Cleaning Up the Stains

“If you live in regret, you’ll regret it.”  —Anonymous

It’s Sunday again, that lovely day that I look forward to all week.  I look forward to my trip to the coffee shop—not just the coffee, but the shop with its warm, deep coffee smell that hangs in my hair and coat for hours, and the hope of possibility that I’ll meet an interesting man or just have a fun interaction with someone there.  I usually do.  Even the walk past the park, chatting with the squirrels and wagging my tail at oncoming dogs, that’s all worth the week long wait.  And then to top it all off, I get to come on home to my peaceful solitude where crying toddlers and ungrateful adolescents are merely echoes. 

On my way home this morning, I passed a mother unloading her crying child from their car.  She was yelling, “Hunter, I have your coat!  Now stop crying!”  My first thought was, of course, judgmental: “You don’t have to yell at him.  Poor kid.”  But as you know, I recognize a pointing finger and its boomerang effect, so I let go of my judgment and turned to my own past tyrannical episodes.  One, I’m about to confess to you, borders on a call to call DCFS.

Casey was in second grade, Riley in fourth.  I’d worked most of the morning and part of the afternoon making a beautiful blackberry pie for a summer potluck.  As usual, I was running behind (the best laid plans of mice and mothers, I always said) so I was rushing and impatient.  The pie was beautiful when I pulled it out: the rich, deep blackberry juice bubbling up through the browned lattice crust.  Perfect.  I ordered the kids to get into the car more than a hundred times, no time to change out of my floured shirt or fix my hair (an egg beater might have done the trick). I grabbed the pie with two pot holders and glowing pride and headed for the car, imagining all the oohs and ahs I’d get from all my party friends.  Carefully I set it on top of the car, opened the door and lowered myself and the pie into the car.  I placed my pride and joy on top of Casey’s lap. She shrieked and flipped the pie onto the floor. 

Did you see that coming?  I didn’t see that coming.  I don’t remember what I yelled, just that I yelled.  Loudly.  Longly.  My poor little girl, for whom I would have felt so much pity had I been a fifty-five year old passerby on her way home to her peaceful solitude, cried and yelled and rubbed her red thighs. 

Twelve or so years later, the blackberry stains are gone, but I worry that my poor little girl who I know now is my real pride and joy, carries the red hot anger in her.  I regret that my priorities were so misplaced and my needs for praise got in the way of my children’s needs at time.  I feel sad when I visit regrets of the past.  I know I can’t change them.  I also know I did the best I could with what I had at the time. 

The good news is I can "look back without staring" and every day is chance to do it better. Now that loving friendships have replaced the isolation I experienced back then, I have more self-worth, a lot more peace, and a bit more wisdom.  I can visit those regrets with my kids and express my remorse and the sympathy I didn’t express then.  I can give them now what I should have given them when I didn’t have it to give. 

I have another confession.  When I cleaned up the car floor, I tasted some of the pie.  It was really sour.  Instead of oohs and ahs, I would have seen sour pusses and forks softly set down at the party.  Maybe Casey was my savior that day.

More good news!  My favorite market has organic blackberries on sale this week.  Think I’ll call Casey and invite her over for a cool compress for whatever ails her and some sweeter blackberry pie.

 

Blackberry Pie

Pie Crust

2 c. flour

1 ½ t. salt

1/2 c. vegetable oil

5 t. cold water

Sift flower and salt in a bowl and hollow out a crater in the middle.  Pour oil and water all together and fold flour into the liquid.  Stop before it’s all mixed or it will get tough.  Form into two balls, one a little smaller than the other.  Roll out the larger ball between two sheets of waxed paper from the middle out.  Save the smaller ball for the lattice top.

4 ½ c. blackberries rinsed and drained

¾ c. of sugar (if your blackberries are on the sour side, add another ¼ c. or so.)

2 T. flour

2 T. unsalted butter

Combine and gently mix first three ingredients.  Spoon into pie crust and dot with butter.  Now comes the fun part: Roll out your smaller dough ball like the first one.  If you don’t have a serrated pastry cutter, you can use a hand saw so the strips have jagged edges.  I suggest you clean it first!  Cut dough into half inch strips and attach them at one end to the bottom crust by folding them under.  Set them parallel with about a half inch between them and loosely roll them back on the counter so you can weave perpendicularly (or at a slant) the remaining strips.  Start the same way for the strips running perpendicularly to the first strips.  This takes more time than you think.  I’m just warning you.  Weave (that means one under, one up, etc.), working your way across the pie.

Bake at 400 degrees for 25 minutes or until your crust is golden and the juice is bubbling up over the lattice.  Let it cool before placing on anyone’s lap.

Old Girls, They Do Get Weary

After two weeks mired in menopausal muck and stuck in CPS sludge, I’m finally moving freely, breathing deeply.  Ah!  Life is good.

Menopause is a slick trickster.  It follows unsuspecting woman down brightly lit streets, then pushes them into dark alleys and bashes them over the head. The poor gals don’t know what it them.  The resulting headache can last for days.  Tears, grimaces, dangling heads become status quo with worries that dull gray will forever be their existence.  If the culprit is found, things start to brighten up and voila!  In one moment everything lifts.  They are renewed in spite of the intermittent thermostat malfunctions.

I’m lucky because I can usually spot the hormonal sneak wreaking havoc with my happiness.  Also lucky, I don’t mind crying.  It waters my soul and I feel at home in tears. 

But these past two weeks haven’t been so clean and clear.  Of course, my grief over losing my mom hangs in the background and surges forward whenever something else makes me unhappy.  On top of that, I’ve had to manage many business affairs for my dad which means phone calls to that same lady who repeats, “I didn’t quite hear that.  Did you say . . .” Adding more to stress to sadness, at work we teachers have been asked to give up forty-five minutes of prep and lunch time and teach two extra classes a day for a week and a half without compensation.  Counselors have been programming, working more intensely without breaks.  And to add even more slime to the mix, while we were all being bled dry, we were given a letter to hand out to students informing their families—oh yeah, and us—that next year the school year will be ten days longer and days will be forty-five minutes longer, again, without compensation.  I could go on about the lack of dignity and respect in a field that is supposed to be all about teaching dignity and respect, but I could get lost on that trip.

After being tired of anger and resentment for too many days, I decided to use some tools that have helped me in the past.  They’re not my tools.  And you probably already know them so you can just skip down to the recipe.  But you may want to stick around up here because they were handed down to me from wise citizens who inherited them from wise citizens so the wisdom has grown exponentially. 

First I remembered baby steps.  Anne Lamott, in her book Bird By Bird, writes about her brother who had to write a report on birds.  He was overwhelmed until his father told him he only had to write about one bird at a time.  “Just take it bird by bird,” his father told him.  One task is manageable; all of them are overwhelming. I kept whispering to myself in the school hallway, “Bird by bird.”  

As a follow up to baby steps, like parents when their babes take those first steps, I celebrated each little accomplishment by praising myself: “Good job, honey!” I took a deep and well deserved breath.  Next!

When others are in need, being tender and forgiving comes naturally.  A friend reminded me to extend that to myself in these stressful times.  It helped to tell myself I didn’t have to be great or smart and to remember to forgive myself for mistakes because I was in a very difficult situation.  Affording myself those little tenderizers eased the tightness in my shoulders, and I actually felt smooth, more fluid.

Listing all that I’m grateful for can move me out of the negativity I get so entrenched in.  The moment I remembered to do that, with each gratitude, my attitude lightened.

Finally, remembering this isn’t final, that everything is temporary took a huge weight off, and I could feel hope again.

Of course, these tools take practice to use, especially when I have a headache and can’t see through the blurring tears or the fire in front of me.  Thank goodness I have predecessors to guide my hands and hand my tools to me.

If none of those work, there’s always online shopping!  This week I got a new immersion blender.  Let’s see what kind of renewing recipe we can make with it.

Potato, Asparagus and Leek Soup

3 c. chicken or vegetable stock

About 2 inches fresh ginger root, peeled and sliced very thinly

1 leek washed and sliced (I don’t use the tough, green part.)

About 5 medium sized red organic potatoes, washed and cut (bigger than bite sized to keep your labor costs down because your time is valuable.  You don’t even have to peel them.)

1 bunch of asparagus, washed, trimmed and cut in 2 inch lengths

1 t. cracked pepper

1 T. salt

1 t. coriander

Dash of cayenne pepper, if you like

Cook ginger, leek and potatoes and spices in stock until potatoes are nearly tender. Add asparagus and cook until tender.  Using that new immersion blender, work around the soup to puree most of the potato and leek and ginger, avoiding the asparagus.  Add water if it’s too thick.  I like to add a little kale at the end for extra iron, calcium and magnesium.

I’m grateful for those who’ve struggled before me and the tools they’ve handed down.  I’m grateful for friends who value me when systems don’t.  I’m grateful for hot, thick soup and online shopping.

Flexibility of Oil

A year ago this time the Special Education Department was told several of us were getting a program change at the new semester.  Dory, we’ll call her, a gumdrop of a woman who runs around spreading news of the end of the world, leaving sticky footprints in her wake, came to me to say she would be sharing my room with me, holding three classes during my lunch and prep periods.  Usually, we special ed teachers are nomads, dragging our camels from one village to another with all our materials piled high on humps, limited unloading space, maybe a corner of a desk top and token drawer.  Up until her news, I’d been lucky enough to have a room to myself, the first time ever. During my prep periods I got to stretch on the floor, sort through materials, and eat my midmorning breakfast.  When Dory told me I’d be losing my private time, I was gracious and let her know she was welcome.  Aren’t I wonderful?

Not so fast!  Shortly after the news, Dory walked into my class while I was giving an oral quiz.  She stopped me and said, “I’ll be moving into the classroom tomorrow.  Where can I put my cabinet?”  No big deal.  Then she said, “And Lindsay, I don’t want you in the room while I’m teaching.”   I was flabbergasted.  I argued that I have materials to prepare.  I wouldn’t be interfering in her teaching.  She said it would change the dynamics.  “How many students do you have first and second period?” I asked.  “Two,” she said.  Two!  How dynamic is that?

I turned red in front of my students who sat quietly, perhaps waiting to see if I was going to slug her.  “I’ll talk to you later,” I said calmly.  “We’re in the middle of a quiz right now.”

After she left, I shook my head, but the dirt and dust clung. In fact it clung all day while I told on her to every one of my buds, as well as everyone else I saw that day.  I guess I thought that the more people who agreed with me, the righter I would be.  And if I’m in the right, I would win out.  I can’t tell you how many times in my life I’ve been stunted by that misconception. 

With right on my side, I was going to clean up the world.  I found Dory in the main office and pulled out my arguments.  “Be reasonable, Dory.”  That, I thought, made me sound reasonable.  “Everyone here shares space and has no problem.”  That’s always good; be part of a united front of muckrakers, a mob raising their mops at the castle wall and shaking their various cleaning products.  “We teachers need to be flexible.” Again, didn’t I look more evolved than she?  Dory interrupted every sentence after one or two words, so I wasn’t able to get my requests, wisdom or cleanser out.  “Let me finish,” I said.  She shook her head continuously while I said, “How is it okay that you come into my class in the middle of my teaching to talk to me about all this, but I can’t sit in the room and be silent during your class?”  See how right I am?  She explained that thirty seconds is different from an entire class period. 

All day and night I obsessed over this.  My frustration at not being able to be in my classroom was outweighed by the outrage I felt at having been up against an interrupting brick wall of unreasonable, inflexible behavior.  Weren’t we all in this together?  Weren’t we supposed to work together to make it easier rather than harder?

I didn’t sleep well that night and still in the morning I was reaming her out in my head.  I said a prayer to help me let go, but right after that little prayer, I continued arguing: “Be flexible and reasonable.”  

Something shook loose.  I changed my prayer on my way out the door.  “Help me be flexible and reasonable.”  The dust and dirt let go.  I had a new mission, one that I could direct and control.  I’d been so busy trying to clean up the world; I forgot to check under my rug.  I went off to school that morning with a chance to be truly gracious.  I would have to figure out how to plan and grab whatever I needed and find places to hang out.  In my exile, I graded papers in another teacher’s room where I observed her style.  During another prep period I worked in the computer lab where I got to be a part of the chatter and laughter of other teachers and staff. 

I realize that being right is what wars are made of.  If oil can make friends with vinegar without giving up it's boundaries, then we can too.  Maybe I am right, but what’s it matter?  Now the world has gotten bigger since I mopped up under my own rug.  My reality is that as long as I focus on what I can change—me—life is wonderful.  And today, so am I.  Again, peace prevails!  You can all lower your mops now.  Go on.  Go home.

Sweet and Salty Salad with Vinegar and Oil Dressing

A recipe to show us how it’s done!

 

Orange beets peeled and cubed and steamed in just a little bit of water

Organic mixed greens (I like the herb mixture with dill and cilantro.)

Purple cabbage sliced in strips (adds nice color)

Red and yellow peppers chopped (best to get organic, if you can find them this time of year)

Organic carrot sliced thinly, julienne style (they curl—very cute)

Celery sliced (adds a juicy crunch)

Cucumber, peeled, quartered and sliced

Jicama, peeled and chopped

Organic blueberries (You have to pay an arm and a leg for them.  But we can’t change that.)

Feta cheese crumbles

Olive oil

Balsamic vinegar

Salt, pepper, cumin and a splash of cayenne

The measurements are up to you.  I like to add the water from the steamed beets as part of the dressing.  Surely this salad will leave you feeling satisfied, knowing you’ve done the right thing, which, in the kitchen and on the inside, truly matters.

Gotta Love That Thumper

“Alcoholism is a progressive disease, advancing even in times of sobriety.”  The Big Book

I’m not an alcoholic.  No, really, I’m not.  But I will admit to being a judge-maholic.  I come about it honestly; I come from very judgmental stock.  My teachers were the best.  My father, for instance, would sit with me at a coffee shop complaining about the guy at a table against the wall.  “Look at that man with his hat on.  He’s inside, for cry-eye.”  Then my dad would pull out his nail clippers and snap away—sharp slivers shooting off this way and that—oblivious to the sneers shooting back at us.  My mother’s judgment took the form of filling in the blanks with conviction: “He’s in debt up to his ears.”  “How do you know?” I’d ask.  “I just know.”  I could go on and tell you about my family and their judgments, but that would be my judge-maholism running amuck. 

All this is to say, that while I work at tempering my judgmental nature with compassion, my judge-maholism progresses in the dark spaces of my mind, and when it emerges, it takes me and the victim by surprise. 

My lovely daughter invited me to hear her boyfriend’s band play at a concert last year.  His music is unique, and I mean that in a good way.  But I had no idea the most important quality at a concert was the volume.  I could feel the bass pounding from the floor up to my heart.  I yelled out to my daughter that I would resist putting my fingers in my ears because that would be rude.  She laughed but wasn’t as amused when I yelled, “If they didn’t have the mic up so loud you could hear what they’re singing.”  I saw her reaction and bounced it around in my echo chamber along with the singer’s words, if they were in fact words.  Then I said in her ear, “I sound pretty insulting, don’t I?”  She laughed and agreed emphatically.  That was the last negative thing I said for the rest of the night.  Just because something is true, doesn’t mean it’s not insulting.  I’m always lassoed off my high horse and thrown flat on my back when I see the sting on her face.  I’m surprised and miffed that she wants my approval because from fifteen years old up to about a year ago, my daughter was opposed to me, my choices, my appearance, my words, my boyfriend, pretty much everything about me.  My view of her and our relationship hadn’t kept up with our actual changes and growth.  I realized then that we are so much alike, and it was suddenly humbling.  While we were busy disapproving of each other (wasn’t that my job as her mother and her job as a teenager?), we wanted each other’s approval.  My judgments now only serve to distance my daughter.    They do no good.  Just because I have them doesn’t mean I have to use them.  Like Thumper says to Bambi, “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say nothing at all.”  I have smart, zingy cayenne pepper in my kitchen, ready to spice up any dish, but I would never want to use it in, say, a pumpkin pie.  When I push those stinging judgments to the back of the dark spice cabinet and pull out a soft cinnamony compliment, I get to see my daughter’s beautiful smile and I feel like a grown up.

I’m sure to forget once in a while and my judgmental heritage will slip from my loose lips, but I know how to focus on the positive, observe our progress and be humble, keeping my fingers out of my ears at a concert.  

This humble pie really sweetens the tongue, even when it’s not Thanksgiving!

Pumpkin Pie

One single pie crust (see post of 11-11-11)

1 ½ c. cooked or canned pumpkin

1 c. sugar

½ t. salt

1¼ t. cinnamon

1 t. ginger

½ t. nutmeg

½ t. cloves

3 eggs slightly beaten

1¼ c. milk

2/3 c. evaporated milk

Combine all ingredients in the order above and pour into an uncooked pie crust.  Bake at 400 degrees for 50 minutes or until it’s not all wiggly in the middle.

Serve while it’s still warm with some real whipped cream on top.  For an extra sweet treat, put Bambi on the DVD player.

Drip, drip, drop

little April shower