Life & Spirit | mulberryshoots

January 1, 2013

a birthday place . . .

My birthday comes a few days after Christmas every year. Because 2012 happened to be a milestone year for me, we found a place on the ocean in Truro on the Cape and our family gathered for a few days to visit, cook meals for each other and walk on the beach right outside our door.

M. put together snowflake garlands and C. helped her place paper red cardinals hopping around tiny white lights set in mason jars along the window sills making the place festive and elegant. Each took turns cooking for the rest of us; then another pair cleaned up afterwards. It worked out great with meals of shabu shabu, chap jae, ham and pea soup, ham sandwiches, delectable cheeses, huge salads with pears, pomegranate seeds and maple syrup laced dressing.

I took breakfast duty each day, making stacks of french toast, light oatmeal bread dipped in beaten eggs laced with vanilla, fragrant in a large electric skillet, mounds of tender, scrambled eggs with chopped scallions, crisp bacon on the side. And lots of hot coffee.

G. and M. went to pick up the lobsters and cape scallops for my birthday dinner. Afterwards, we had M.’s homemade coconut cupcakes with cream cheese frosting lit with candles. On the last day, after packing and loading the cars, we sat down to one last round of eggs benedict, made with warmed ham on toasted whole grain and cheese bread topped with tender poached eggs and generous dollops of hollandaise sauce made with Meyer lemon.

Sand, wind, water, salt. Lots of it everywhere. Thoughtful gifts abounded, the most touching of all was a DVD with voiceovers and music made by my daughters and granddaughters, including the littlest one at the end (Josie at 27 months old) saying “hap-py birth-day, gram-my”. The DVD movie did not come across like a “this is your life” kind of tribute which always seems to me like a valedictory farewell (okay, now you can go and sit somewhere.) Instead, it was a light-hearted celebration with lots of humor, flowers and food, good times shared together. I noticed a favorite suede jacket that I wore in college and wondered where it went to. There were comments from my blog too and a parade of the countries readers originate from, set to the “Star Wars” opening trumpet theme.

All in all, for an introverted, reclusive worrywart person and mother, the thoughtfulness and affection shared by everyone during this birthday holiday made us feel happy and content, especially me. And Josie’s innocent joyfulness at being near the ocean said it all: “O-cean! O-cean! SO Happy!” We are lucky to have such a wonderful family. And my thanks go to each and everyone who made this birthday holiday so meaningful and full of love.

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December 18, 2012

almost christmas . . .

Do you know of things that seem to happen EVERY YEAR in your family while preparing for the holidays? In ours, it seems that the Christmas tree stand cannot be found. Anywhere. Each year, I vow to be sure to store it beside the lights so that the tree can be set up and the lights put on it. Without these two steps, we’re stymied. Usually the tree lights don’t work either.

So yesterday, while the weather was going at it in our town with an icy sleet-like snow, spitting ice bits, forming an invisible sheet of ice that kept you from moving very quickly from the front steps to the car, we looked high and low for the tree stand. By late afternoon, we had searched for it in the closets (3,) the basement, the barn, again in the basement but to no avail.

G. planned to go out to deliver the mince pies to family and neighbors leaving around 4:15 p.m. Unbeknownst to him, I had been on the phone upstairs calling around to Rocky Ace Hardware stores, Lowes, Jerry’s Hardware and found out that one Ace Hardware store had a metal tree stand and I asked him if he would kindly hold it for me: he said he would but that they closed at 5 p.m. on Sundays.

I put on my jacket, went outside on the slick ice on our driveway and noted that G.’s truck was still here. Of course, he had taken the Subaru because it has all wheel drive. Nonplussed, I called him on his cell phone and after about ten minutes, he picked me up and we headed Read the rest of this entry »

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December 16, 2012

mince pies . . .

So today is Saturday and on a lighter note than in the past few posts, I’m going to describe the very cute mince pies that I made tonight. About a year ago, I was looking at the Williams Sonoma catalog which shows up pretty often. I usually avoid buying anything because the wares seem overpriced or meant for kitchens much more elaborate than mine. On that particular day though, I was taken by an appliance called the Breville pie maker. I had fantasies of making miniature chicken pot pies from leftovers, quick little apple pies for dessert from leftover fruit in the fridge.

I played around with it when it first arrived and then I put it on the back shelf in the pantry. I felt guilty about it a little bit but it wasn’t hundreds of dollars and I forgot about it. Over Thanksgiving, Read the rest of this entry »

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December 14, 2012

“safe for democracy” . . .

I’ve been in a kind of time-out this week during the day. When I went in on Tuesday as a potential juror, I was surprised to be empaneled on the jury for a criminal case in the Superior Court of this district. The experience was a real eye opener.

First of all, there’s a new courthouse building with large high-ceilinged rooms and technology such as TV screens on which introductory videos were played for the jury pool. More important, there was a tone and approach towards us jurors from the get-go: which was a highly respectful and appreciative tone towards the privilege of serving as jurors, for our taking the time and paying the expense (driving and parking fees) for serving on juries.

We learned that the American jury system is unique in the world. And that visiting jurists from Europe and Asia are befuddled by how our system can get individual citizens to serve on juries on their own volition. We were shown that having a vote and serving on a jury are fundamental rights and obligations for our democracy to work.

A judge came to the jury pool to thank us all for being there and for being patient while the trial lawyers prepared to argue their cases. When we were empaneled, our judge did the same thing, thanking us and instructing us not to talk about the case with ANYONE, not our spouse, not by email, not to each other. . . until the deliberations were completed. We, the jury, complied. Most of the time that we were sequestered in the jury deliberation room when we were not in the courtroom, we were near silent, not much chit chat among ourselves. We were polite but kept our distance socially.

Our case was estimated to last for four or five days but yesterday, we returned our verdict at the end of the third day. It was a complex Read the rest of this entry »

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December 9, 2012

for myself . . .

Once a long time ago, (and I’ve written about this before,) someone said to me, “Do it for you, don’t do it for me.” I can’t remember anymore what it was about but it has begun to sink in how often I do things for others–especially when they haven’t asked me to do anything at all. Does this make sense to anybody but me?

I was talking about it with G. last night and G. said, “live your life,” and “keep it simple.” If this blog has been about anything, it has been about these two statements. Ironically, I seem to be the one Read the rest of this entry »

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December 8, 2012

one by one . . .

You know how things are when you’re about two weeks away from THE DAY if you are celebrating Christmas and things, although they seem do-able, start to feel a little overwhelming?

I’m happy to report that we have made a good deal of headway by discussing logistical puzzles that have given way to solutions that offered up more possibilities than when we were boxed into the “way it had to be.” One example for me and my daughters was that M. wanted very much to stop by H-Mart, a humongous asian grocery store halfway here on Christmas Eve day to be able to buy thin-sliced Kobe beef Read the rest of this entry »

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December 5, 2012

persimmons . . .

I don’t know about you but I look forward to this time of year because persimmons appear in the markets. There are two kinds of persimmons: the hard, squat ones that you can eat called fuyu; and the graceful pointed ones that will pucker up your mouth something awful if you are impatient and eat them before they turn almost to mush when they are ripe. These are called hachiya persimmons, are hard to find and can also be expensive when you come across them. They’re worth it though.

Because they are purchased hard, I usually have them lined up in my kitchen window to ripen. My daughter, M. exclaimed when I showed her my kitchen on Skype the other day, murmuring that she remembered them Read the rest of this entry »

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December 4, 2012

being (more) known . . .

Well, I did it. It took me ALL DAY to put together the 200 posts of the blog so far into a hard copy volume the way that I wanted it to be. There wasn’t really that much to do after the transfer of the posts to the website (Blog2Print) went through. That worked after the third try. But the rest of it took hours: adding 8 pages of family photos to MyPages, deciding about the front and back cover photographs, what the dedication page would look like. Now I can see what book publishing people do for a living.

Because it was the last day for a 20% discount (which for me was the make-or-break to do it in the first place,) the website was sluggish, no, that’s not the right description: it was a breakdown lane. The photo upload feature was hard to find, never mind use– and the appearance of that little multi-colored spinning ball made my heart drop every time it stopped things cold, you had to exit the site and Read the rest of this entry »

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December 3, 2012

time in . . .

This is the 200th post on a blog that first appeared on February 11, 2011. It’s truly amazing to me that since then, there have been 11,070 views from 75 countries. Even more touching to me has been the gradual evolution of a group of readers who regularly visit the blog and who stay in touch with me about its contents.

In preparing to codify what I am thinking of calling “volume one” of “Mulberryshoots,” I reviewed about seventy-five of my most recent posts and am struck by the recurring themes of life and death, especially for those who are taken before their time and those who remain here to remember and to share wisdom about what we have learned the hard way. There’s lots of flowers, plants that were lost and those that took their place. Even more about food, cooking and its relationship to our feeling of being taken care of and of taking care of others.

I hope that the blog will be pertinent, entertaining and perhaps even useful to some readers. Today, I’m going to take advantage of a publishing discount and have volume one created in hard copy as a remembrance for my daughters and granddaughters. At least someday, they will have a chance to know me not just as a mother and a grandmother, but as the person whose voice can be heard in these essays.

Thank you.

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December 3, 2012

steep hills . . .

I was talking with G. this morning about how sometimes we go through long periods of what feel like hard times. And that life is not simply black and white between happy and unhappy but often grey for much of it.

I know that one of my daughters, who seems truly happy now, went through years of isolation and difficulty, personally and professionally. Another has been having her ups and downs as well. As for myself, my clearest memory as a young child was wanting to hide in the kitchen cabinet under the sink of the big house where lots of us were staying in Shanghai while fleeing from Japanese and Communist armies who were fighting each other at the time. The noisy company of all my cousins was something I withdrew from to be alone in order to Read the rest of this entry »

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