I always liked the sound of “The Ides of March” from when I’d first come upon the phrase in my reading of Shakespeare.
In 1998, it took on a new meaning: the day that my father died. He was on hospice so his death was no surprise. My mother’s (who had died 2 years and 2 weeks earlier) birthday was March 13. He hadn’t been eating or drinking much for several days before her birthday, but on that day, he perked up. He was laughing and joking, almost his old self. He sat up in his hospital bed (that was in the middle of the living room) and asked for a fried clam dinner with french fries and cole slaw and dinner rolls and God only knows what else.
So, my brother ran out to get his requested meal, which (as you probably guessed by now) turned out to be not only his last supper, but also his last lucid day. We didn’t think it was any coincidence that it was my mother’s birthday that he chose to perk up, or that 2 days later he followed her and died.
I like to have a fried clam dinner on or around March 15th in honor of my dad, like I buy primrose around February 29th in honor of my mother. The only problem now is…where to get it!
My mother’s birthday is was March 13; she would have been 71 this year. I wasn’t going to write a post about her because I just published one a couple of weeks ago, but here we are. The day started off as many do, with a quick look at Facebook to see if anything was going on.
So, the first thing I saw was something posted by Jeannine entitled: A letter from Mom and Dad (dad died years ago on 3/15). I mean, are you kidding me? So I watched it, and cried. Off to a good start.
Next, another FB post, this time by my sister-in-law, where she describes the boiled dinner she is making today…Andrea mentions that she makes it the way her mother-in-law, my mother, did. Sniffle.
Then we went to my friend Susan’s house. She had recently been to Ireland and brought my daughter and me back some presents. Mine included a “family” of heart-shaped rocks. More tears.
After a bit, I pulled myself together and we chatted for a while, then we gathered around the laptop so that Susan could show us pictures of Ireland that she took during her trip. I reminded my daughter that we were half Irish, so she should be especially interested in viewing these pictures of the country. “I didn’t know you were Irish!” my friend said. Well, it’s no wonder, since I’m usually going on about my Italian heritage. My mother, however, was Irish. I told Susan, “As a matter of fact, it’s her birthday today.” As we sat and watched Susan’s wonderful pictures of and stories about the places she had been (I nearly started crying again), I suddenly thought, “Okay, Ma, so you’re showing me that you’re here today, making sure that we remember you on your birthday! We do!”
And we did. Surrounded by love. Solid as a (heart-shaped) rock. 🙂
(Gee, maybe turning those clocks ahead really wreaked some havoc with my equilibrium!)
Okay, so it’s March, not February. I meant to post this last month and just realized that I never did. One weekend, thinking about my New Year’s word which, as you may recall is “Edit”, I helped my daughter edit her room. We purchased risers to lift her bed up high enough to allow and underbed storage container to fit underneath. We dismantled the bed, vacuumed it all out, changed all the bedding.
My husband started during the week, working their way around the periphery (like at the supermarket? The way you’re “supposed” to shop to get the healthy food, right?). They attacked the furniture surfaces (read: clutter magnets) first: bureau, nightstand, corner table, desk. They next moved on to the closet, completing the top shelf and the floor.
I took over on the weekend, finishing the contents of the closet and all of the (5!) bureau drawers. When we were finished, we had 4 stuffed trash bags of things she didn’t need/want/use/wear anymore!
I was so motivated by how great her room looked that I proceeded on to do my own closet (well, most of it) and my (6!) bureau drawers. I took out 2 1/2 bags of cast offs.
I read the book :30 Days to a Simpler Life by Cris Evat about 10 years ago, and still have it. Okay, okay, I save things. It’s what I do. My mother threw away everything, including all of my childhood belongings, and I guess that I responded to this by never throwing away anything (at least, that’s what my husband will tell you!) but sometimes I really do need something that I haven’t used in 10 years! So I have my book out, dusted off, and am consulting it as a tool to help me with my objective for 2011: editing!
One of the most effective suggestions in this book, and the one I still use to this day, is this: go around the house (or you can focus on just one room; it’s up to you) with an empty bag and fill it. With what? With anything that you don’t need/love/use/want anymore. Anything that you can part with that will give you the gift of this: empty space. Go ahead, try it. The book suggests that you do it every day, but even if you only do it once, that’s still one whole bag less of clutter in your home.
Try to resist the urge to fill it back up right away (you know you’ll want to). 🙂
I admit it: I have crushes. All the time. My husband is pretty tolerant of them. He even produced a picture of Boston Rob for me for Christmas last year (downloaded from the internet and printed…in color!). I’m exceedingly happy now that Survivor is back with its new season, Redemption Island.
For date night this particular week we decided to have a picnic. What else would you do in March in Maine?
We had no babysitter, but then our daughter had plans for a couple of hours in the evening. At the last minute we decided that we didn’t want to go out (6:30-8:30 is late when you get up before dawn!) so here’s what we did instead:
Dropped the tweens (daughter and friend) off at their movie.
Called in an order to Pizza Napoli. March specials going on are pretty good. We took advantage of one of the March specials: “buy any large pizza get a free small cheese pizza”.
Came home, rummaged in the fridge for a bottle of wine. The first one was vinegary, so we found a bottle of our favorite wine: Moscato D’asti…so what if it’s supposed to be a dessert wine? We both love it.
Moved the coffee table and spread out our “picnic” on the rug.
Find The Good Wifeepisodes that we DVR’d but had no time to watch. (Man, has it really been since February 8th??).
Then we had to both get our stuff ready for work, so we called a brief time out to see to that and to get our daughter settled (whom her friend’s parents were nice enough to bring home for us).
Oh, the “Boston Rob” thing? That’s just for laughs. The husband thing? He’s the real thing. 🙂
Okay, I borrowed this alliteration from the book Ask and It Is Given by Jerry and Esther Hicks. Spring is in the offing. In the spring, when a young man’s thoughts are lightly turning…women’s thoughts are turning too: to thoughts of Spring Cleaning.
I was reading an article in the March issue of Whole Living magazine entitled “Cleaning House” by Susanna Sonnenberg about decluttering. She says that it helps to ask three questions when you are wondering about keeping something:
Do I love it?
Do I need it?
Does it bring me peace and energy or uneasy trouble? (Italics added by me)
I found this very motivating. Maybe you will too. I decided that it doesn’ t have to be a major deconstructive (read: overwhelming, make me want to quit before I start) effort to declutter. Here’s my plan: starting now, as I handle every object throughout the course of my day, I will ask myself those (above) questions, and if the answer isn’t “YES!” to any of them, out it will go.
This is my plan. Since I am a midlifer, I can only hope that I remember it (reference the book: I Remember Nothing by Nora Ephron). 🙂
Now, my husband? He’s great at this. Me? Not so much. Hmmm…maybe that’s he has time for his thoughts to “lightly turn…” in the spring?? Ha!
Sauteed chicken cutlets, roasted fingerlings and baby carrots
Cooking from what’s on hand isn’t as hard as I thought it might be.
This time, I had the presence of mind to raid the freezer the night before, so that the meat would have time to thaw before I was going to cook it.
Thawing in the microwave never goes well for me. I invariably wind up with partially cooked meat that ultimately turns out dry and tough. Note to self: It’s best avoid the microwave for thawing meats when at all possible.
In the pantry I found a half a bag of fingerling potatoes and some onions. In the fridge, I found some baby carrots that were no longer appealing to eat raw, but there was still some hope for them…I decided that roasting the veggies was the best way to go.
For the chicken…I came across a recipe years (and I mean years) ago in Pam Anderson’s book: How to Cook Without a Book (Check out Pam’s blog by the way, Three Many Cooks) for cooking cutlets (pork, chicken, whatever) and making a quick pan sauce to go with them that I’ve used over and over and over (the recipe, not the pan sauce)…definitely worth the price of the book just for that recipe.
Find Pam’s technique for cooking the cutlets without a recipe here.
To roast the (tired) vegetables, just put them on a cookie sheet, drizzle with olive or canola oil, and roast at 400 degrees for half an hour, then check them, stir them around on the pan, then put them back for another 20 or so minutes, depending on how dark you like them. When done, sprinkle with sea salt and give them a few grinds of black pepper.
When I use the term “lying“, I’m not referring to “a song by an Australian band”, or “a 2006 film”, or even “a horizontal position” kinds of lying. Nope; I’m talking about the good ol’ fashioned kind of lying: when someone tells you “a deliberate untruth”.
Recently this happened to me. I sort of pushed the envelope. I asked questions to which I was receiving vague answers and had actually just decided to drop the line of questioning altogether when the universe intervened.
Well, the universe by way of a table of bystanders (sitstanders?) who may or may not have overheard the conversation, the particulars of which I won’t publish here One of them made a statement to the person that I was talking with and she was forced to acknowledge it, thereby giving away that what she had been telling me was not true. A big, fat lie. She could not have been and not have been some place at the same time. Turned out, she was there. After she told me that she was not there.
So. She didn’t comment at all after answering the bystander, thereby contradicting what she had told me just a few minutes prior. What should I do about this?
I ultimately decided not to do anything. Why should I, now that we both know that she was not telling me the truth? I have been giving some important information about her character (and perhaps our friendship) that I did not have before. I guess that’s enough.
Interestingly, she was not the only person in this particular week that I realized was lying to me. Right to me face. When asked a direct question. Unbelievable, right?
For now, I think that I’ll keep that in the back of my mind.
Moral: I guess there’s a lot of lying going around…so be careful out there!
So, it’s cold and dark outside most of the time now, with the (nearly daily) threat of snow looming large, and it can be hard to find your happy place.
You may not even notice that you’ve lost it at first. Maybe a family member (read: husband) or a friend says, “Hey, what’s up? You don’t seem like yourself lately,” and you say, “Nothing’s up. I’m fine,” followed by the standard, “I’m just tired.”
Then you get to thinkin’…well, work isn’t what it used to be, and I really have been feeling tired lately…and that annoying bill that came in the mail and they overcharged me and I have to call about that…there’s a half hour of the day gone, just to get through the phone tree and get a human on the phone! And don’t even get me started on the laundry! OMG! Miss one day and what happens? You’re inundated!
But then something really nice happens: your husband comes home with flowers unexpectedly (for you!). Your child gets a 106 on her test. Your son gets promoted at work. And you remember…”Life (really!) is good”…
So, it’s that time of year again; when the anniversary of the day a relative died rolls around and you try to remember without being too sad.
This is my mother. At the time this picture was taken, she was a sister, a daughter. At the time this picture was taken, she was not yet a wife, a mother.
She was graduating from high school then, and her life was ahead of her. Too soon, it was over.
My husband took me for a ride a few days after she died with no particular destination in mind. We ended up at a local market with an attached greenhouse. As I walked around the store clutching my Kleenex, I was drawn to some colorful plants that my husband told me were primroses. For a moment, I actually felt happy looking at the little faces of the flowers, so on impulse I purchased one. I took it home and placed it on the little shelf above my kitchen sink.
Every time I looked at it, I remembered my mother’s death with a pang that was then tempered with a little bit of calm. In the spring, my husband planted it in the back yard.
Each year that followed, I brought home another little primrose plant and in the spring we planted it outside. Over time, all of these plants thrived and soon, without specifically intending to do so, I’d created an entire garden of primroses, which became sort of a tribute to my mother. I was very sad to leave it behind when we moved.
This year when I was browsing at Trader Joe’s I spotted some primroses which (of course) immediately evoked thoughts of my mother, so I bought one. This spring I intend to plant it in my kitchen herb garden to revive my mother’s tribute garden from years past.
I chose yellow for the first plant because when I was growing up, she bought me an outfit that I refused to wear: yellow pants and a yellow shirt. “Who wears that color pants?” I complained. She ended up returning the outfit which I wouldn’t have been caught dead wearing. Years later though, I recall this incident and wonder, “Why couldn’t I just wear it? Give her what she wanted?”
It’s ironic that yellow is now my favorite color.
Also, “You Are My Sunshine” was a song she loved and sang to us frequently when we were kids.
She died on leap day, February 29. We joked afterward that she chose that day purposely, so we would only have to feel sad about the day she died once every years. She was nice like that. 🙂
The Kennebunk 2011 Winterfest was yesterday in (you guessed it) Kennebunk, Maine. It was great that it wasn’t February 25th, since we got (yet another unwelcome) snowstorm. It was fun, but would have been more so if it had been about 10 degrees warmer (I’m just sayin’).
It kicked off with a pancake breakfast at Duffy’s for $5.99 per person (the money went towards supporting the Winterfest event) which included a drink and 2 enormous pancakes. I didn’t photograph them because they weren’t anything special…they were too big, too thick, too pale, too insubstantial…a disappointment really. When we were leaving I saw some smaller, thinner, better browned pancakes coming out of the kitchen, but it was too late for us. I mentioned to the server that maybe the kid portions should have been one pancake if they were going to make them that ginormous; maybe they listened? It was also a little bit disconcerting that the food arrived so quickly. In one case, I saw people’s pancakes arrive after they had barely sat down and they hadn’t even gotten their drinks. I also felt like they were rushing to get us out, but wasn’t sure why.
Next year, I will go to Perfecto’s Caffe on Main Street in Kennebunk for breakfast instead.
Then next stop was the Kennebunk Town Hall where a craft show was held from 9am-2pm. There was a big crowd here (even Elvis made an appearance!) Dory’s Dogs was there making Nutella and Banana Crepes to die for. I took a bite and died right there. They were amazing. I couldn’t get a picture because my hands were covered with Nutella…I wasn’t worthy.
The kids had the option of making some glass bead projects, but those were not cheap. The key rings were the least expensive project at $3, then there were earrings, bracelets, and other projects, some costing as much as $15. The two women running the craft were awesome: funny, patient, helpful. The kids loved it.
Next: the scavenger hunt. They were given “clue bags” and had to go around to area businesses to get the different parts of the snowman and then assemble it at the end to get the chance to win a DQ or a toy store gift certificate (we’re still waiting for the call that we won…). This is where it would have been very helpful if it was a) warmer…it was in the low 20’s) and b) did not span the construction zone at the bridge or c) include the Mail It Unlimited Store that was way out of the way from the general location of all of the other participating stores. There was a shuttle, but there were supposed to be two (if found out later that one broke down). The one that was running was never at a stop when we needed it, and it was so cold that it was better to keep moving.
After some compromising (that involved driving to the last two stops that were past the construction area) we finished the hunt and headed for the Soup Contest. This was awesome. You paid your $3 and then sampled coups from 18 different pots and then voted for your favorite. It was tough; some of them were excellent, but some were decidedly not. After telling them that they should have had separate categories for cream soups and broth soups, I picked the Farmer’s Chicken Soup to win, and Izzy picked the Hot Sour Soup to win. My runner-up was the Roasted Chestnut with Sage and Creme Fraiche. This year, they didn’t disclose which local business made which soups (as they had done last year) so we were voting blind.
Overall, it was a great day: good food (except for the pancakes), good exercise to work it off, good fun with tweens.
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