Which food, when you eat it, instantly transports you to childhood?
My mom made it in the electric frying pan she cooked everything in. She made little wells in the canned hash and put eggs in them. Two for each of us. I ate it like it was ambrosia.
I make that dish for myself sometimes. Not often. But I think of my little nuclear family and all the cheap meals we thought were special.
Mom did some good things.
I’ve been trying to escape by reading novels. The joke’s on me, because Demon Copperhead, by Barbara Kingsolver (2022) is not an escape. It’s more of a descent into hell with a really nice guy. Many of you have already read this book, but I’d been holding onto it for a while, thinking it would be a hard one to get through. I was correct about that, but it doesn’t mean the book wasn’t worth reading. Not when one of our greatest living novelists wrote it and it’s about a topic that has touched so many families, even those of us on the outside of the opioid epidemic.
I loved realizing that the book was based on the story of David Copperfield (get it, Demon Copperhead…), which was another book that was so depressing I had a hard time dragging my hyper-sensitive empath eyes over its words. Dickens really knew is sad-but-true sh**. Knowing that ahead of time, I knew where the arc of the story of the main character, who goes by Demon Copperhead, was heading. I just didn’t want to go there with him for a while, so I had to set the book aside as soon as the Big Bad Drugs came out.
A lot of the book was like visiting a new world (at least a respite from White Evangelical Christian World), because for better or worse, I have very limited exposure to addictive substances or illegal drugs, other than alcohol. Thanks to growing up with my mom (who was addicted to legal substances of tobacco, alcohol, and prescription drugs), I didn’t want to have anything to do with anything that might possibly mess with my brain. So, I partook of no weed, no shrooms, no LSD, and none of the other stuff.
It’s not that I didn’t know any people who enjoyed their substances of choice. I mean, I was a teen in the 70s, for goodness sake. I just wasn’t immersed in the culture that went with it. Yes, I managed to have fun anyway.
The world of foster care is another one I don’t have direct experience with, but I gained a lot of sympathy for friends and family who lived through some of the unpleasant aspects of the system. And I’m so grateful for the good foster parents and successful people who made it through.
Thankfully, Kingsolver has a knack for describing how things feel from the point of view of the person experiencing them, which means I learned about drugs from the user’s point of view, where things that might have scared me were just part of Demon’s daily life. Kingsolver also makes most characters in the book sympathetic – you can see how they got to be in the mess they were in. I liked her description of having sex from the man’s point of view, too, since it’s obviously not something I’m familiar with.
One thing that got me through the hard parts of Demon Copperhead was that sometimes I could just read the words and enjoy how well crafted they were, especially when Demon is observing the world around him. That boy had the artist’s eye, thanks to Kingsolver!
In summary, you probably should read this book. It will be eye-opening to those of you who’ve never lived in rural America or spent time in the poor parts of Appalachia. For me, the overwhelming feeling I got was how grateful I am so have only lived on the edges of the world in this book, and how much more empathy I have for those thrown into it by no fault of their own.
Write about your first crush.
I’m only answering this question because I didn’t have any great topics today. So I’ll tell you about my dreamy seventh-grade crush. There are no photos of him to share since I lost my yearbook. Here’s an approximation.
Kevin Murray was a year ahead of me in school but we were in Spanish class together. I thought he was both hilarious and incredibly cool, because he owned rock and roll albums. I didn’t have a record player that would play them yet.
He picked on me a lot, but it didn’t bother me because I was a new person in junior high and was one of the popular kids in the academic track. We all picked on each other and had nicknames for each other. Man, seventh grade was GREAT. We had young, hip teachers and spent a lot of time writing plays based on Star Trek and publishing the school newsletter on mimeo paper. Mmm, that smell.
Back to Kevin. I thought that long (for 1971) red hair, those green eyes, and the freckles made him look like a sexy leprechaun. Or something. Anyway, he showed me he liked me by randomly showing up on my street and pretending to steal my new, very cool, red-white-and-blue Murray Eliminator bike (same name as him, so obviously it was his).
I showed I liked him by riding my bike around his house in case he might come outside, and drooling over his parents’ incredible blue Citröen car.
We had a fun summer of innocent pre-teen flirtation. My dad found us very funny, pretending to be annoyed by each other. He kept telling me “that boy likes you.”
Then I was moved to South Florida despite my protests, and that was it. No email, no texting, no Facebook, so no contact. If letters were exchanged, I don’t recall. No, I do not need to find him. I’ll just treasure my dim memories.
I pined for Kevin until the summer after ninth grade when I met the boy I’d really swoon for. That’s another story.
Weird postscript: by the time my younger son, an actual Irish boy, was a toddler, I realized who he looked like. Eww.
On the other hand, I now have an idea of what adult Kevin would have looked like, though I don’t think he grew to be 6’3”.
You can blame this post on my friend Jennifer, who complained (in a funny way) today about how some kinds of clothing just don’t work for her. She mentioned how high-waisted pants don’t fit well on her body shape, and that she finds shirts with longer hems in back to be unflattering as well. She pointed out that mid-rise jeans actually hit her midriff, since she is short-waisted. (See below for her original)
You can also blame my thinking about other people’s clothing hang-ups and preferences to watching the new show “Wear Whatever the F You Want” with Clinton Kelly and Stacy London, who now help people find a wardrobe that THEY like, not what the stylists want them to wear. I have found a few of the choices not to my taste, but then, I wasn’t the one wearing them!
Our clothing reflects a lot about how we want the world to perceive us as well as about how we perceive ourselves. No wonder I hear so many proclamations among my friends about what they’d NEVER wear. My stepmother told me repeatedly how she didn’t like “shark hems” on tops (which I wore a lot of back when she was at her peak). My sister was adamantly against short sleeves that came to above the elbows on women “of a certain age” (for me they interfere with my ability to enjoy my flappy area in its wingiest).
I have friends who never wear pants, others who never wear dresses, those who love leggings and those who hate them, and then there’s all the pants “rules” like letting your undies show above your pants, wearing skinny or wide legs, jeans or no jeans, rips or no rips, etc.
Of course, the sane voice inside our heads will tell us that people can wear whatever the f they want, and our issues with their choices are just that, our issues. That’s absolutely true! I was wondering, though, where did my own clothing prejudices come from? One answer is my mother. She was not fond of tattoos, liked long painted fingernails, and enjoyed wearing clothing that “matched.” The other main answer is the times I grew up in. I wanted to be a hippie when I grew up, so my love of tie dye, jeans, and long braids is pretty predictable. My dislike of polyester double-knit pant suits and (for the male-type folks) leisure suits derives from the same thing: I still wanted to be a hippie, and adults were trying to dress me like an old Florida retiree.
I’m truly enjoying learning about other people’s fashion likes and dislikes because they tell so much about each of us. I loved reading Jennifer’s fashion rant, and would equally love to hear yours. What do you just love and what drives you to distraction when you see it or are forced to wear it? As an incentive, I’ll share some of my irrational fashion opinions, as long as you remember that I am very fond of many, many people who make choices different from mine. I enjoy the variety. So here you go:
There is a mosquito in my office, so I’m going to stop typing. I’d love to hear some of your clothing opinions.
So apparently “high-waisted” pants are the latest trend in womens’ clothing. That’s the last thing short women like me need. Ha. I’ve been wearing high-waisted pants since before they were popular — for like 5 decades. At not-quite-5′ tall anymore, I’ve always been what they call “short-waisted”. Meaning if I put on regular womens pants, the waist comes up to just under my bust. I used to roll down the waist band of pants a few times so the crotch wouldn’t hang down at my knees. Give me some “high-waisted” pants and they’d probably come up to my neck. For me, “mid-rise” pants, which supposedly come up to just below the belly button on non-short women, come up to just above my belly button. Just about right.
And another thing. I hate those shirts with what they call a shirt-tail hem. Those things are about 2″ lower in the back and on someone short like me, those come down below my butt and look ridiculous. Ugh. I hate them.
Rants over. For now.
What’s your favorite thing about yourself?
I didn’t have too much to write about today, other than that horses are cute and I have a new favorite light fixture. So, let’s find out what my favorite thing about me might be.
Okay, so, answer the question, Suna. And don’t say you like something except for this that or the other. No self put-downs allowed.
I used to always say my favorite thing about myself were my feet. They were not too big or small, medium width, and had nice toes. Now they are more mature feet with mature person issues. So, nope, it’s not my feet.
All right. I’ll refrain from pointing out the obvious negatives for this, as instructed, and declare my favorite thing about myself is how I can empathize with others, care deeply about people who don’t care back, and always see our commonalities as humans. That boils down to one concept but I don’t have the right word for it.
Note that I can now set boundaries, so my character feature is one I can now embrace without fear of hurting myself. I’m not going to run out and embrace the toxic people in my life, but I can try to understand them and care, from a distance.
Super Sensitive Suna, as I labeled myself on Facebook today, can take the occasional sadness and hurt that comes from all that caring, but it’s worth it. I just have to expect to have the occasional down periods. It’s a small price to pay to keep cherishing my favorite thing about myself.
I’m taking a break from Facebook, since the fallout on a post I thought was not too controversial turned out to incite strong partisan feelings among my friends. I respect their rights to debate, and find areas of agreement with each, but I’m so damned hypersensitive that I had to take a break. I also snoozed a few very nice people for a while. So, I’m no longer listening to the fallout until I’m up to it again. I do want to hear all views, but I also want to remain mentally stable.
But I can still blog and write on my Substack, which is where I rant. I’ve been trying to listen to birdsong my porch or birding slab, but I’m thwarted. There is an incessant throbbing sound echoing through the trees. It fills most of the spectrogram on Merlin Bird ID.
It’s cicadas. I can hardly hear myself think for them. Once they start up around 9 am, they’re in all the trees every minute unless it rains. My best birding the past couple of days has been right after a storm, when birds have a feeding frenzy thanks to flying insects, and I guess the cicadas need to dry off.
Only the loudest and closest birds pierce through the wall of cicada sound. I do get a lot of House Sparrow chirps. That’s because their nest is above me (to the right; I’m not putting chairs under their extra-decorative nests.
These mofos are everywhere. When not feeding, they’re sitting around pooping on our outdoor furniture, grills (which are covered), etc. They’re not native, so we could dispose of them, but nope. I just make sure they stay out of the new screened porch.
Speaking of our lovely new porch, the Barn Swallow eggs haven’t even hatched yet, so who knows when we will be able to shut the door. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t quite so dang law abiding and could remove the nests.
I do have a bit better luck with birds on my walks, where there are some areas a bit farther from the cicadas. Plus, there are always good old eyeballs for spotting birds! Yesterday I found a Mississippi Kite and today a Green Heron.
So, between traipsing through mud to tend to horses and listening to birds, my last free week before my consulting gig starts is full. I also keep crocheting, and now April and May are connected on my temperature blanket, and June is caught up. The nice KnitPicks lady said that if I do not get yarn by ten working days to call them rather than patiently waiting a month like I did. I am now warned.
I’ll leave you with bugs and flowers. Please send healing thoughts to everyone who’s affected by world events, and listen hard, even when it’s difficult to hear.
Living in a place where two incompatible world views exist and where each world view sees the other as filled with stupid, hateful liars has become almost too painful for me. I hate being able to see how strongly each faction sees itself as right and true and the others as blind.
I don’t think my own beliefs and values even matter. Those of us who want to live in harmony with our friends and loved ones, all of them, will be the first to be caught in the crossfire when it all falls to pieces. We’re just expendable wimps.
Today people I admire were vilifying people like me for daring to express their beliefs in public. These weren’t extremists, just who I thought were regular people with different views from the other people I admire.
It’s painful to witness. Time for me to retreat and try to regroup. I won’t heal completely or forget how frightened people act towards the “other” but I need to regain my incentive for participating in the world outside my little ranch.
Later, haters.
I have a bad feeling about tomorrow. I care about people on all sides of the national and international strife right now, and my love for them trumps any cause.
For anyone under armed attack, I wish you safety.
For anyone protesting, I wish you safety and peace.
For those instructed to control others, I wish you safety and good judgment.
For the powerless and afraid, I wish you safety and protection.
May we find a path to a world of reason, communication, compassion, and peace.
Yes, I said the T-word in a sentence.
Gee whiz. Last night 8.5” of rain fell at the Hermits’ Rest. That’s the second most since we’ve been keeping records (2011). It was wet this morning.
It’s rare for water to flow over our driveway, which is the dam that created the front pond. It did last night, though, and much of our road base washed away.
The pond got the highest I’ve ever seen it, but with the water flowing quickly through our big culvert, it quickly lowered once rain stopped.
I walked down the road to see how Walker’s Creek looked. I’m used to it being out of its banks, but it was way over the road and there was a large dead tree in the middle of the bridge. That’s some strong water.
I talked to the guys who put the sign out. They said they’d move the tree when the water receded, but we think the neighbor down the road did it.
I thought about all the birds and turtles and hoped they were okay. I knew the frogs were happy, because I could hear at least four kinds.
I’m always fascinated by how the water drains from the property next to ours down an arroyo, to be joined by runoff from the cultivated field across the road, which becomes our mighty stream that joins the creek eventually.
Our back pond also has runoff feeding into it. When it’s full, the water goes to the pond behind our woods, then helps flood the floodplain field. No wonder it looks like we live on a lake when it rains a lot. All this drainage will start after receiving two inches of rain. Eight inches creates huge masses of water heading along until it reaches the Little River, which is also joined by Big Elm and Little Elm Creek. I’m guessing all their water has made the Brazos River pretty impressive right now.
It was interesting that the talk at tonight’s Master Naturalist meeting was watersheds. How water flows is mysterious but it works! Soon the creeks will all be back to normal, and at some point, Walker’s Creek will go through another dry period. I hope not too soon.
Ooh, in other excitement, I finally finished May on the temperature blanket. I sure was glad to receive new black yarn!
What is your favorite season of year? Why?
It’s a good thing there’s a prompt to answer today, because action around here was fairly limited. So, I’ll dwell on my favorite season and you can think about yours, and maybe even share it in the comments! Why not? I’ll share some pretty nature sights from today, in the unofficial season of late spring humidity.
When I lived in Illinois, I could never choose between spring and autumn as my favorite seasons. Crabapple trees, spring bulbs, peonies, and lilacs made the world so beautiful up there. But in autumn there were the orange, red, and yellow deciduous trees that contrasted so beautifully with the dark tree trunks (or light, with birch trees). It was beautiful in Champaign-Urbana, all year round. That’s right. I liked winter as long as it was above 0°F and there wasn’t an ice storm.
Here in Texas, I only have one season I don’t enjoy, and that’s summer. At least my new job will force me to stay indoors during the worst of the heat. I always feel sad for the animals, especially the chickens, and the dying grass on ground with huge cracks in it from drought always looks apocalyptic. I don’t need more reminders of apocalypses. Plus there are the fewest birds here in summer.
It’s hard not to like spring in this area, with all the wildflowers, birds, and butterflies. I hope we still have them in the future. This year was pretty bad for all of them, thanks to an unusually dry winter. And sadly, spring always reminds me that summer will be here soon. Not to mention how many allergies spring brings (but I appreciate the plants’ need to reproduce).
At this point in my life, autumn is my favorite time of year, even though it often arrives late. I can take long walks, once it cools off, and more birds show up as they migrate south. I love the smell of fallen leaves, which also make it easier to see wildlife. The only problem with that time of year is that it’s so busy! There are conference and events and trips…
Winter here is surprisingly great, though. It’s not that cold except for a few days each year, and there are so many entertaining birds to enjoy. Campgrounds are more empty, too. And I never sweat. I hate all that sweating in the other seasons. (I rarely sweated until menopause finally happened and I’m still not used to all that dripping.)
I’m not confident that I’ve answered the question. Let’s hope I’m much more with it tomorrow.
The Hermits' Rest 