing
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Posted on November 28, 2004
Colorado has been a thread in the fabric of my life forever. I first came here when I was less than a teen, attending a summer camp in the shadow of the Rocky Mountains. I spent six weeks learning to ride a horse and make a lanyard and swim in cold mountain waters. I learned campfire songs that still cling to me and, at the same time, met new friends who are long just memories.
After I aged out of the camp experience, I continued to visit Colorado because my aunt and uncle and their children were there. I passed halcyon days in their home, peeking out the third story window at the passing scene and imagining that I would one day capture the essence of life in their family. I never did; not because I didn’t try, but because it was impossible.
I needed to be a realist.
So this year, while men wage war overseas and politicians scramble for their place at the table, I returned to Colorado and my aunt and uncle and cousins and grand cousins. It is Thanksgiving. And it is wonderful.
The young girl of yesteryear – the one who rode horseback and sang camp songs — is a memory herself. But the feeling of family, that sense that one is connected with others regardless of what one thinks of them is overriding. Which is why I want to acknowledge it in writing before the moment passes.
See more 10 Minutes in category Me/Family, Nostalgia
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Posted on November 27, 2004
I miss my piano. I’m not the best student of the art, but when I go away I realize how much my weekly piano lesson and my piano mean to me. They are childhood companions, not in the sense that I knew them when I was young. Instead, it’s in the sense that I am starting to know them, like a child learns, one step at a time.
I’ve taken piano lessons for almost three years now. I’ve acquired a great deal of technical, mental knowledge. I’ve acquired less in the actual music realm. I think it’s because my fingers cannot keep up with my brain.
But I hope that someday these two will meet. And when they do, there will be a great cacophony of sound, a recognition that brain and fingers have been working arduously toward the same goal. I will smile and then set to work. And I’ll play like never before.
I’ll never be lonesome again.
See more 10 Minutes in category Me/Family
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Posted on November 26, 2004
Chinos are the offspring of blue jeans. They were born somewhere in the twentieth century and grew to adulthood in the late 1900s. I know this because I recently received a catalog from Lands Ends that uses Chinos as a marketing theme like I have never seen.
Case in point: There are Chinos for guys who want pants to fit, regardless of whether the wearer seeks a tapered traditional pair or a roomier, relaxed fit. Then there are Chino shorts, which are – according to the advertising – long on comfort and made to last.
But what does this really mean?
I didn’t have time to ponder the question, because the next few pages reveled in Weekend Khakis, which – as far as I can tell – are Chinos in disguise. Let it be said, however, that Weekend Khakis are “perfect for the guy always on the go.” God forbid if he stops. Next we have everyday Chinos which, according to the advertising, “may be the most versatile pants you can own.” They’re also called “Classic Chinos” because they “bridge the gap between time at work and time off.”
I was only halfway through the catalog, but I saw the rationale here. It’s to induce readers, AKA purchasers, to see Chinos in a brand new light, one that enables them to shine in every single social situation just by wearing the right pair of pants.
All I want to know is, Is this what the world is coming to?
See more 10 Minutes in category Things to Ponder
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Posted on November 25, 2004
I have a lot to be thankful for. My joys are not the same as those hardy first Pilgrims, but they are as equally life affirming.
As I remember the story, Indians helped their new neighbors survive the harsh, November weather by showing them the local agriculture, by participating in a celebration of the harvest. Quite possibly, they showed how to dry and preserve foods for the coming winter.
My family doesn’t live on the same basic level. Our idea of a harvest is to visit the local supermarket the day before we gather. One of us also visits the local winery too.
But the concept of taking time from a busy schedule to give thanks for what we have, for acknowledging that if we don’t work together now we’ll have less next year, is still paramount. So whether you are alone and celebrating in a modest fashion or whether you are among family and friends and taking from a table well laden, let the day hold the same resonance.
Today we give thanks for what we have, or possibly for what we had, and maybe for what we hope to have in the future. As Tiny Tim said about another holiday, “God bless us one and all.”
See more 10 Minutes in category Dining/Food, Me/Family, Special Events
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Posted on November 24, 2004
It’s the day before Thanksgiving, often noted as the most busily trafficked day of the year. I’m jetting from Michigan to Colorado, by way of Chicago’s O’Hare Airport. It’s an imposing sight. People running, luggage tagging along. Fast food vendors hustling, cash registers trying to keep up. Overhead voices calling Mr. Denaka, Ms. Smith, and reminding us not to leave our luggage unattended.
I’m on overload, and I wonder why I subject myself to this ritual.
Well, I guess it isn’t about airline travel; it’s about getting there and being with family. It’s about pushing myself into limbo as I maneuver airline security lines and tight seats and no meals, so that I can spend Thanksgiving with those who mean the most to me.
Time was when airline travel was relaxing, special, a class unto itself. But that era went out with hostile takeovers, September 11, and bankruptcy filings. Today, you need to have eaten before you get on a plane. You need to empty your bladder too, because the pilot may or may not turn off the “Fasten Seat Belt” sign. You need to be skinny, docile, and patient. It also helps if you are white, American-born, female, and act dumb.
I can be all of these things, although acting dumb takes special consideration. I do it because it suits my needs. It’s a strategy, not a way of life.
I don’t know where the future of airline travel lies, but I am becoming more and more disenchanted. And, my disenchantment is based on how I am treated today, here in the present. It’s as if I am a sardine seeking admission to the next available tin can. Believe me, I want to be treated as the unique sardine that I am.
See more 10 Minutes in category Annoyances
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Posted on November 23, 2004
The December holidays have their own familiar themes, ones that seem incongruous at other times of the year. It doesn’t matter if you celebrate Hanukkah or Christmas or Kwaanza; you expect to see certain symbols in the marketplace, on television, and in your local newspaper.
Having a Christian-based background, I react to evergreen wreaths, traditional carols, and Christmas trees, both real and artificial. And even though I don’t actively attend church these days, I enjoy the retelling of the birth of Jesus Christ.
But at one time in my life, I was married to a man of Jewish heritage. So I learned to appreciate the tradition of giving gifts for several nights, of lighting a menorah, of eating potato pancakes made from scratch. My in-law family, at the same time, came to my house to decorate a Christmas tree for the first time. We learned from each other.
I’ve not had a Kwaanza experience, but I’m pleased that this holiday is growing in significance to African American families. Why shouldn’t they celebrate their religious culture too?
Today is the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, the turkey day that is a uniquely American holiday; and it seems an appropriate time to begin acknowledging the other festivals ahead. It is in this spirit that I hope for peace on earth this year. I wish it for everyone who reads my blog and all of those who don’t.
This is a theme that is never incongruous.
See more 10 Minutes in category Special Events
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Posted on November 22, 2004
Forty-one years ago today John Fitzgerald Kennedy, then President of the United States, was shot to death in Dallas, TX. Anybody who was a teenager or older at the time remembers exactly where he or she was when the news broke.
I was walking to my next class at Loyola University of Chicago when my boyfriend came running up, a look of disbelief on his face. “Have you heard?” he said. “The President’s been shot. He’s in the emergency room of a hospital in Dallas.”
In the ten minutes between classes, everything changed. By the time I arrived at my next class, a voice came over the public address system to announce that Kennedy was dead. In the following days, the nation would learn that Lee Harvey Oswald bore the responsibility. But for those few moments, it was the unthinkable.
The nation and I spent the next four days in front of our television sets as the President’s body was brought back to Washington to lie in state before a funeral and burial at Arlington National Cemetery. The widow, the dignitaries, little John-John saluting his father’s casket, the riderless horse, the military salute: I remember it all as if it were yesterday.
See more 10 Minutes in category Nostalgia, Politics, Special Events
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Posted on November 21, 2004
I had hoped this holiday season, which is just now really kicking into high gear, would find fewer catalogs showing up on our doorstep. This hope was based on the fact that I signed both Earl and me up with Direct Marketing Association, Inc. It purported to get our names removed from as many mailing lists as possible, and it promised “a significant reduction in unsolicited commercial advertising mail.”
So far the five dollars I spent has proven to be a bad investment.
Instead, “they” are multiplying. Not only that, “they” are becoming stranger. For instance, the one at my feet is the Things You Never Knew Existed Catalog, featuring a talking figure of Johnny Depp in his Pirates of the Caribbean costume on the cover. That alone convinced me not to even peek inside.
Then there’s the Petrossian Caviar Catalog offering – you guessed it! – beluga, ossetra, sevruga, baerii, and transmontanus caviars. A little over a pound of beluga can be purchased for a mere $4400 plus shipping and handling.
At the other end of the price spectrum, Art & Artifact advertises over 200 gifts under $30. That piqued my curiosity, so I let my fingers do a quick thumb-through. On page 38, I found the Easter Island Bobblehead for $18; page 41 showed birdhouses in the shape of the Eiffel Tower for $19.95. And the back cover offered a life-sized WWI propeller that leans in a corner waiting for someone who needs a conversation starter.
I must not associate with the trendy people, because nobody on my Christmas list would have the slightest interest in any of these things. Thank goodness.
See more 10 Minutes in category Annoyances
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