Christmas Déjà vu



Not everybody can have a juniper Christmas tree.

 On Christmas Day 29 years ago we were living here.

 

Dean brought our supplies in on a sled.



















I remember two things about that Christmas.


Yes, that is our wok lid covered in foil.


Number one: the main course was antelope. The four antelope we had shot that Fall were the only meat we ate for the nine months we lived out in the middle of nowhere, in a cabin with no electricity or running water, at the end of a road that was closed – either by drifting snow or mud – for five months of the year. Well, to be perfectly honest, we ate four antelope and the chicks we later mail-ordered, raised up until they were plump and tender and then sacrificed to the God of Hungry Stomachs.

Number two: Friends from town drove 40 miles on a wintery highway, seven miles on a snow-covered dirt road, and then skied ½ mile or so in to our little cabin just so they could share Christmas dinner with us. I don’t remember what time we had determined dinner would be served but when that hour came, even though our friends had not yet arrived, we sat down and ate. There was no discussion as to whether or not they may have driven off the road and were lying bloody in a snow bank. There was no discussion as to whether or not they might have gotten lost and were wandering around freezing and disoriented. There was no discussion as to whether or not we should worry about them or wait for them. We just figured they weren’t coming. It was time to eat so we ate. I now know, many years later, that we should have waited for their arrival before we ate our Christmas dinner. But when you’re living in somewhat “rustic” conditions, you become a bit primordial. You just kind of forget about small details like brushing your hair or not eating dinner until your guests arrive.

We had just swallowed that last bite of antelope and wiped the grease from our mouths with the back of our hands when our visitors arrived at our door. Their cheeks were red from the cold; they were invigorated from the ski and their hungry stomachs were anticipating a warm and welcoming dinner. I hang my head in shame when I tell you we felt no embarrassment as we told them we’d already eaten. We just brought them in, sat them down at the table, and placed the measly remains of our Christmas dinner in front of them.

Sounds horrible, doesn’t it? Emily Post would have been red-faced at our total disregard of common courtesy. But here’s the thing. Living in isolation can sometimes cause a person to become a little bit weird or even the teensiest bit crazy. I’m sure Dean thinks he stayed perfectly sane but it wasn’t me who thought pickups could fly over snow drifts four feet high.  And anyway, I only beat my fists in the snow bank and screamed at the stars once.

Twenty-nine years later, we once again spent Christmas in a cabin, only this time Dean and I were the visitors. Christmas morning we donned snow shoes and walked about ¾ mile in to a cabin on the mountain to surprise three little grandchildren. It was a sunny and crisp day with only the sound of the crunching snow and Dean yelping each time the bell on his pack swung into his elbow.

You’ll just have to imagine a picture of three surprised faces excitedly running out of the cabin door because as we approached the cabin, I reached for my camera, and promptly fell into a twisted heap.

Fortunately for Dean and me, Leslie and Ryan were much better hosts than we had been to our visitors.  They made Emily Post proud. Even though we were ½ hour late arriving they did not eat without us. There was lots of food –  cheese, salami, delicious soup, homemade bread topped with butter Emerson had shaken by hand in a jar with a marble, ham steaks, baked beans, garden carrots and potatoes, cornbread and homemade cookies.

We wore ourselves out sledding,

playing games,

and helping with chores.

There was a bedtime story under the soft glow of kerosene lamps,

before we all crawled into our beds. Dean and I shared a bed with Pierce. It was a quiet and peaceful night. There were no cars roaring down the street, no sirens, and no barking dogs. The only sounds were Myra’s soft snoring, the occasional snap of the fire flickering in the stove, and a sharp intake of breath whenever Dean rolled over onto Pierce’s freezing cold water bottle.

It came to an end much too quickly. There was a quick icicle tossing contest before we packed up,

 fired up the snowmobile,

left the peace and beauty of the mountain, and headed back to town.

However, unlike the visitors who came to see Dean and me all those years ago, we left with bellies filled with oatmeal covered in brown sugar and homemade butter and many happy memories.

More photos of Christmas on the mountain are here.

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Christmas Déjà vu

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

From Dean and Sophie,

Cathy and She Who Must Be Named,

and of course,

Shadow.



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MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Kitty Update

I needed to mix up cookies for our "Christmas on the Mountain".  Dean said he was going downstairs to watch TV.  I said, "well, get one of the kitties and hold her til I get the cookies mixed up and then I'll come down and get the other one and hold her while we watch TV."  He said, "but won't the other one be lonely if I only take one?"

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Kitty Update

Christmas Came Early

About five weeks ago I was nearly buried alive in tissue, ingesting so much tea I swayed like a water balloon when I walked, and making honking noises that would put a goose to shame. Lily, my cat, fell ill at the same time. I went to the doctor and got antibiotics for a sinus infection.  I took Lily to the vet where she spent the night.  For whatever reason, her kidneys were failing.  The vet put her on IVs, and did what she could.  I recovered – but Lily did not. The next day, at 5:20 p.m., I was back at the vet saying goodbye before she was put to sleep. She was only six years old.

For the past five weeks, when I walk in the front door after work, she’s not sitting there waiting to greet me. I’m sure she missed me terribly and her happiness on my return each night had nothing to do with the fact that she knew I would turn on the bathroom faucet for her so she could have a nice cool drink.

There has been no warm furry body curled up next to me after her night time head butting signal to raise the covers.

No butterball crawls into my lap, on top of the project I’m trying quilt, and refuses to move.

No ball of fur nearly trips and kills me in the evening racing to beat me to the bottom of the stairs where she knows her nightly Greenie treat is waiting for her.

I miss her. I miss her so much it took not one …

but two little girls ...

to fill the void she left in my heart.

They had an adventure and were well taken care of by Lisa before they found their way home to me.

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Christmas Came Early

The Sounds and Smells of Christmas

Last weekend Leslie came over and we had a Christmas goodie baking day. She wanted to send a box of home baked goodies to Grandpa (my dad) who, after Mom died, became adept at cooking burgers in the George Foreman Grill, but has not yet figured out how to bake a cookie in it.  She figured he might enjoy cookies made from Grandma’s recipes, so we made Ginger Lace Cookies, Sugar Cookies, Walnut Balls, Mexican wedding cakes and Scotcheroos.

Grandma’s Old Fashioned Fudge was also on the “to make” list but I told Leslie she was on her own for that one. Back before I came to my senses I used to try and make that fudge. I wanted to make it just like Mom’s – perfect. I tried several times, but my fudge was usually more like sand than silky smooth chocolate. The last time I tried to make Mom’s fudge was when Abby needed a treat for a party when she was in grade school. That time I overcompensated for the sand factor and it was too soft. Rather than be discouraged, I was inspired. I proudly handed her a container of “fudge balls” to take to school. Unfortunately the poor child was scarred for life after being teased by her fellow students about the “elk poop” she brought to the party. Not one to be deterred by my experiences however, Leslie valiantly attempted the fudge — which progressed beyond sand to cement and she was also forced to admit defeat.

As we all know, Christmas goodie baking can be a dangerous activity. There is the risk of blindness when spinning beaters are lifted from a bowl of icing. There is the tongue burning hazard resulting from “testing” a cookie before it’s sufficiently cooled. There is the peril of burning flesh which can happen in the blink of an eye when your husband walks behind you with a cup of steaming tea as you are turning with a pan of cookies which were, a mere two seconds earlier, baking in a 350 degree oven. And then there is the risk you will chop off a body part.

Leslie and I weren’t the only ones who were chopping last weekend. While frantic cookie-baking was going on in the kitchen (with occasional “help” from a child)  ...

there was some pretty intense chopping going on in Dean’s art room. Art and craft lessons with Papa have become a Saturday morning ritual at our house.

And sometimes those lessons have involved a paper cutter. A very sharp, very wicked sounding paper cutter. You

know – the kind of paper cutter children are warned away from with sayings of “if you even LOOK at that paper cutter, your fingers will shrivel and dry up and every time you pick your nose a finger will break off.” Of course, if you are the Papa who owns that child-mutilating contraption, apparently it is your duty to “teach the children how to cut paper” without shortening their already stubby little digits.

 My method of dealing with any Dean-led activity which I am positive will (but Dean assures me won’t) result in a calamity, is to just pretend like it’s not happening. For example, when the girls were young and we went hiking, I would see Dean take my daughters up close to the edge of a cliff so they could see “that special rock way down there”; the rock just beyond the depression in the ground where I suspect some previous father’s child had gotten a “closer” look. When that happened I would just turn around, walk away and hum a happy tune to myself. “These Boots Are Made For Walkin’” was always a good choice.

Anyway, as the cookie production continued, every time I caught a glimpse of three children, Dean, and a paper cutter, all together in the same room, and heard the rrriiiiiiccccchhhhhhttttttt sound only a wickedly sharp blade can make, I cringed, turned away, and beat that cookie batter to the tune in my head, “I They Will Survive” which, as it turned out, was a good song choice. Later in the day when I heard that very same rrriiiiiiccccchhhhhhttttttt sound, it was Pierce, in the art room, all alone, with the very shiny, very sharp paper cutter, contentedly putting all his recently learned skills to work.

After the screaming died down and Dean pointed out that Pierce had NOT cut off his fingers, he somehow managed to twist the blame onto me since I was the one who had made Pierce cry when I bellowed “NO!” — not his Papa, who cooed over him and took him off to watch football in the den with him. A bit later as Leslie and I were spreading the melted butterscotch chips on top of the Scotcheroos, we heard muffled cries coming from the living room. Pierce was on the couch, bouncing up and down, his head shaking back and forth, both hands rubbing the saliva that was dripping out of his mouth all over his face. He was making gagging noises and choking sounds. Leslie grabbed him and kept saying over and over, each question a bit louder, “Pierce! What did you eat? Pierce! What’s in your mouth? Pierce! Show me what you put in your mouth!” Squeaks, gagging, face rubbing, head shaking and smeared spit was all she got in return to her frantic questioning.

Finally, as only a mother can, she interpreted the gurgles and gags to be “it stinks! Stinky! Stinky!” In concert with each other, Leslie and I yelled “Dean! Dad! Did you fart?!” Dean, not even realizing he was now alone watching football, of course denied it. He blamed it on the dog. Pierce meanwhile was still gagging and spitting and holding his nose. Leslie told him to “go downstairs where it won’t stink.” Centuries of genetic conditioning kicked in. If smoke rises to the top, stink must do the same. He covered his head with a blanket, got down on all fours, stuck his skinny little butt in the air and scooted across the floor to the stairs.

In the time it took him to slide down the stairs on his belly with a blanket on his head, then turn around and run back up, he was back in the kitchen. He was still gagging, still holding his nose, and still shaking his head back and forth making more squeaky gurgling noises which Leslie interpreted to be “it followed me! It’s on me! Stinky! Stinky!”

Was it Dean? Was it Shadow? My vast experience with Dean tells me it wasn’t him. And Pierce’s eyes weren’t watering so it didn’t seem that Shadow had let one loose. My personal belief is that Pierce has a strong aversion to the aroma of butterscotch but only Pierce truly knows (and he’s not sharing).  What I do know is the next time I need some entertainment I’m going to have Leslie bring Pierce over, bake something with butterscotch chips and see what happens. But I’ll hide the paper cutter first.

If you have all finished frosting your cookies ...

and still have time for more baking, here is the recipe for my mom's:

Ginger Lace Cookies

¾ cup shortening

1 cup sugar

1 egg, beaten

1 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp. ginger

2 level tsp. baking soda

2 cups flour

4 tablespoons molasses

Roll in balls the size of marbles. Roll each ball in sugar. Bake at 375 degrees for about six to eight minutes.

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The Sounds and Smells of Christmas

Can't Take Him Anywhere

Let’s all take a break from the stress of Christmas shopping, the pressure to bake everybody’s favorite Christmas cookies, the sub-zero temperatures and the blowing snow to write (that would be me) and read (that would be you) a bit more about our trip to the Amazon. Oh, wait … it got up to 49 degrees here today and the sun was shining brightly so no sliding into curbs and no backs aching from shoveling snow for us. And gosh, Leslie came over and baked cookies with me over the weekend so that’s taken care of. And geezo peezo, I am 95% finished with my Christmas shopping. Well, dang! Ha! H … I mean, Ho! Ho! Ho! Merry Christmas to you all!

If you can still see the blinking cursor under the dripping cup of eggnog, or blobs of cookie icing (or whatever it is you’ve thrown at your computer) and you don’t need to clip your toenails or scrub the toilet, read on for the next installment of our Amazon adventure.

One thing I did not expect while at the reserve was that I would be waking up at 6:00 a.m. every morning. This was not by choice, but because the weaver birds woke up at 6:00 a.m. every morning and got to work building their nests.  And they didn’t care who they woke up with them.

Our alarm clocks sounded like this

(I only recorded two of the “alarms” on the mp3 but you get the idea.  And let me tell you, they are much louder in person, at 6 a.m.)

Once the “alarm clock” had gone off, and while Dean was untangling himself from his mosquito net, I went exploring and discovered these industrious leaf cutter ants busy at work. 

The worker ants take the leaves to their nest and compost it to make mulch so they can grow fungus to feed their queen and her children. Kind of how Dean collects leaves and grass, composts it for his garden, and grows food for me.

After breakfast we crawled into the canoes and floated off to visit one of five communities living in the Cuyabeno Reserve.

On the way we stopped for a potty break at the local rest area and as we walked back toward the canoes our unmarried, very proper guide pointed out a plant used as a contraceptive.

Dean, being Dean, asked him if he'd tried it and if it had worked well for him. I quietly slunk away and tried to blend into the foliage of that very same contraceptive plant.  Our very polite guide paused, turned his head in Dean's direction, stared blankly into space for a moment and then took a breath and continued on with less acknowledgement than he would give an annoying fly.  I tucked that

“response that wasn't” into the special “Dean” portion of my brain for the remote possibility I may need to put it to use myself.  Fortunately for Dean, our guide allowed him back in the canoe, we continued on, and reached the community.

We walked through butterflies so thick they looked like leaves,

and were greeted by a baby monkey the local people had adopted when its mother was killed. He was cute but I have never understood why anybody in their right mind would want a monkey for a pet. Pretty soon it was my turn to hold the little guy. He was so soft and cuddly and loving … maybe monkeys would be a fun pet ... and then I remembered watching monkeys pick fleas off each other at the zoo … and I came to my senses ....

We were led to a field of manioc bushes where a local woman showed us how to take this manioc root












and, in less than an hour, produce this tasty morsel covered in honey.













She whacked off the outer covering of the manioc root with her machete like she was peeling an orange with a butter knife.  We, however, were only allowed to peel the skin with our fingers after the initial cut had been made.  I suspect our guide knew there weren't any plants growing in the community's medicinal garden that would miraculously reattach our scattered fingers and arms if we tried whacking with the machete ourselves. 

For the whole series of photos on how to go from dirt-covered root to yummy food you can go here.














While the rest of us were busy licking the honey off our fingers, Dean asked our guide about the long, skinny cylinder he'd seen propped up against the wall. Next thing we knew, the guide was whittling a sharp piece of wood, twisting cotton onto the end of it and the monkey was running for cover. Dean blew hard but that dart dropped just a foot in front of him.  I think he mumbled something about his beard preventing him from getting a good seal on the mouthpiece but the laughing and snorting that broke out all around me made it hard to hear him.

Long after the weaver birds had gone to sleep for the night, we were led on a night walk in the jungle armed with only our flashlights. Dean and I always seemed to end up at the back of the pack so I was always trying to get the perfect insect photo after the rest of the group had moved on. The flashlights we had brought were barely adequate to find our way from the bed to the bathroom and I could sense the panic rising in him when the rest of our group (and their much better flashlights) moved out of sight.  I didn't really think our guide would leave us there, wandering in the jungle, alone ... but there was that incident at the contraceptive bush earlier in the day ... Consequently I didn't dawdle long and most of the amazing insects we saw are only pictures in my mind. That’s not to say others  didn’t get great photos so you can look at them here.

 

As well as visiting the community and walking through the jungle at night we also did a bit of this.   

And of course, a bit of this

 



before we went back here to refuel our batteries before our 6 a.m. alarm clocks woke us up for another day (and another blog post).

 

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Can't Take Him Anywhere

I Knew There Was A Reason I Kept Him

For the past three years I have been using the birthday money my dad sends me to buy myself a cup of coffee on my way to work. I put my birthday money in a sandwich baggie and store it safely in that special place in my car especially designed to store CDs and baggies filled with birthday money. Then once a week, until the baggie is empty, I buy myself a special birthday money coffee.

I have designated Friday as my special birthday money coffee day. I’m not sure why I chose Friday. I should probably have chosen Monday. What could be better than starting the week with a special birthday money coffee? A special coffee I could drink without feeling guilty for spending money on something I could very well have made myself for 1/100th of the cost. Or maybe I should have chosen Wednesday. Wednesday would be a good birthday money coffee day. It would be a special treat to break up the long, arduous work week.

But I didn’t choose Monday or Wednesday. I chose Friday. It’s become my tradition now. It’s my habit; my compulsion; my own special obsession. I can’t change it. I can’t. Not without some birthday money coffee therapy anyway. But birthday money coffee therapy would cost money so then I’d need guilt therapy because I don’t think I could cope with the guilt of spending money on therapy. The guilt of knowing I could have easily purchased a cheap self-help book would just be too much for me. But then if I purchased the book I’d feel guilty because I could have checked it out for free from the library. And if I checked it out for free from the library I’d feel guilty because I’d know I could have Googled “guilt therapy” (and gotten About 2,430,000 results--0.18 seconds) and not used the gas I burned to get to the library. That would require even more therapy and … well, that’s why I can’t change my birthday money coffee day.

I’ve been thinking about my upcoming ten weeks of Friday morning birthday money coffee since my birthday way back in October but there just hadn’t been time to start the weekly trips yet. It’s important to me that I enjoy my Friday morning birthday money coffees consecutively. I don’t want a week here and a week there. I am willing to wait until I can buy coffee ten weeks in a row. I need consistency; a coffee rhythm that says to me, “everything is right with the world.”

Early this week I began to harbor hope that my birthday money coffee could begin this Friday. I checked the calendar and saw nothing for the next ten Fridays that would prevent me from purchasing my birthday money coffee in those special paper cups with the plastic lids. I don’t know why, but I love those paper cups with plastic lids. I love the cardboard sleeve specially designed to protect delicate fingers from the heat of the coffee. And I especially love being able to throw that cup and plastic lid away when I’m finished. It’s not that I’m wasteful or trying to intentionally add to the landfill. I’m a recycler. I save plastic and newspaper. I have a little pretend garbage can on my kitchen counter for compost scraps. And I live with Dean. But I’m engulfed in such a feeling of absolute power when I throw that cup away with total abandon. It's intoxicating. Take that, you paper cup!

Finally, yesterday I decided it was time. All day at work as I drank my home-brewed coffee, lukewarm from my thermos, I thought “tomorrow I am going to buy my first Friday morning birthday money coffee.” My excitement continued to build once I got home. “I’m not going to need you tomorrow”, I said to my thermos as I rinsed it out. “Tomorrow I’m buying my Friday morning birthday money coffee in the cup I can throw away with utter abandon.”

This morning I woke up excited and filled with anticipation. And then I heard the wind. It was howling. I knew I would have to walk across the office parking lot in 40 mph winds clutching my precious Friday morning birthday money coffee. But I wasn’t worried. I had a plan this year. A “how to get my steaming coffee across a windy parking lot and into my cubicle without spilling a drop” plan. I will share my plan with all of you, just in case you may find need of it in the future.

The Friday Morning Birthday Money

Coffee For Windy Days Plan

Attire:

• Wear earrings with secure clasps. This is not a dangly earring day. I nearly had a dangly earring blown out of my ear once while walking across the parking lot in the wind. Risking spilling your birthday money coffee while chasing an earring across a parking lot is an unnecessary and preventable risk.

• Pull your hair back and tie it at your neck. Being blinded by blowing hair, causing you to walk into the side mirror of one of the huge pickup trucks parked in the lot, spilling your birthday money coffee all over yourself is, again, a preventable and unnecessary risk.

• Wear pants. There may not be anyone else in the parking lot at that ungodly early hour but a woman’s first reaction when her skirt blows up over her head is to grab for it. And if she is holding a cup of hot coffee, … well, I don’t want to go there. Again, a preventable risk.

• Wear solid shoes with low heels. I don’t believe this needs any further explanation.

• If possible, fill your pockets with rocks. (This is where being married to a geologist can, for once, come in handy). Flying through the air may sound like a thrill, but the folks below you who will be pelted with droplets of hot coffee will not appreciate it. Another alternative is to eat a lot of pumpkin pie, completely covered in whipped cream, like I did. The added weight will hopefully keep you grounded, but if you should still find yourself floating like Mary Poppins, the subsequent landing will be softer due to your increased soft, fatty tissue.

Parking Lot Protocol:

• Place your coffee securely in your right hand.

• Push open your car door with your left shoulder and old it open with your left foot. Do not let the door close no matter how strong the wind is.

• In one smooth move, slide out of the car, covering the special coffee-sipping opening on the top of the cup with the first finger of your left hand (even if it leaves a brown spot on the new alpaca gloves you bought in Ecuador). Step aside quickly, letting the wind slam your door shut.

• Tightly hold your Friday morning birthday money coffee in your right hand, still pressing the first finger of your left hand onto the coffee-sipping hole on the top of the cup. Lower your head, lean into the wind, and stagger as fast as you can to the office door. Do not release your finger from the coffee-sipping opening on the top of the cup no matter how much your finger is burning. If you raise your finger, even for a second, the wind will blow that coffee out of the opening, straight into your eyes, blinding you. This may very well cause you to trip over the parking lot curb, onto the sidewalk, where your sprawled body will then be whipped and rolled, over and over, until you are tangled in the snow fence where no one will hear your cries or see your battered and beaten body.

This morning I followed that plan exactly. It went like clockwork until I was halfway across the parking lot and realized that my coffee was still bubbling up out of the lid. How could that be? The lid was on tight. I was holding my finger tightly on the special coffee-sipping hole on the top of the cup. Did I have a damaged lid? How could my plan be defective?

Once I got my Friday morning cup of birthday money coffee safely in my cubie and took a closer look I realized there was a flaw in my plan. There is a tiny, tiny pinhole in the lid across from the larger special coffee-sipping opening. A pinhole large enough to allow coffee to bubble and erupt on a windy day.  Can I cover both the coffee-sipping opening and the tiny pinhole while walking across a parking lot fighting hurricane-force winds? Can I do that and stay upright until I reach the safety of the door? I don’t know.  I feel I must develop a revised plan. A plan that I fear involves physics and math and some kind of complicated aerodynamics formula. And I need to come up with it before next Friday because what if it’s another windy Friday morning birthday money coffee day? I can’t just wait until a day when it’s not windy. I can’t change the day. I already told you why.

If I can’t come up with an adequate revision to my plan I might have to come up with an alternative course of action. Right now there is only one alternative I can imagine. I need to find a Friday morning birthday money coffee delivery service.

Where IS Dean?◦

I Knew There Was A Reason I Kept Him