The Glow

The glow of my fall tree is quietest at 5 a.m.  Before anyone else is up and before the sun rises.  Normally around this time of year, we go out and find a live dead tree to anchor up in the living room.  We water it regularly like we’re taking care of a delicate rose.  I found a two-foot long funnel that we can sink into the tree at waist height with the end dipping into the water bowl, so rather than bending over and crawling under the tree with a watering can, we can just dump the water in from a standing position.  Despite all the watering, the tree often starts slouching its arms to the ground well before Christmas arrives. 

Looking through Christmas tree photos, I found one from a few years ago that was strange: two skinny fake trees were standing side by side exactly where the live dead one should have been.  That was the year the real tree started shedding its ornaments several days before Christmas day.  Its branches and needles reached to the floor with such gusto that the ornaments simply slid off the ends or hung precariously on the tips as if on the edge of a cliff.  I removed all the baubles, tipped the tree over, and hauled it to the curb. 

While I said I always wanted a real tree, this year I made the move to an artificial one.  The adventure of choosing one on the tree lot in the cold, the setting up—and some years, the falling over—plucking my favorite big tree from the group only for Bill to remind me that we don’t have twelve-foot ceilings, the stuffing of hundreds of lights into the pokey boughs before the ornaments go on… that adventure will not be this year.  Instead, I had a tree of light and hope at the beginning of November; now I have a fall tree, and next week I’ll have a Christmas tree.  Who knows what will become of it after the twelve days of Christmas.  It may very well revert to an undecorated tree of light and hope.

Two weeks ago, I stood at the edge of the Christmas tree display in Home Depot trying to pick the right tree.  I knew the height I needed: less than eight feet.  I knew the width: round enough to fill the window spot and narrow enough so that we could walk between the tree and couch into the living room.  I knew it needed to look real: no poles or wires waving at me from the inside.  The choice came down between two trees: one with 1,400 lights and another with 4,000.  I had never had more than 1,000 lights on the trees of my past, so I was pretty sure that 1,400 would be plenty, but that 4,000-light tree was spectacularly twinkly and mesmerizing.

Standing there too long in a mask and with my glasses fogging up, I contemplated the kind of light I wanted to make with this investment.  The gambit of cataloged light adjectives squarely fell into two camps: that which I detested and that which sparked warmth.  In any kind of meditative or mindfulness practice referencing light, I translate whatever the instructor suggests envisioning into a tempered light.  Bright, radiating, white, exploding, and beaming light do not energize me.  All of those point to burning hot summer days where the only good place to be outdoors is near a body of water.  A pool or the beach.  Beyond that summer association, the reference of those powerful rays of light remind me of radiation treatment.  I’m thankful I had that in my wheelhouse a decade ago, but those descriptors of light fall too close and joggle the memory box.  Imagining a beam of white light shining up and down my chakras takes me out of the moment quicker than would a bucket of ice water thrown over my head.

This past summer I took the boys to a swimming pool several times a week.  That was a great reprieve to be in the sun with a cooling pool to jump into when the heat got too intense.  We never went mid-day when the crowds were big, rather we went late in the afternoon and normally left the pool around 8 p.m. as the lifeguards played “Closing Time” over the speakers.  We trudged out in wet swim gear, towels wrapped around us, and bags in hand.  It was a fifteen minute drive home where we could shower and dry off. 

As the season waned, we watched summer slide away by the sunlight shortening on the drive home.  I came to a red light one evening and my eye was drawn to the white, slatted United Methodist Church steeple to my left just across the intersection.  The west side was draped in a lovely hue of golden pink.  The glow of color was divine.  I imagined the setting sun’s rays hitting the top of the steeple then being diffused into a flood of ambient light washing down a white canvas.  Cascading light.  With no overbearing intensity.  Firm enough to light the sky and the land.  Indirect but present.  Quiet and peaceful. 

I stood solid in indecision until I paired that steeple light with each of the Christmas trees.  Both were sparkly, but the intensity of the lights soon settled into those two camps of light adjectives.  That comparison finally made the decision an easy one. The glow of the 1,400-light tree will take us through the holiday season and the dark winter, and perhaps it will pull us right into spring.

May you find just the right light as we head into this holiday season.

Too Much

(Written mid-October through mid-November)

Before Halloween, I cleared the shelves on either side of the fireplace.  They were laden with unread, unused, and unwanted books.  Twenty books on New England travels: from best restaurants in Boston and coastal walks in Maine to hiking the Green Mountains in Vermont and directions to waterfalls in the Northeast.  Stacks of games that no one played.  Old photos that no one looked at.  The stuff on the shelves didn’t elicit calm and welcoming, but rather it all looked like too much.  Too much left undone.

A healthy clearing between seasons feels good.  Not just an in-depth dusting.  An absolute removal of everything.  The shelves sat empty for two weeks.  A little sad looking but also comforting.  Tabula rasa: a blank slate.  Like clearing the cobwebs before the headlong plunge into the holidays and winter. 

Now the shelves are thickly settled with Halloween decorations.  Thickly settled, that quirky New England road sign posted in rural areas where buildings are less than two hundred feet apart for at least a quarter mile.  Often times it doesn’t look thickly settled as the homes sit far off the road and are hidden by trees.  The coy thing about these signs is in their legal assertation: the yellow “thickly settled” sign is code for “30 mph speed limit.”  No where is that visually stated on the road.  Quaint wording reminiscent of pilgrim days? Or tricky speed trap?

In the coming week, I’ll dismantle and re-tub the Halloween decorations.  Eight tubs of black, orange, and purple; cats, pumpkins, skeletons, and scarecrows.  And the shelves will stay sparse until the ten tubs of Christmas enter from stage right. Another intermission in the middle of too much.

Sometime in the last year, my husband Bill and I discovered Jamie Oliver’s Show on PBS, “Quick & Easy Food.” I remember when Jamie, a young English chef, first came on the food scene back in the late nineties.  His spunky young energy flew in the face of stodgy chefs. 

Bill and I have gone through many iterations of cooking, and our spice cupboard reflects it.  It takes up one cupboard in our kitchen and the spices are alphabetized.  We don’t follow the recommended shelf life on spices because we know that they can be resuscitated with a twist of thyme between the palms or a dry roast of cardamom in our small skillet dedicated to dry roasting.  That spice cupboard is like a desert full of wildflower seeds burrowed into the sand and lying in wait for the every-20-year rain.  Yet to cook an intricate dish means to go on an archaeological dig through the bottles, and undoubtedly, among the 75 bottles, there will be one spice missing.  Thus, it was only a momentary surprise that when we looked for Italian seasoning yesterday so my husband Bill could make his legendary Bolognese sauce that the cupboard was bare of that ingredient.  Here’s where the beauty of Jamie’s quick food lies: he uses just five ingredients, plus a handful of pantry staples: salt, pepper, extra virgin olive oil, and red wine vinegar.

Our 14-year-old son Liam saunters through the kitchen on occasion with a request for ingredients to try a new recipe.  Most recently he wanted to make muffins—make that one muffin, in a mug, in the microwave.  “I just need some self-rising flour and vanilla ice cream.”  And indeed, with those simple ingredients, he replicated a food hack he had seen online.  The result was a bit rubbery but edible to him.  Jamie Oliver’s five ingredient recipes are like food hacks for grown-ups.

As some people are drawn to cozy British mysteries for the cinematography of the land or the Marvelous Mrs. Mazel for the stunning period dress, I gape bright-eyed at the tight shots of a thick steak being rolled in pepper on all sides and at the sight of garlic and sage hitting hot olive oil. It’s like a balm for the senses.  When my son Liam was little and his eczema raised its ugly head, I would cover him in thick skin cream, Vaseline, or a few dabs of Cortizone.  If he had a sore spot, I would tell him that we just needed to put on a little “shield,” and he would feel better.  I would look at the spot and decide which version of ointment would work best.  As he grew older, he didn’t complain about the hurt, he only asked for the fix.  “I need some shield.”  Jamie in the kitchen reminds me of the “shield”—that which protects.

A few weeks ago, up in the middle of the night unable to sleep, I was watching one of Jamie’s episodes.  I smiled seeing a close-up on a beautifully clean counter of cilantro, butternut squash cubes, a whole chicken, a bottle of red curry paste, and a can of coconut milk. The few ingredients for “Thai Red Chicken Soup.” When the stores opened later that morning, I nipped out for the five ingredients. 

The beauty of this was the ease of preparation.  A little chop of the cilantro stems, a big chop of the squash, a rinse of the chicken, a pop of the lid on the curry paste, and a twist of the can opener to free the coconut milk was all the prep required.  I dropped that whole chicken into a stock pot and dumped everything else in on top of it.  Then I simmered it for 1 ½ hours.  That was it – done. 

Twenty years ago, Bill and I would have made an afternoon out of making red curry paste.  With a little rummage around online, I just found one recipe for this paste that included fifteen ingredients ranging from fresh lemongrass and fresh turmeric to avocado oil and coconut sugar.  I read that prep as four grocery stores and at least one ingredient substitution.  Too much. 

While chopped cilantro stems flavored the soup as it cooked, the leaves were reserved for serving. I took a handful of freshly chopped cilantro leaves and liberally sprinkled them over my bowl of soup.  I have a special connection to cilantro that’s hard to put into words—if you grew up with cattle, you have a better chance of understanding.  When cows graze, they lower their majestic heads to the ground where their big teeth rip off a hunk of grass, and then they slowly lift their heads and chew and chew and chew.  Standing still, looking around unhurriedly, they chew and chew and chew.  Cattle don’t have huge food choices, but what they have, they chew.  I’ll stop short of explaining that chewing as it relates to their digestion, for the important point here is their calm and quiet happiness in eating grass. Cilantro is to me what grass is to cows. Cilantro, balm, and shield are one when there is too much.

 ***

Click here for Jamie Oliver’s “Thai Red Chicken Soup” recipe—and a picture of the final product. Jamie Oliver’s show airs on PBS; however, I couldn’t find a link to this particular episode. 

Looking for an Essay

At 5 a.m., there are no leaf blowers revved up in the neighborhood or motorcycles storming up the hill outside our house.  Even the leaves are still without the squirrels shuffling through them emulating the sounds of big game creeping up behind me.  It’s dark and foggy with streetlights showing clouds of moisture at ground level.  Before sunrise may be the place where I can best focus on writing. 

This is my son Will’s senior year in high school, so we are marching through the corridor where so many others have forged through before us: college application season.  For two months, the word “essay” has loomed dark and large.  Following the school’s college counselor’s advice, last week Will applied “early action” to the colleges that have that optional deadline.  The counselor’s strategy is for students to apply early and find out in December if they’re accepted anywhere.  If they are, that gives them a bit of confidence to forge on with the other schools that have January 1st regular decision deadlines—unless students decide that one of the school’s that accepts them early is where they want to go.  Now, come December, with the Common App and the essay completed, applying will be easier.  Except for those occasional schools that require a supplemental essay or two.  Or six.  It’s draining to think about someone else’s essay deadline, so much so that the keenness for my own faltered.  And the word “essay” itself lost its artful meaning when it time-traveled back to high school, away from the confines of writing as a passion. 

So at 5 a.m., I’m looking for the place to write and for the passion to reignite.  And while the fingers didn’t meet the keyboard over the last several weeks, ideas sputtered about at various intersections throughout the days and weeks. I’m going back over a list that I muddled together.  It’s not complete as I do not always have a pen and paper to my right at these intersections where inspiration hits. And, given my undeniable ability to stay in the present, the glowing ember may burn out before I can record it.  A few months ago, I was having lunch with a friend who had been on her fair share of meds that affected her memory.  I related to how she was feeling as chemo cobwebs still cloud my mind.  We were talking about mindfulness.  I said that I should feel at ease with mindfulness because I can’t remember things that have already happened nor things that I need to do in the future, so I’m left squarely in the present.

I’ve scanned through these jotted, fragmented ideas and future essay titles.  Few make sense.  It’s as if I wrote them in code so no one could steal the ideas.  I thought there would be more inspiration there; rather, I pick up on two themes of bright light and unending noise.  I read through the notes as a whole and think perhaps they are pointing to a larger overarching theme—of seeking peace and calm.  I’ll keep poking through this double-sided page of thoughts and maybe next time around, there will be clarification.  For now, I have the somewhat nauseating feeling I get when I’m looking for that incredibly special gift I purchased two months early but now cannot find, for it’s hidden in a safe spot.